170 boxes of aparajita arrived today… but i ordered 240, and i haven’t heard anything from the guy in india since he said he would send me the tracking number three weeks ago… which he never did… 😐
at this point, i’m satisfied that the incense i’m getting is the authentic aparajita, but if the guy in india starts jerking me around with quantities, i’m not gonna be very happy…
Their website is retarded, I got 2 emails from NN murthy , he is the one running the show. He even directed the export managers to apologize loool. Sir,
Thanks for your e-mail.
Your previous mail has already been sent to our export section. They will reply very soon.
Current mail will also be sent to them for immediate needful.
Regards,
N.N.MURTHY.
Ok so this Aparajita mystery just keeps getting weird. The ones I got from sitar emporium , are brown black your right, white inner packet. My friend had one in a yellow tranlucent inner packet, they were pretty much similar , but I find the white packet ones sublime. The ones I got from ebay , came in a purple seethrough packet but smelt reformulated but with burnt clove undertones it gave me a headache. A pale comparison to the white packet ones. These ones were black almost , no brown at all.
well, i’m very likely never going to hear from the दस्यु that i bought the last batch from, but yours is the best lead i’ve gotten since then, so i’ll see whether this one pans out or not…
and, yes, their web site is “retarded”… although i would choose a different adjective to describe the web site, since the word “retarded” cuts a little closer to home than i am comfortable with…
the colour of the inner packet doesn’t indicate anything except where they were able to get the material to make the inner packets for that batch of incense… i’ve seen the inner packets be white waxed paper, yellow waxed paper, heat-sealed plastic, ziplock bags… i’ve seen them wrapped in hindi newspaper… for that matter, the actual colour of the stick doesn’t make as much of a difference as most people think. when you’re talking about a durbar incense, the actual stuff that burns has no scent whatsoever. the scent comes from fragrant oils and so forth into which the sticks are dipped.
the ones you got from ebay, that were in a purple see-through packet, might have come from The Purple People, who used to carry aparajita, but ran out a few years ago.
as i said, if you bought aparajita from sitar emporium within the last year, you bought the “new” aparajita, that is brownish-black, which they bought from me, which should be exactly the same as the 170 boxes i just received.
cauvery hasn’t responded to any emails that i have sent for the past 7 years – at least – however, i didn’t write to sri murthy… i’ll give that a try… however, according to their web site, the email address that you related is actually for Ashok Kumar Singh, managing director, and not NN Murthy (whose email address is [email protected])
however, the amount that i bought isn’t really considered an “enormous” amount… when they talk about an “enormous” amount, they’re talking about one of those fourty-foot shipping containers… which i don’t have room to store (as much as i would like to have one… 8) )
1980 lol, I am born in 1985, I dont know how Aparjita looked then. No, I am talking of the one I got from Sitar Emporium, its a brownish color in a white inner packet.Its wonderful! The civet and musk are the dominant notes in this one. Cauvery does respond actually, I received a very detailed message from them, NN murthy was pretty helpful (He is the general manager), but I told him I had purchased it already in the US . This is his email [email protected], and considering you order an enormous amount, he would probably have it custom tailored to your needs.
if you bought aparajita from sitar emporium within the past year, you’ve probably been purchasing incense that i imported from india. as far as i’ve been able to tell, sitar emporium and hybrid elephant are the only two places that still sell aparajita online (or anywhere, as far as i’ve been able to tell). there are a bunch of web sites that advertise it, but it’s out of stock, or they don’t respond to emails… but sitar emporium was completely out of aparajita until i bought 240 boxes last year, and sent 120 of them to sitar emporium.
the aparajita that i got recently – the 170 boxes – is black. i haven’t seen the light brown aparajita since at least 1980, but it is my impression that the colour of the incense stick is due to the “filler” that is used in its manufacture, which has changed significantly during that period of time.
they did assure me that the aparajita that i got this time was “made to order”, however… for whatever that’s worth…
i didn’t order it from Cauvery Karnataka Handicrafts, although it has their logo (as well as a logo from Mavana, and an appointment by the maharaja of mysore). cauvery hasn’t responded to any emails i have sent for a number of years. Mavana sent me email a couple years ago, but never responded, and the contact that they gave me in the united states was somebody’s cell phone who didn’t know what i was talking about. the contact i had was from Ambe Handicraft International, but they have stopped responding to emails as well… 😐
I picked up 9 boxes of old formulation aparajita from Sitar Emporium when I was visiting my relatives in Chicago. I gave up on getting them imported to Canada, and after reading you got 170 boxes of the 240, I made the right decision. Are the ones you got the black ones or brown ones. Considering the amount you ordered they should customize it for your needs. I am assuming you did not order it from
Cauvery Karanataka Handicrafts.