By David Segal
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 17, 2006
NEW YORK
We are getting closer.
"Over here," says Laurice Rahme, a perfume maker with an elegant French accent. "Stand right here. It's incredible."
We inhale together, then nod in unison. A hell-borne stench wafts over the corner of Baxter and Canal streets, a hectic intersection in Chinatown.
There is a fish market nearby with an assortment of scallops and lobsters cooling on ice, but those odors have been overwhelmed by something else, something vile and pitiless. Hints of rotten mustard, a soupcon of ammonia, undertones of armpit. The scent evolves in your nostrils like an argument that escalates -- it starts off testy, then insults your mother.
"I think it's the kitchen," Rahme says, walking down the street and toward the rear of a restaurant called Sun Say Kai. Embedded in the sidewalk is a trapdoor leading to the basement, where men are sweating and cooking. They gaze up, startled.
Rahme takes some tentative whiffs. "Old fried oil, heated and reheated," she guesses. "And organs, like the kidneys and liver."
Jackpot!
We are on the hunt for stupefying aromas -- a stink safari, if you will -- and this is exactly the sort of gruesome emanation we knew we'd find. For every passion of the senses there is a nirvana: Wine lovers have the vineyards of Bordeaux, fans of John Singer Sargent have the Tate Museum in London. For connoisseurs of the rank, New York in the summer is a destination without peer, a wonderland of the noxious.
It smells so bad that we've brought along two olfactory experts for this tour. Along with Rahme, the parfumeur , there is Andrew Macchio, a retired veteran of the New York City Sanitation Department. He speaks with a robust Bronx accent, and when he isn't speaking, he sings. His specialty is '40s and '50s standards, and his signature tune, he says proudly, is "Mack the Knife." At social gatherings, when friends goad him into singing -- one imagines it wouldn't take much goading -- he saves that number for last.
"I make 'em wait," he says. "They yell for it and I make 'em wait."
Macchio was a few paces behind Rahme on the Chinatown sidewalk, but he has caught up and is eager to investigate. He bends at the waist and peers into the subterranean kitchen. Then he stands up and shrugs a little.
"You're going to laugh at me," he says after a moment, "but I don't think it's that bad."
Rahme tries to look unruffled. It's about 1 o'clock now and Macchio has already mentioned a few times that he's ready for lunch.
"This," he says, gesturing toward the chefs, "is actually enhancing my appetite."
* * *
By consensus, New York smells far better than it did, say, a decade or two ago. But it is never exactly pine-fresh, and it still is a city without alleys, which means garbage piles up on the sidewalks, about 50,000 tons of it every day. The summer adds a sickening finish to the redolence, whisking in suggestions of butter and bile.
Maybe "suggestions" is the wrong word. These are more like ransom notes.
From June to August, New Yorkers trade tales of horror-show fetor like fishermen who've returned from the sea. To live here during those months is to sidestep mysterious heaps and oleaginous puddles -- downtown gravy, if you will. Subway stations are miasmic. A nauseating surprise lurks around just about every fetid corner.
But some corners stink far worse than others, and our team one recent morning has identified five of them. We plot our itinerary at Bond No. 9, the flagship store of Rahme's perfume line, which she launched in 2003. Bond No. 9 sells 26 scents, each named after a neighborhood of New York: Eau de Noho, Madison Soiree, New Harlem, Gramercy Park and so on. The goal, obviously, is to bottle the spirit of the place, not the actual fumes.
"We capture the soul," Lahme says.
This, of course, makes Lahme the ideal guide today, because anyone who can cork the essence of a street can surely describe its funk. Plus, she has a cool limo, which will be our reconnaissance vehicle. It's a vintage British cab, painted white and festooned with the Bond No. 9 logo. Our chauffeur, Gerard, appears to have been ordered out of a chauffeur catalogue. He has a handlebar mustache and wears a captain's hat.
"The meatpacking district, Gerard," Lahme trills from the back seat.
There are five of us, not including the driver: a photographer and Lahme's assistant Claire have come along. Lahme gives a quick version of her career, which began with her selling furniture in Paris and segued into a stint with a niche perfume maker based in France. Macchio is silent for a minute, which requires an effort that is almost visible.
"Since I'm retired, I'm into scented candles," he announces. "They're fairly expensive, and yet they're disappointing."
Lahme is describing how the attacks of 9/11 befouled the air of downtown Manhattan, inspiring her "whiff of the city" idea.
