The great aromas of travel

by Steven Knipp

Journalist and world traveller Steven Knipp takes us on a sensory journey around the globe — remembering the delicious, evocative and dubious scents that forever recall his favourite destinations.

For me, some of my fondest travel memories are smells. Scientists say there is a durable association between smell and memory, but we don't yet understand why memories of individual smells linger so long—the actual receptor cells in our nose that first take in an aroma change every 60 days. Still, the human brain can recognise up to 10,000 distinct smells.

When I was a young boy, my parents would take me on day trips to New York City as a birthday treat. So, one of the first aromas I associated with travel was the compelling odor of gasoline (in this case, from city buses), an exotic aroma that didn’t exist in my hometown. The slightly sweet tang I inhaled in Manhattan was not bus exhaust, but actually a colorless liquid called benzene, used in gasoline. Today’s higher environmental standards have reduced benzene’s use as an additive, but you can still sometimes catch a whiff of the stuff at gas stations. Ah, the nostalgia!

On the way back from those early New York expeditions, my dad’s return route to New Jersey would take us home via the Holland Tunnel under the Hudson River. And the moment we emerged from the tunnel’s dimness we'd encounter the lovely scent of freshly-brewed coffee; it wafted over the entire town of Hoboken and, in the decades before Starbucks, was the town’s major claim to fame.

The reason for the wonderful scent: Hoboken was home to an enormous processing plant owned by the Maxwell House Coffee Company, a fact proclaimed by a huge rooftop sign: “Good to the Last Drop!”

Unfortunately, Maxwell eventually closed its Hoboken plant, and so both of my beloved boyhood olfactory memories—fresh brewed coffee and the beguiling bouquet of benzene—are literally gone with the wind.

But as I grew up and began traveling farther afield, my proboscis became progressively promiscuous and my olfactory cells collected new and more exotic smells. Florida, for example, smells as might be expected, like suntan lotion. But, if you are in the right place at the right time—early morning in central Florida—the wind is often infused with the pleasant scent of fresh orange juice.

Many Americans believe Ireland smells like a peat fire. But I’ve travelled widely across the island and have only inhaled an authentic peat fire a few times (this might well be because peat is becoming synonymous with greenhouse gas emissions). But when the Irish do decide to pack the occasional fireplace with dried bricks of the stuff—like they do at the 400-year-old Bushmills Distillery bar—the sweetly-fragranced air flowing up from the stone fireplace is indeed aromatically soothing.

Japan is, unquestionably, the cleanest county on the planet, meaning opportunities for new aromas are limited. But if you’re lucky enough to stay in a traditional ryokan, you will sleep on a tatami mat, a soft and densely woven floor padding made from reeds. If the tatami in your room is new, look closely. You’ll see a slight green tinge and it will smell exactly like freshly-cut grass. Bedding down for the night on a fresh tatami is an extraordinary experience: like falling asleep on a summer’s evening in a forest clearing.

For many travellers, our most fondly remembered aromas are associated with food. For me, nowhere is this more obvious than in Hong Kong. When I first moved here years ago, I loved strolling the back streets of bustling Kowloon at dinner time. As the sun set, the district’s legendary neon lights would flicker on. I would turn down side streets and find them virtually choked off with hundreds of hawkers, their ramshackle stalls piled with all manner of goods. On both sides of these narrow lanes, above the small shops, lived the bulk of Hong Kong’s population. And every few seconds I would hear the sudden “Zzzzzz!…” of hot oil sizzling in a wok. Straight off, my nostrils would fill with mouth-watering aromas of peanut oil, garlic, fresh ginger, pungent pepper corns and fragrant sesame oil.

While exotic aromas associated with food are mostly pleasant, that’s not always the case. Once while traveling to a remote Philippine island, I had the opportunity to dine on tropical fruit bat. As the name implies, fruit bats live on fresh fruit (mangoes and bananas being favourites) and are said to taste quite sweet. Often found on rural menus across the tropical world, these large flying mammals are often known as “Flying Foxes” because of their thick red fur.

So perhaps I shouldn’t have been too repelled when supper arrived to my bamboo table. Roasted in sweetened coconut milk, its furry aroma instantly recalled a very off-putting boyhood memory of… wet dog á la New Jersey.