Canada: Sensorium, Scent

"Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived." ~ Helen Keller

The sense of smell has been critical to the survival of human beings. Early in our evolution, when we were on all fours, our smell sense was vital to our survival. As we became upright, olfaction was no longer the dominant system. We still depended on it for locating our food, mating, and hunting however the other sense systems began to play a much larger role.

Some interesting smell facts:
* The sense of smell is 10,000 times stronger than any other sense. * Every person experiences the same exact odor differently. * We have a keener sense of smell later in our day. * Woman have a more acute sense of smell than men. * Olfactory nerves can renew themselves. * Each of us has an individual odor thumb print. * The right hemisphere of the brain is responsible for odor recognition. * Smells fall into the following catagories:
minty, floral, ethereal, musky, resinous, foul and acrid.

Smell Idioms:
To win by a nose. The sweet smell of success. I smell a rat. Everything is coming up roses. Smelling like a rose. Nosy. The nose knows. Something smells fishy.
Wake up and smell the coffee!

The word for smell in Spanish and French is "sentir" which means to feel / to smell.

When I heard we were going to Vancouver the first thing I did was to e-mail fellow botanical / natural perfumer Ayala Moriel. Ayala and I have known each other and participated in a few perfume groups and exchanges, but we had never had the opportunity to meet in person. Having arrived in Vancouver late in the afternoon, Greg suggested we go on a walk. As we toured the city by foot he mentioned that the following morning we would be shown an apartment as a potential live space during his stint at Rainmaker Studios. When he told me the address, I looked at him in disbelief. It was the same building that Ayala lived! What synchonisity.
My first visit with Ayala was fun, insightful and inspiring. Like illustrators, niche perfumers spend much time in solitude, cloistered in their ol'factories. It is a delight to meet
other artists working in the same medium, and a double treat when given the opportunity to see how they work. The arena of Natural/Botanical perfume often resembles Gladiatorial contests of ancient Rome. Ayala and I choose not to be part of the adversarial games and see the benefits of an inclusive perfume community.
Upon my arrival I was treated to a custom blended tea made specifically for her perfume Tizrah, meaning linden in Hebrew. In addition to the delicious tea she brought out fresh dates and Ethiopian tahini, as well as chocolate truffles. What an unforgettable and wonderous combination of flavors. I was enchanted with the fresh date and tahini pairing.
Ayala took me up to the studio and introduced me to her consultation process which was followed by experiencing her perfumes and witnessing a bit of her working methodology. She is very warm and willing to share glimpses into her scented realm, including some fragrances still in progress, soon to be released. My favorite of the perfumes I experienced and have samples of include Tamya: a cheerful floral, Caberet: a warm, rosy fragrance and Espionage: a deep, leathery perfume which dries down with a lovely soft and sweet powder note.
Ayala has just debuted her new, very expansive and informative website where you can read more about her and get samples. Additionally you can view a feature of her on CBC TV creating a custom perfume.

The Sense of Smell Institute
Smell Idioms
Ayala Moriel
Ayalas blog

Canada: Sensorium, Taste

There are almost 10,000 taste buds located in our mouths, which can distinguish five different types of flavors: sweet, salty, sour, bitter and unami. We are all familiar with the tastes of sweet, salty, sour and bitter, but, what is unami? Unami receptors pick up the taste of glutanic acid salts such as MSG.
The sense of taste is the weakest of all our senses and depends in part on the sense of smell. Evident by when we have a cold, and can't taste our food.
We were quite well nourished during our stay in British Columbia. Close to the hotel we had a lovely farmers market on Saturday mornings. The market had all sort of delights which we would bring back to the kitchen in our hotel room and create feasts with. The three of us are still yearning for those yummy welsh cakes we picked up one morning. There was even an accordion player at the market who played a lovely Argentine tango for me. It was great to see plenty of Organic Certified produce as well as many farmers using the biodynamic method of growing and tending the earth.
The Public Market at Granville Island was another wonderous place to buy groceries, although we only found one Organic vendor. There were stalls with pasta, bread, pastries galore, fudge, and flowers...all FRESH. We also purchased Canadian maple products and some treacle for Eve.
Besides cooking regular meals we ate out quite a bit, meeting with many of the other production artists from Rainmaker after their arduous workday.
Vancouver has some splendid eateries, with lots of variety and interesting fusion restaurants. Finding places that did not include MSG in their food preparation was an interesting challenge I was not prepared for. One of our regular favorites was Earls, it reminds me a bit of Jerry's on Prince Street in NYC. Other favorites were; the Sandbar in Granville Island, The Pacific School of Culinary Arts where the students are both your server and cook, Azia for asian fusion and really delicious roti, Arbutus Market Neighborhood Coffeehouse was a regular when we were
in Kistalano for lunch and craved their panini sandwiches, Baru was fun, although super slow,
Rebar Modern Food in Victoria had the most amazing veggie burgers on the planet, Moxies was very good, similar to Earls in it's classic grill quality,

