Hungry Ghost Moon 2006

[biocarolyn]

... Offerings of ginger candy, sugar cane, smoky vanilla and rice wine mingle with a ghost’s perfume of white sandalwood, ho wood, ti, white grapefruit, crystalline musk and aloe. This scent is tapered by the presence of seven herbs, woods and resins used in the purification of the spirit and the purging of earthly concerns from the soul.

Oh this is gorgeous. I have been trying to track down a bottle, totally unsniffed, because I love these notes. Citrus, Asian vibe, light musk =

And I was so right. This is light, ethereal, and wonderful. The grapefruit is still predominant in the bottle and on my skin at first, but it dies down and melds wonderfully to float around with the woods, ginger, and light musk. Lovely. Too bad my chances of getting a backup are slim to none, since I expect I would love to wear this regularly. Ah well, thankful for what we have. Another beautiful scent.

[laslibres]

I've been trying to track this down for-e-ver...it came out the MONTH before I got into BPAL, so I totally missed it, and it always sounded good to me.

 

And I was right! It starts out kinda grapefruit and berry-ish (I dunno where I get berry from, but I do), a little sugary, and a little bit of...something else. I get hints of wood, rice wine, musk, and ginger, and they all combine to make the grapefruit more complex and more elegant than just grapefruit on its own would be. It smells like Night Gaunt mated with Diwali. It's kind of light, you could almost say it's ghostly, which is appropriate. I wish I could totally slather this on, maybe make it less light that way, but alas, I have but one imp. I love the little bit that I have, though. It's such a beautiful and interesting scent!

[HamletsKeeper]

It seems three years of aging doesn't help this scent much. I get nothing of the grapefruit nor any sugar for that matter. It's now a fairly flat sandalwood musk scent with a hit of ginger on top. Occasionally I get whiffs of something more but it's occassional. Nice and pretty and probably stunning three years ago but nothing I would invest time and effort in finding a bottle of now.

 

There are nicer more current scents to hunt down than this one.

[ami226]

On the skin: Whoa!! This is sweet! I am getting lots of grapefruit citrus and what I am guessing is sweet ginger/sugar cane. I would definitely eat something that smelled like this....

 

After a bit, the grapefruit fades a little and I get a slight bit of yummy vanilla and something slightly woodsy. Definitely a morpher.

 

Whoa!! And then a bit later the grapefruit comes back with a vengeance!!

 

And then it fades again. Now I get a sweetness with a hint of something that makes me think of rice wine.

 

This scent is a crazy morpher that goes through every single note. Wow!

 

Okay, now it is starting to take on a sunscreen smell. Strange, there isn't any coconut that I normally get with this certain smell. Must be the vanilla that is turning slightly plasticky on my skin. *sigh*

 

This scent reminds me of Tissue and other light Shungas.

 

Hmmmmm, sadly this one isn't for me.

[heathercaley]

This is just beautiful!! It's such a huge jump from my usual dark and scary bottles that I hoard like crazy. I've been dying to try HGM for ages. Vanilla/ginger/rice wine/sandalwood sounds like notes of total win for me.

 

Once applied, I melt. I simply melt. I'm really loving this.

 

It's slightly refreshing with a touch of citrus, and the sugar ginger candy is spicing it up just a touch. It's not sugary sweet at all, and the woods are super soft. The musks aren't too crazy either. The aloe is really beautiful in this.. really making it juicy.

 

When it dries down, the musks and woody grapefruit are all that is left behind, but it's beautiful!!!

 

 

Verdict? Not that traditional grapefruit breakfast eaten by Frances "Baby" Houseman‎'s mom toward the end of Dirty Dancing.

[Marblemeadow]

Shocking. I opened the bottle and almost licked it. MMMM. Foodie and yet close to the earth somehow. This is one that I will keep very close to me in my most treasured box. I hope the bottle lasts forever. It might be one of my new signature scents! This one just keeps getting better with age and each time I try it. Truly a masterpiece.

[starpixi81]

First off, big thanks to the kind and lovely forumite who frimped me this!!

 

This is gorgeous. It smells kind of like honey when it is first on, reminding me a little of Lush's fabulous Honey I Washed the Kids scent.

 

This is a beautiful mix of ginger, light grapefruit, rice wine, and a sugary musk. It is very sweet, but it has a lot of depth and dimension. I can smell the sandalwood way in the distance, grounding the scent, but not being overbearing like it sometimes is on me.

 

I have tested out the 2011 HGM and that one is a little more elegant and much less sweet to me, but I love them both equally.

Edited June 28, 2011 by moonberryjam

[Vega]

Sniffed: Light, cheerful, sugary sweetness.

 

On skin: Overall, Hungry Ghost Moon is a light but complex sugary-sweet scent. I don't recognize a lot of the notes, and those I do know are too well-blended to distinguish individually. This Moon is a bit sweet, a bit dry, a bit woody, very lightly foody, and with the characteristic gentle calmness of BPAL's Asian-themed blends. Peacocks, La Vague and Rozpustnica smelled similar to my nose -- all fruity-musky-sugary, and all too subdued to hold my interest -- but Hungry Ghost Moon is more complex and quite lively in comparison! Over time it becomes drier and a little bit smoky, the sugar emerges more, and I can now pick out ginger (from the slightly spicy kick) and white musk, although the scent remains quite blended. Colour impression is a translucent, pale grassy-green.

