Mohsina Malik
Inside a gnarled wooden outlet, Aziz looking proficiently into a bottle, that holds a liquid, once the most loved in Kashmir, the wrinkles on his face, and these empty bottles lined up on the shelves, stained and largely unused, perhaps have a tale to tell, a tale of fading love for Aroma, for rose water.
Recalling his childhood days, Aziz rejoices the days, when as a child, he would watch the entire process of Rose water making, and his whole family would take part in making rosewater and other syrup, “now we rarely have visitors, the demand has dropped down drastically.”
He remembers how his mother would keep heaps of rose petals in their courtyard. “Women would prepare the best syrups. Now it is only me with my sense of duty left,” says a nostalgic Aziz.
Aziz Ahmad Kozgar runs a 500 years old shop of rosewater, Aziz Ahmad when his father died he continued the legacy of making rosewater.
Located near the Khankah-e-Moula Shrine in Srinagar, ‘Ark-e-Gulab’ holds the memories of the rise and fall of this business. The shelves of the shop contain empty glass jars that according to Aziz Ahmad Kozgar once remained filled with different varieties of rosewaters.
This ancient store near the Shah-e-Hamdan mosque in the old city is run by Unanis whose ancestors were Central Asian medicinal practitioners. Manually distilled rose water is stored in decanters and is incredibly refreshing on a hot day.Many of my customers would buy the ‘natural rosewater’ for bringing glow on their faces, but now the market is full of facial cosmetics and artificial rosewater products due to which the natural rosewater has lost its relevance, says Aziz.
The shop may be the last to sell natural rosewater, says Aziz.
The Kozgars would also make a variety of herbal concoctions, but the shop now specializes mainly in rose water and a couple of other traditional herbal syrups thought to improve digestion, which are prepared today, as they were centuries ago.
Arq-e-Gulab is steps from the Khanqah-e-Moula shrine in the bazaar at his shop in Fatehkadal area of Srinagar’s Old City.
This august tradition of producing rose water may die once Aziz Kozgar shutters his shop, Until then, the heady fragrance of a bygone era remains encased in the dark interiors of Arq-e-Gulab, holding within it a storied history of immigration and artisanship.