What Sounds & Smells Instantly Transport You Back to CH?

[Spoonbill]

For me, it's the smell of bonfires in autumn and the 'tchack' noise that jackdaws make. Also the smell of new football boots that leaps out of the shoebox the moment you take the lid off - and that very distinctive smell of cricket pads and wicket-keeper's gloves.

(I wouldn't nominate the smell of freshly-mown grass, because that smell reminds me of every school I was ever at.)

I also can't see a pied wagtail (even on TV) without being transported back to the Quad...though a pied wagtail is neither a sound nor a smell and therefore has no business on this thread.

And then there's the smell/taste of Shloer, which was always sold in the interval at the Arts Centre during posher-than-usual productions.

Anyone else want to add to the list?

[michael scuffil]

The Dining Hall. I have only ever had a similar whiff once since -- in a holiday flat somewhere. It was quite unique. It may have changed since the formica came. And the Tube in winter -- sweaty games clothes drying. And Pat Cullen's pipe.

[Ajarn Philip]

Have to include Spoonbill's rejected freshly-mown grass - it always makes me think of Big Side, even now. (Besides, I was only ever at 2 schools, and the first was in Sarf Lunden and didn't have any grass of its own).

The theatre, at least when new, had a distinctive odour that I could only describe if I smelt it again.

Sorry, but undoubtedly stale socks has to be on the list... and the changing rooms - I never knew mud could smell...

...and over-boiled vegetables.

The Art School.

But I'm off topic, as I'm talking mostly about smells I remember from CH, not about current smells that remind me of the place.

[J.R.]

Gun oil in the armoury.

[blondie95]

the history libaray smell-whenever i go in 2nd hand bookshops it transports me back that musty book smell

[kerrensimmonds]

Linseed oil (cricket bats). Dubbin (netballs). The white stuff for cleaning canvas shoes. Shoe polish. Bluebell polish. Sound of a large mower. 'Dee Dah!' - train horns. The distinctive sound of a Fr. Willis organ.

[MKM]

Jelly. I've never found anyone who agrees, but to me the Hertford chapel smelt of strawberrry jelly.

[AndrewH]

The theatre, at least when new, had a distinctive odour that I could only describe if I smelt it again.

I went into the theatre on last year's Old Blues Day, and the "distinctive odour" was exactly the same. Not sure that I can describe it. I guess that it must be one of the materials used to build the place for the smell to have persisted for more than 30 years!

[Vonny]

For me it's when I go into old buildings - that musty kind of smell - reminds me of Hertford & Horsham.

[sejintenej]

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Tripe


Ammonia (Sprim)

Sweat (or, for any ladies) perspiration by the bucketful

[jtaylor]

I bought some proper wax polish for a wooden table a few years back. When I opened it, it immediately took me back to the smell of the CH dormitories and the main house stairs at the start of a term, after they'd been freshly polished....

[Jo]

What a fascinating thread. Ajarn is correct that there's a difference between smells that automatically evoke memories of CH, and memories that evoke smells (if that makes sense).

Sadly, I have none of the former. However, I do remember the smell of Bluebell (only place I've ever seen it - Brasso everywhere else), tinned spaghetti for supper in house....well, that's about all really

Sounds - well, the school bell obviously. It ruled our lives and told us when and where to go next. Some of the more memorable staff voices (there are whole threads elsewhere about Queenie). The gavel in the dining hall that signalled grace before and after meals.

I feel there ought to be more: I was there for eight years. But maybe it's just too long ago.

[Mid A 15]

Band music and, although not a sound or smell, I have to agree with Spoony and say pied wagtails.

Are they still plentiful?

[kerrensimmonds]

Funny... I don't remember any wildlife birds at all at Hertford. Is my memory deficient...?

[Chrissie Boy]

That incredibly distinctive smell you always get around organ-cases. I've niffed it in many a church over the years and it always transports me back to the organ loft at Big School and the gallery of the Chapel. Also that smell of musty sheet-music, which is the same everywhere in the world. Yellowed sheet-music with rusty staples always smells the best. And am I imagining things here or is there also a smell peculiar to hassocks?

Then there's that smell of wet dirty dishcloths in urgent need of washing/disinfecting - in other words, the Brew Room sink smell. And always, the smell of tinned shoe polish which will forever be associated with Sunday morning shoe-polishing in my junior house prior to Shoe Inspection. And yes, wax floor polish, which I especially associate with one morning breaktime when we all came back to find the whole dayroom floor plastered in the stuff, as yet un-rubbed-in. Almost everyone slipped over and bust their head. Health & Safety regs wouldn't stand for that kind of nonsense now.

The smell of an empty beer bottle...I recall sniffing the crated empties outside the Grecians' Club when I was a Junior and it was pretty heady. And definitely the Tube smell. I worked in a hospital years ago where there was a comparatively modern underground spine corridor which nevertheless whiffed of the Tube. Is there such a thing as the smell of asbestos? Maybe that was it.

And then there were those wild garlic/cow parsley smells which will always be so closely associated with wandering around the countryside on Sundays. Whenever I catch a nostrilful of 'em, I'm suddenly 13 years old again and hanging around the stream that ran along just inside the ring fence at the Horsham end of the school estate. Does it still exist or has it been landfilled with old fridges and mattresses?

Also the smell of road-tar melting on a sweltering summer day. Makes me think of bicycling to Barns Green and back in a thoroughly Mad Dogs & Englishman way, with soft tar dribbling down the cambers at the roadsides.

Also the smell of an unlit cigarette, rather than a burning one.

Sounds-wise, I'd nominate that hissing sound that railway-rails make as a train approaches, before the train wheels themselves become audible. As a junior I spent quite a lot of time around the old railway, Eastlands copse, the Bird Sanctuary etc. and the noise sank in without my realising it at the time.

Then there's that feeling when you're watching a parade or carnival and a band goes right past you, the bass drum making your entire chest cavity resound. Know what I mean?

And the smell of the back asphalt on a hot summer day - not melting, but somehow emitting fumes all the same. I caught a whiff of that in London last summer and I was instantly on my way to/from the Tuck Shop, as it were.

Finally, the smell of malt bread. Remember those Parents' Day teas which you had to have a ticket to get into? The malt bread was always the best thing on offer.