He dropped off something at Adi Da's house in Marin County and was told that Adi Da was waiting for him. So he went downstairs to see him. He happily greeted James and showed him one of the incense stick packets that he had sent to him. It was called Primo Incense, and was distributed by a company in Seattle. The scent that he had in his hands was called Yellow Rose.

 

"This is what I want burned in my meditation halls henceforth"

He lit an incense stick and walked to the corner of His room where there was a Shiva lingam. He waved it around the lingam and then told James, "This is what I want burned in my meditation halls henceforth". 

So Adidam (the practicing community of devotees of Adi Da) bought the Primo Incense for many years into the early 1980s, at which time they no longer carried it. We enquired of them and found that they had been bringing it into the US through the Sughandhi company in Poona. Adi Da suggested then that they become the new distributor. 

James first stayed at the Sugandhi guest house in 2002 and visited with the company then. He videotaped the entire making of the incense which was shown to Adi Da on the sacred Island of Naitauba, in Fiji.

 

 

We were told that Sughandhi believed in using only natural ingredients and that the company was one of only two companies at that time that made totally natural incense.

The stick is covered with charcoal and then the scent is rolled onto the stick. It is done by ladies, by hand. Many of them come and pick up the ingredient mix and the sticks and roll it at home and bring back the completed sticks.

There are 22 ingredients in the Avabhasa Rose incense, a formula that is specific only to Adidam. Other forms of Rose incense are sold by Sughandhi to other ashrams around the world.