"Unless you were in New York then," Lahme says, "it's hard to describe the smell."
"I recently bought two bunches of eucalyptus branches for my car," Macchio goes on. "I says, 'Perfect under the seat,' but I never put it under the seat; I put it on the front seat, passenger side, but it's drying, the leaves are flaking off, but I haven't had time to clean it because you've got to see my apartment. Every room is having something done to it."
We arrive in the meatpacking district, which has been colonized by trendy nightspots and restaurants. In the morning, though, the few remaining packing plants have the run of the place.
"People ask me why we don't do a perfume for this neighborhood," says Lahme, as we get out of the cab. "It's because we don't want to capture this."
"This" is a lungful of what feels like a toxic cloud of spoiled pork. It's nearly 90 degrees already, and as a couple of warehouse workers toil near huge tubs of meat, which have been placed on the sidewalk, we walk around looking for the most fragrant spot. It's right next to the cab.
Lahme breathes in. "It's fat. It's fat that gets old."
"Rancidity. Is that a word?" Macchio asks. Not for the last time today, he seems unmoved. "It's bad, but there's a lot worse than this. If I might mention maggots."
Back in the car, we head uptown to the southeast corner of Central Park, across the street from the Plaza Hotel. A dozen or so horse-and-carriage drivers wait here for fares every day. Still, this smell is a bit more intense than anything you'd find at a stable.
"Every smell has notes, just like music," says Rahme as we walk past the line of horses. "It can be loud or it can be discreet, it can be showy or subdued. You can put any notes in there that you like."
Lahme clearly isn't accustomed to describing melodies this unpleasant. She seems a little stumped.
Macchio needs little prompting. "It's woodsy," he says. "I'd put it on the level of a skunk smell -- which, you know something, I don't actually think is that bad unless you're right in it."
We drive a few blocks east to the 59th Street subway station at Lexington Avenue. Even when it's cool outside, the No. 4 train's platform, which is many flights below ground, will induce a grimace. The heat turns the place into an ordeal, and when it's sizzling, well, it's as if a new line of nauseating weapons is being secretly tested here by the military.
As we descend the lengthy second flight of steps to the 4, Lahme begins to sweat, then she stops.
"I'm getting claustrophobic," she gasps. She turns around and flees the station.
Macchio soldiers on and stands on the platform for half a minute. "Truly mildewy," he decides.
Truly mildewy? Look, an old pantry is "truly mildewy." This is like honeyed rot marinated in hummus, as odious as a wet kiss from a wino.
"Worn rubber, old shoes, people?" speculates one woman waiting for the train.
A woman in a business outfit brushes off the question. "This isn't one of the worst stations," she says. "Go to Spring Street. It's like someone dropped a bag of fish there, every day."
Back in the cab, Macchio is being quizzed about his years on the garbage truck. He says he crooned on the job from day one, to keep his mind off the trash. He sang loud and long enough to become a minor celebrity in the sanitation world, showing up in newspapers and on local TV. Now he sings at restaurants. Not that he's hired to sing at restaurants. He just does it when friends ask, which he claims is often.
As he talks, we are rumbling through the Lower East Side in search of Ridge Street. There is reportedly a live chicken store there, where Ridge meets Delancey Street, and a number of blogs about life in New York have cited the place for its killer bouquet. After some wrong turns, we arrive.
"Oh, my God," says Lahme, as she tiptoes toward the open front door of the place. "That is horrible."
It sure is! Vivero, as it says on the side of the building, is a shop piled high with chickens, and when you get near them, the smell is an unholy confection of fecal matter and offal. If migraines had an odor, they would smell like this. The temperature is now past 90, and the stink here forms an almost physical boundary, like a force field. Claire, Lahme's assistant, retreats into the cab.
Lahme stands her ground, but looks shaken. "I have to take it a little bit at a time," she says, backing up a few feet.
A security guard in a blue shirt sees us, walks over and looks confused. Four people from a British cab are sniffing and shaking their heads in wonder. He shoos away the photographer, who is trying to shoot a wall of chickens.
Macchio has been smoking a cigarette and mulling. Now he walks a few feet past the guard toward the chickens. He returns in less than five seconds, looking stunned.
"That is one of the worst smells I have ever encountered," he says, awe in his voice.
The highest praise, like four stars for a restaurant. Hats off, Vivero. We climb back into the cab, slightly sickened and a little giddy.
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