MEDIUM RARE 

This, said the salesgirl, “is our bestseller, Christmas or after Christmas.”

She was showing me a small squat bottle containing a green liquid – green as an apple – without letting me smell its contents. The price tag was P320, the brand is Aficionado, a fragrance for men, which is just as well, because the CEO and president of the company believes that “Filipino men are conscious of their hygiene – they shower twice a day.”

As a lady from Scandinavia noted, “Your construction workers, if you will observe, take a shower after work, before they go home. Not because they’re vain, they just want to look clean, smell clean.”

No wonder, there are 400 kiosks selling what Joel S. Cruz – “S” as in scent – calls his “affordable men’s colognes.”

(What is it about the letter S and scents? I’m thinking of Victor Siasat, who heads the ScentSmith group of imported fragrances for men and women.)  

Joel could easily be nicknamed “Mr. Aficionado” even if he prefers his product to be nicknamed “Germany (not German) perfume.”

I met Joel at an afternoon party hosted by Imelda R. Marcos at the Goldenberg Mansion in the Malacañang compound. He wore multiple silver and gold chains and his hair was shoulder-length. I did not smell cologne on him. He had quite a story to tell, about his merchandise and his children, eight of them, including two sets of twins: “I am blessed.”

Born of a Russian mother, the kids are Filipino-Russian, technically. The eldest is 12 years old, and there are more daughters than sons. All eight kids were born in the Philippines: “It would cost me millions to pay for surrogacy in Russia.”

To make his colognes affordable, Joel imports the ingredients from Europe “by the barrel.” His office is in Sampaloc, Manila, but his plant and warehouse are in Bulacan. More than fragrances for men and women, Joel also sells air fresheners, scented candles, and the like, you get the drift.

If Joel has bothered to find out how long his colognes last on somebody’s wrists, throat, or behind the ears, he hasn’t shared the information. Generally, those areas of the body are supposed to be where to dab or spray the fragrance, for results that linger...