Once Upon a Country, Once Upon an Oil

By Raghda A. Maksoud

It was a hot summer day in ancient Cairo in 1998, and my first day at my first job. It was a journey that started with 13 different countries, airplanes, cars, airport terminals, a lot of travel time, friends, experience, education, and love — and yet still exploring and discovering. I was very fortunate to be part of one of the biggest ecological farms projects in Egypt for aromatic plantations — a heaven in the middle of the desert — for Fridal, a a privately owned Egyptian company.

I still remember entering the plant early in the morning, and having a very powerful aroma hit my nose and my mind — an aroma that take me to a thousand different places at the same time: my grandmother cooking on a Friday night, our backyard flowers blooming in springtime, and a new place that I have never been to. This was my first acquaintance with aromatic plants and essential oils; it was a powerful introduction and yet a mysterious one.

For a bachelor’s graduate from English Literature and arts, chemistry and aromas were a very different subject, but I was very lucky every step of the way, starting from working with my mentor, Mr. Tarek Abou Bakr, who guided me through the world of essential oils, creativity, plant love, and magic to where I am now in the Aromatherapy industry.

My first stop was Egypt, my birth country — the sunny, mystical, and magical city that never sleeps. Egypt is one of the major sources for various types of essential oils. It’s a civilization where aromatherapy started 7,000 years ago, during the third Dynasty when mummification was invented for immortality. They left the deceased person’s heart in a jar, believing that it was more important than the mind. Ancient Egyptians used frankincense, myrrh, cedarwood, juniper berry, and spikenard at some stage to preserve the bodies of their royalty in preparation of the afterlife. In fact, one of the very first extraction and distillation processes in history was for the lotus flower in the old Egyptian civilization.

One of the most popular oils in Egypt, specifically in the delta region in the northeast, is jasmine (Jasminum grandiflorum). I loved walking in the fields of jasmine where everything looked white and bright — an army of jasmine pickers gathering early at dawn with their traditional baskets, picking the delicate flower for distillation, the early sunshine, the heavenly aroma coming from the fields, and the smile on the farmer’s faces can spread joy and happiness for days and days in your mind.

Egyptian Jasmine

China was my second stop, a 13-hour flight from Cairo, the bright and colorful country with years and years of wisdom and traditional medicine, China was a very different destination, different culture, different food, and different oils. One of the most popular oils in China is cedarwood oil (Cypresses funebris), found specifically in Sichuan province in the southwest part of China. It’s a woody, musty, spicy, and cedar note plant.

My third stop, beautiful Morocco, was, with mountains, valleys, gypsies, and Argan oil (Argania Spinosa) — the most authentic and traditional nut oil in Morocco, and one of the most used oils in aromatherapy. The wild-growing tree is one of the most famous in the world, not only for its therapeutic benefits but for its ecological benefits in fighting desertification and economic value for the Moroccan economy. Until today, an authentic pressing extraction method is still used by locals for culinary grade. while some innovative industrial methods are used for the mass extraction of the cosmetic/therapeutic grade.

My fourth stop was Albania a remarkable small Eastern Europe country with a diversity of land cape from the Albanian Alps, valleys and the Adriatic Sea, Tirana the capital is a very welcoming city with a very distinguished Eastern European feel in the architecture, food, and culture. From Tirana to the mountains in the North in Shkodra where wild sage “ Salvia officinalis “grows, watching the harvest in this rocky mountains with a hot climate and very hard conditions, with hand picking in the late afternoon when the mountains were shaded was one of the most unforgettable experiences in my life.

My fifth stop was Sri Lanka, or “Lanka,” a rich and enormous cultural heritage, islands, blue waters, forests, and on top of it all, Ayurveda. Cinnamon leaf oil (Cinnamonum verum), a musky and spicy oil distilled from the cinnamon leaf, grows around the Madhu River, and is widely used for its therapeutic attributes as well as being a food flavor oil. The process of making the cinnamon spice is very different, time-consuming, and labor-intensive, and begins with scraping the outer layer of the bark with special tools. The inner layer is then very gently carved to separate the cinnamon from the bark wood; this skinned layer is then rolled into layers, combined, and dried for 10 to 15 days.

My sixth stop was the U.S., where I moved six years ago with my family; it is now our home by choice. It’s the most diversified country in the world, with different geography, climates, cultures, innovation, and technology — and working in the essential oil and fragrance industry for more than 20 years paved the way for me in the industry in the U.S., where I joined a global project for developing essential oils and aromatherapy

One of the most life-changing experiences for me was when I joined an Aromatherapy class in New York City, where I started seeing and hearing plants talk in a different language. It was where essential oils and an aromatherapist’s friends changed my life and my perspective.

And there are still more stories to tell!