Vietnamese incense from Tradewinds for £3.99. This incense is available from a number of Asian online shops in a variety of countries including the US - KayakCreeks, and Australia - Exotic Groceries. The company is Vuong Kim Thanh, based in Saigon. Difficult to work out the name of this particular incense - I couldn't find it on the archived website. Much of the wording refers to the incense being smoke free, but there is the wording, Phat Ba Quan Am, which translates roughly as Buddha Avalokiteshvara, and there is an image of a woman on a green dragon, which I feel probably refers to Guanyin, a Chinese representation of Avalokiteshvara. I shall take Phat Ba Quan Am as the name, and translate it as Guanyin, as being the nearest possible meaning, based on the image.
I like the packaging of Chinese and Vietnamese incense. It's usually bright and colourful and very jolly. I love the image on this tube. The weight is 180g, and there's probably 180 or so sticks in the tube, so at £3.99 this a good value packet. The sticks are 7 1/2 inches, with 5 inches of firm, machine extruded paste on a scarlet dyed machine-cut bamboo splint. The scent on the stick is pleasant, perfumed, light, floral, chalky, some rubber band, light sandalwood.
I like the packaging of Chinese and Vietnamese incense. It's usually bright and colourful and very jolly. I love the image on this tube. The weight is 180g, and there's probably 180 or so sticks in the tube, so at £3.99 this a good value packet. The sticks are 7 1/2 inches, with 5 inches of firm, machine extruded paste on a scarlet dyed machine-cut bamboo splint. The scent on the stick is pleasant, perfumed, light, floral, chalky, some rubber band, light sandalwood.
The burn is pleasant, perfumed, sweet, floral, but with that smouldering sandalwood sawdust that seems to be a feature of Thailand, Vietnam, and Chinese incense. That smouldering damp wood dust smell is not one I particularly like, and is one I associate with cheap incense from these secondary incense producing countries. I think this Vuong Kim Thanh incense is pleasant and attractive, but also rather limited. It's soft, pleasant, well behaved, and somewhat boring. There's nothing interesting here. There's no passion here. No surprises. No delights. Just a pleasant sweetish floral scent - a bit like a packet of Love Hearts. And it comes with an accompanying drift of smouldering damp sawdust/wood-powder that drags it in the wrong direction. I do like it. It's actually a decent everyday scent. It's not a bargain basement everyday scent, it's a decent one.
Date: Nov 2024 Score: 34
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