essay on sweet smell of a petrichor
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Explanation:
Petrichor (/ˈpɛtrɪkɔːr/) is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. The word is constructed from Greek petra (πέτρα), "rock", or petros (πέτρος), "stone", and īchōr (ἰχώρ), the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology.But moments before a rain event, an “earthy” smell known as petrichor does permeate the air. People call it musky, fresh – generally pleasant. This smell actually comes from the moistening of the ground. ... A byproduct of their activity is an organic compound called geosmin which contributes to the petrichor scent.
A week ago in Chennai, we had an unseasonal storm of rain. We’d been flying, doors off, searching for the matriarch that we’d not seen for a while. As the cloud thickened and lowered, and dark skeins of rain descended to hide Musinga Hill, we headed back towards the airstrip, lest we get rained out. We landed with minutes to spare. We’d just got the camera off and doors on before the first violent gust arrived that whipped the rudder over, and set the plane rocking on it’s under-carriage. Neither of us cared that the search had been cut short though, because with the wind came the smell of rain – the sweet smell of petrichor.
Everyone has their own favourite smell – it might be that of new-cut grass, the bruised leaves of lemon verbena, freesia flowers or linseed oil.
For anyone that has lived in rural Africa, the smell of petrichor is likely to be high on the list. I didn’t know the word existed until a year or two ago, when it was mentioned by a geologist friend. For such an evocative smell, the word has a hard, scientific edge to it – as if wrought from decades of lab work, academic etymology and too little time spent outside, with a smile tilted up to the rain.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the term was coined by two Indian scientists from the greek words petrus (rock) and ichor (the fluid flowing through the veins of the gods). I might not like the word, but I do like what it describes: rain soaking into the soil, freeing botanical molecules that have been trapped by clay and rock – volatile essential oils that rise to the surface and are carried on the wind that rolls out across the ground from thunderstorms. It is why we couldn’t smell it from the air – petrichor is for earthlings.
For me, the smell conjures up images of vast Serengeti landscapes, where wind-lashed grass heads are topped by churning skies. I like to think of cold petrichor-laden air sinking into termite mounds, and waking winged alates. It rarely disappoints. Elephants turn their trunks towards the source minutes before the cold wind arrives – that stirs and then bends their ragged ears. Impala and gazelle hunch, backs to wind. Ostrich crouch low to the ground. Out on an exposed branch a grey tree frog shifts its position almost imperceptibly – the first move it has made in months. Then the first fat drops fall, and spatter on the backs of Tsavo elephants. Rivulets flood their wrinkled skin, before pooling, ochre at their feet – leaving them fresh transformed, grey once again.