4.75" 
Amber, Sandalwood & Myrrh Fragrance Oils & Punk
THE NETHERLANDS AND INDIA

I remember that day at the beach quite well, as no one was swimming. We were on the east coast of India, quite far south, and I had been told time and time again the sea was a dangerous place. But still, due to the heat, I would have loved to have swum in that water. Alas, that place specifically was not a welcoming zone. Instead, I settled for a smell. A series of smells coming from the incense truck parked by the entrance to the beach. You could see the heat rising off the sand, and you could smell the most unusual odor in the air. The sticks were burning, and people pushed in, swarming his cart. I don't know why they chose him. He was just one of many, but the scent, it has never left me. Many years later, while biking in Amsterdam, I smelled that scent again. It was sudden, but it was there, and I was on that beach. I went to the source and inquired. It was incense and it was many burning. It was made in India, in fact, and from the same coast I had been on. I was again in that moment on the beach, with that man, and that cart, and the heat rising off the sand. For a moment, those smokey lines in Amsterdam were the same as those heat waves in India. Produced under fair-trade principles since 1977, with sustainability at the forefront, and made with "by hand" principles (which means every stick is hand-rolled, every paper is hand-marbled, every text is hand-screened). Thus a lot more people are employed by, and benefit from, the production; more than 200 women, to be exact.