Madurai and Jasmine in fragrances
I'm writing this as someone originally from around Madurai moving to the US.
I got on my flight from Madurai with a bottle of "Lost in Madurai" from House of Kanzan, thinking I could smell it when I miss home. Then I walk into the Jo Malone section in a duty-free store and see Jasmine Sambac & Marigold. I got curious and looked at the description, and surprisingly, it's from Tamil Nadu.
And then I was doom-scrolling r/fragranceswap, and there I see someone listing Madurai by Memo Paris. I looked it up, and apparently the perfumer Gaël Montero created the perfume thinking about his trip to South India and Madurai.
Later, I was browsing a niche perfume store online and I see a perfume called "Malli Nadu" (meaning Jasmine Land in Tamil) by Nissaba, and I look it up and, of course, it's based on Tamil Nadu and most of its ingredients are imported from there.
Then I went down a rabbit hole on the internet and saw that fragrance houses like Guerlain, Dior, Bvlgari, and even Lush buy jasmine absolute/extract from Madurai. That means J'Adore is probably Madurai malli? Why is Madurai and jasmine everywhere? I'm losing it.