An RI (Raffles Institution) classmate Jong Long and I had gone out on some class errand in downtown Singapore, so he parked his car at the school as it (the old RI site on Bras Basah Road) was nearby.
We returned to his car after dark (it gets dark in Singapore around 6:30pm). Jong Long got into what he thought was his car, and then said, “This is not my car. It smells different.” (Don’t know how he managed to get in.)
That was in 1971. Fast forward to 1997. A then-student invited me along on her walk through the Yorkshire Dales with two friends of hers. At one of the places, we asked the B&B [Bed & Breakfast] man to drive us into, and back from, the village for our pub dinner and drinks. When we followed him to his car at closing time (he had to come into the pub to let us know he'd arrived), he somehow managed to unlock a car that looked like his, then realised it wasn’t his car as it had a different smell.
(Singapore, 1971; Yorkshire, UK, 1997)
They say smell is the most primitive amongst the senses...what will this mean for people with a heightened olfactory system..?
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DeleteI can understand it as being the most primitive sense -- animals are a good example, sniffing out outsiders. I always let a cat or dog smell my hand at first acquaintance, rather than approach them full-bodied, for them to decide if they like me or not.
DeleteA heightened olfactory system: I lost my sense of smell and taste after a bad cold in Zürich in Nov 1987 (going there straight from Peru, so the change of seasons / hemispheres must've been a factor). It lasted 3 months, everything tasted like saw dust -- would've been a good time to lose weight! I then read that zinc helps restore smell/taste, so I took some -- and regretted it. I could smell everything on my Tube journeys in to work: body odour, unclean clothes / hair / breath, everything. So, I feel sorry for those with a heightened sense of smell...