Eve and I liked to get homemade gelato after taking the ferry over to Granville Island, YUM!

Biodynamic Farming
Demeter-USA
Demeter International
Earls
Sandbar Seafood Restaurant
The Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts
Azia
Arbutus Neighborhood Coffeehouse
Baru
Rebar
Moxies
Capers Market
Granville Island directory
GI Gelato & Coffee House
604-682-7865

Canada: Sensorium, Sight

In the northern realms of America the sense we tend to rely on the most is our sense of sight. Of all the senses in our collective cultural sensorium "vision" is used to assess and determine situations. Looking back in history it was the modern printing press, introduced in 1440 by the German Johann Gutenberg that began our shift into the "seeing is believing" paradigm. Over the next hundred years it was aided by several modern inventions, primarily the microscope.
Micro in latin meaning "small" and scope "to see". Philosophical ideas of the new era combined with the shift to a strong patriarchal system. All these factors working together in the shift to a culture primarily based on the sense of sight.

British Columbia is rich with beautiful imagery, specific to Nature. Vancouver dwellers are fortunate to have a thousand acre evergreen oasis within the city. What makes Stanley Park so different from other mega cities with parks is that this one is an evergreen forest with the water around the majority of it, giving it the feel of an island.
Across the Burrard Inlet in North Vancouver is fabulous lush forest, specifically the Capilano River Regional Park, Grouse Mountain and Capilano River. We visited the extremely tourist thick Capilano Suspension Bridge where the gem of the park is the Tree Adventure just on the other side of the gorge. Just before I crossed the wobbly 450 foot span I witnessed the trees on the other side. A magnificent, untouched span of towering trees stood beckoning to me, singing to my heart. My eyes filled with tears as I gasped at the beauty and majesty. The dense old growth forest is filled with Western hemlock, ancient Douglas-fir, Western red cedar and Sitka spruce. We learned that the tree most revered by the First Nations People of the area has been the cedar, in fact their storypoles are made from these silent giants, also referred to as "arbor vitae' translated to tree of life. Along our eco tour we learned that this area is part of the Temperate Rain Forest that is spattered along the western Pacific Rim as well as a few other areas around the world. This rare biome has seasonal variation with rainfall in the range of 60 to 200 inches per year. The moist air from the Pacific Ocean creates ideal growing conditions for the tall ancients inhabiting the area. The Coast Redwoods also grow in this biome but are not as prolific as the four previous mentioned trees and are not found in Canada. Our informative guide explained the eco-system of this biome including the dynamics of the food chain. The birds and bears of the forest consume the trout and salmon from the lakes depositing the bones of the fish onto the forest floor as fertilizer. Deeply inspired by the day, I drew a storypole my sketchbook illustrating this lovely circle of life.
The other major feast for the eyes came when we took the BC Ferry over to Vancouver Island. A coastal naturalist on board educated us about the local folklore and environment of the area. We saw quite of few bald eagles perched on the tops of trees. Unfortunately the day was very cold and gloomy, however, the clean ocean air and island views were enlivening. As I heard the guide speak about Salt Spring I remembered a friend had mentioned to us to go there. Thus, when we arrived at Victoria we hopped onto another ferry to the emerald realm of Salt Spring, one of over a dozen of the Gulf Islands. Later I was to learn that the artist Nick Bantouk has a studio here. Enchanted by the peace and rugged beauty of the isle, I vowed to return soon. It reminded me of the vital lush quality of Hawaii, the peaceful hippy atmosphere of Topanga and my summer days spent on Catalina Island. Returning to Victoria I was immensely disappointed by the amount of people and the disneyland-esque quality of the city. The following day we visited a storyboard artist Greg was working with at Rainmaker. Ken is very warm and friendly with a fabulous house surrounded by a grove of Canadian Oaks and filled with amazing artwork and artifacts. He designed the glass window in the front door of his 1950's ranch style house. From their we choose to over to Cathedral Grove, we choose the old growth forest over the Butchart Gardens. The power and vitality of eight hundred year old native trees is so far superior to experiencing a crowded, non authentic manicured garden scape. Cathedral Grove is located in the MacMillan Provincial Park appropriately named for the awe inspiring height of the trees and the quiet sacred quality of the environment. Woefully some of the park area is threatened by the construction of a cement parking lot. We would have liked to continue on our adventure to the tide pools of Botanical Beach and Hot Springs Cove, but had to catch our ferry back to the mainland.
Back in Vancouver more visual treats presented themselves at Granville Market, an urban oasis of artist studios, charming shops and a public market. Eve and I took the water ferry often to this magical place where we would walk for hours taking in the sights. A few minutes away in Kitsalano is Rainmaker Studios where Greg worked daily creating visual development with a team of other artists. The creativity and level of draftsmanship among the group is wondrous. We saw the film "Stardust" based on the graphic novel by the same name written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles Vess. The film is delightful with great performances and does justice to the written word and illustrated story that we LOVE.

