I don’t know about you, but when I get sick, especially with any kind of respiratory illness, my olfactory sensitivity skyrockets!
Just yesterday, stricken by the flu/cold epidemic making the rounds at my glorious school (sic), I boarded the bus and sat on one of the many seats. As soon as I sat down, I felt like Jean-Baptiste Grenouille in Perfume.
First, this slightly obese lady waddled on. Oh sure, the fat person smell, you say. No, this was something fruitier, perhaps the stink of the rolls of cheesy flesh packed together. Then come a guy with a strange cologne, one that was fruity, perhaps grapes and mangoes mixed together in a macedoine of garish odours. He was followed by the guy who works in the Koya restaurant, and predictably, he smelt like the cooking from that restaurant, but underneath, I smelt a patina of hair oil.
He was followed by an attractive young couple. The girl smelt nice, of oleander and evergreen promises. He smelt nothing like her, which wasn’t odd considering the Old Spice lathered all over his person. They made up the token decent smelling couple at the front of the bus. Right behind them was the dreaded sweaty athlete. Fresh off the tracks, sweat stains and all, reveling in the sheer endorphin high of his recent exercises, this guy stood proudly at the front, puffing out noxious clouds of sweat-laden carbon dioxide. As for me, I could smell it all, the glorious rush of hormones, the lactic acid creeping up the calf muscles, the brain slowly coming down from the high, the inevitable inching death in the recently exercised muscles. But, I digress.
Next came the lady with the baby carriage. The terrible reek of the baby assailed my nostrils at the same time as its woeful cries filled the bus. All the seats were full by now and there was nowhere to move to. I cringed as the mother pushed the baby right up to me and sat down, beaming with maternal pride. I could smell the buried lust for compliments oozing out of every pore. Ignoring her with all my might, I focused on the new smell from behind me. Here was a hungry student, perhaps someone who woke up late and grabbed a snack. The meal had carrots in it, and some sort of Asian gravy, along with potatoes. It was good and took my mind off the wretched baby in front of me.
Finally, the old man got on. He had been waiting for everyone else to get on and he smelt like any old man should. Pre-war clothes with the smell of the Blitz fresh on them, socks that were darned by his Victorian great aunt in the days of Rothschild, and a hat that would make Charlemagne look young. He got on the bus and came right at the baby. Surprisingly enough, the old codger wasn’t cantankerous. Instead, he billed and cooed over the baby, while the mother fussed like a mother hen over her hideous spawn.
The bus started moving, a draught of cold February air through the windows dissipated the odours and we were off.
