The Palvapii have no ears, no eyes, no taste, no sense of touch. All they have is a nose – and believe me, it’s big. Other Societies in the Cosmos – “Alien” is regarded as a derogatory word as everyone is welcome; there is no such thing as an alien – as I was about to say: Other Societies in the Cosmos at first had an enormous difficulty in knowing how to communicate with them. Once a machine was invented that could translate their smells into words and images then everything was fine.
To them a shape is an arrangement of smells. Music is the arrangement of smells. Everything in the Arts is an arrangement of smell. In fact they have dozens and dozens of olfactory masterpieces.
I had the good fortune to visit Palvapus, and I couldn’t smell a jolly things. Everything is so subtle. When I was asked to speak at one of their conventions (via the translating machine) about five hundred filled the hall. Before I even had a chance to say “Good evening” most of them were vomiting. There was chaos. They cried “The stench! The stench!” I’ve never been so humiliated in my life.
I was ushered to the space terminal by Palvapii wearing masks. I boarded a spacecraft and left for home. So a word of advice to anyone who aspires to visit Palvapus: It’s a sixteen hour flight; don’t take a rocket that doesn’t have a shower.
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