Our enchanted visual story of British Columbia ends here with a few links:
Capilano Suspension Bridge
Grouse Mountain
Vancouver Island
Salt Spring Island
Nick Bantouk
Granville Island
Neil Gaiman
Charles Vess
Stardust the Movie

Canada: Sensorium

The next few posts will delve into my sensorial experiences in British Colmbia over the last few weeks. This tour will take place through the five senses.

Canada Intro

I've just returned home from a very nurturing, fun, educational and exciting adventure in the British Columbia area of Canada. I feel restored with much to share after such a beauty filled journey.
The trip was a semi-vacation, due to Greg working on a CG (computer generated) animated film at Rainmaker Studios. My daughter, Eve, and I flew up to take in the sights and spend time with Greg while he was in Vancouver. I looked forward to new adventures to feed my inner artist while spending time with both Eve and Greg and getting away from home.
My one strong intention was to connect with a fellow, niche perfumer I have known for several years but never met in person. There is nothing like connecting, one on one, with another artist working in the same medium. This was my chance! Stay tuned as I share the full sensorium from the trip in the next series of blog entries.

Canada

Greetings from Vancouver, Canada, a city of tall, glass towers mimicked by tall green trees. It is quite a beautiful, metropolitan city along the North rim of the Pacific Ocean with dense wilderness. My first impression, looking down from the tiny window on the airplane, was GREEN. Quite a contrast to the Santa Monica Mountains which this time of year are a deep shade of ocher. I've concluded that this area is made up primarily of water+earth elementals, where as the Santa Monica Mountains are more fire+earth.

My first visit to this area was during art school. My grandma Ani, Mom, brother Luis and I all flew up to San Francisco, rented a car and then drove up the Pacific Coast. The most vivid memory from that trip is the striking, turquoise color of the water at Lake Louise and the trees of Jasper Forest. The picture, just above, is of my grandma and mom at Lake Louise.

The sensorium (how we experience or perceive the world through our senses) of Vancouver is very much like other mega-cities I have visited. Freshest in the archive of my mind it reminds me of Buenos Aires and New York. There is a definite modern European flavor and, although I've never been, it makes me think of Asian port cities such as Hong Kong. During this trip I have become keenly aware that the memory impressions of places are strongly made up of smell, influenced by both sight (the incredible view from our hotel) and sound (the constant drone of the city). The aroma of the underground parking garage mingled with the scent of frying immediately places me at my grandparents apartment on Libertador in Buenos Aires. Almost as if a parallel universe has opened up and transported me to family lunches, with homemade pastas, fresh farm cheese and dulce de leche from the ranch.