Flower Fragrance, Memories and Their Emotions

The fragrance of Night Blooming Jasmine really 'takes me back' to Asia. Marcel Proust said smells bring back complete memories, including their emotional content, so we experience them as if we were re-living the event. I used to think Proust was exactly as satirized by Monty Python, self-consciously overly romantic and intellectual. I can never get through any of his books.


But the scent of Night Blooming Jasmine really brings back the nights my siblings and I sat on the balcony in Hong Kong, telling each other stories (and feeding the mozzies!).


I'm glad it's a tough plant that can take care of itself. For that same reason, I have cats for pets. They need food and water, but that's it. They never get out of shape so they don't need to be walked. They don't care what you think so you don't have to be attentive. And they're small enough that you can overpower them if you have to. :)


The neurologists now say that Proust was right about the close association of smells and memories because the smell sensors are right next to the primitive brain where emotional memories are stored, so we do associate smells with emotions.


Here in Western culture, consumer marketers think smells like cinnamon and pine are nostalgic. For us Asians, probably insense and hot garlic oil work better!

Night Blooming Jasmine is Blooming!

Whoopie! My sister sent me a 4 inch high, two twig Night Blooming Jasmine plant. It looked healthy but I babied it anyway. Re-potted it into lovely SuperSoil and added more perlite as well as vermiculite, added an earthworm. Dunno how well the worm likes living in a pot, but even if it dies, it'll still enrich the soil. Put a clear plastic bag upside-down over the plant that's held upright with a chopstick stuck into the side of the pot. The bottom of the bag is open for ventilation. I put the plant on a warm windowsill that gets only morning sun.

In a week, it bloomed! Really powerful fragrance coming out of the bottom of the plastic bag -- filled the whole kitchen! What a fragrance! Marcel Proust was right, the smell brought me right back to my childhood in the tropics of Asia with all those old emotions unchanged.

Now I've removed the bag and placed the whole plant in it so that the top is open to let more of the fragrance out, but the sides are right up to the top so the interior environment should still be very humid.

It really does only bloom at night. In the day time, the flowers are closed.