 

Verdict: While I like Hungry Ghost Moon much more than other blends in the same scent family, it's still a bit too light and subdued for me, and I don't see myself wearing it much.

Edited July 16, 2011 by Vega

[KittyHawk]

I should have known better than to buy a partial bottle of 2006 HGM...

 

because it is perfect. The vanilla, the ginger, the white sandalwood!!! My skin loves these notes even more than my nose does. It seriously breaks my heart that this may well be my only bottle of this ever, so I will be ever so careful with it. Hungry Ghost Moon makes me nostalgic for something, but I don't know what. I think one of my grade school teachers must have worn something that smells similar, because whenever I put my nose to my wrist, I imagine myself hugging someone, a lady, in one of the classrooms. It's uncanny how evocative this scent is for me. It's so, so, so beautiful. Please last forever, little bottle. I will wallow in my tears the day this becomes a sniffie.

[Honey]

So excited to give this a try!

 

 

Imp: The notes that strike me first are grapefruit (juicy, tart, fresh), aloe (light, green, fresh) and rice wine (sweet and sour). Yum, good.

 

Wet: Fresh, light, yellow/green/white. Similar to but much stronger than Kumiho, similar to but less lemon-y than Embalming Fluid (and I was disappointed by both).

 

Dry: Light and fresh. Could need a stronger throw. After a wile, the creamy and spicy candied ginger & sugarcane come through. Oh, this is yummy and JUST.MY.THING. Vanilla adds to the creamy texture. I am sure the musk and sandalwood will appear later and make this long-lasting and nice. Oh, darn, I so want a bottle of this!!

[Ghost of a Rose]

In the vial: Not too sweet, especially at first, but then some sweetness creeps in. Wood is the dominant note, with some herbs, a little grapefruit, and some spiciness of ginger. This is a very complex scent, so it's difficult to pick out any of the specific ingredients. Beyond the wood and herbs, I had to look at the description and try to smell each thing individually in order to detect any of them.

 

On me, wet: Pretty much the same. Spicy, woody, unisex, not too sweet, with a just a hint of citrus at first. The grapefruit is coming out strongly as it starts to dry - very realistic and delicious!

 

On me, just dried: The grapefruit note is holding out longer than it usually does on me. At this point, the scent is mostly grapefruit and wood. But the wood and the subtle nuances of the other things keep this from being too fruity or foody for me. (I don't like to wear fruity or foody scents as perfumes.)

 

After 1 hour: From a foot or so away, the throw is vanilla. Up close, the blend has somehow morphed into something vaguely pineapple (which isn't in it. Weird.) Usually I get the base notes of sandalwood and musk on the drydown, but with this, I'm not getting them at all.

 

Later ETA -

After 2 hours: Now I'm finally picking up some of the sandalwood and musk. Those, along with the vanilla and "pineapple", are now pretty evenly balanced.

 

I was really interested in the concept of this blend, especially after having read Peony In Love by Lisa See, which explores the concept of the hungry ghosts (among other things.) Beth has done a great job in realizing the concept. This is a complex, sophisticated, and attractive unisex blend.

 

My rating: 4 stars

Edited August 24, 2011 by Ghost of a Rose

[Balame]

I got this as a frimp from a kind swapper and let me say that it is a true testament to "light" scents. The cap on the decant was really weird so I ended up getting this all over my hands, but even freshly applied and slathered I had to get close to smell anything. Definitely a skin scent.

 

Ethereal and wispy are good words to describe this. It's so delicate and has sort of a magical vibe, but in a familiar comforting way. I did not get the fruit any of the other posters mentioned, perhaps because the oil is so aged now. I got a very soft white musk, aloe and gentle vanilla. Serene but yummy.

 

In the middle of drying I did start getting whiffs of grapefruit, but it wasn't the "in your face" grapefruit of say, Cheshire Cat or R'lyeh. Instead it was tempered by sugar cane (not candy sweet, a very natural scent) and thus it didn't come across as citrus-y. More like a sparkly sugar, if that makes any sense.

 

Not getting spice, not getting any of the woods, but that's fine. It's a "pretty" scent, but unique enough that it doesn't remind me of anything commercial.

 

For those that like The Girl, this is in the same vein. It's funny, it's been ages since I smelled TG and I was underwhelmed when I tested it... if anything, this has a similar musky, soft, seductive quality without any of the weirdness I got or the cloying nature of florals.

Edited February 13, 2013 by Balame

[bellumed]

Very interesting in the bottle. Same family as Embalming Fluid, light and pretty aloe and citrus, with ginger giving it some spice. But on me, I get a boring-ass sandalwood and musk. Ginger chills in the background, but it's just not doing it for me.

[Naomi Kelsey]

Wow, I LOVE this. A strong blast of sweet sugary grapefruit with a slight woody/vanilla top note, surrounded by leafy, herbal edge. I agree that this is unlike other Lunar scents---it's not floral, delicate, or floating. It's rich, warm, and fruity without being too sweet. Just amazing. 5 out of 5. I've been eyeing this for a while and I'm so glad I got it.

[fairybites]

Creamy slightly floral citrus, I thought it was orange or orange blossom initially. I think it's probably just the grapefruit and ginger confusing my nose or something. I like how it's a little fruity and a little floral; not one note seems to overtake the other. I do agree that because of the aloe it's a little similar to Embalming Fluid. The throw is so low, might be due to age or just the notes. Won't be upgrading, but it was nice while it lasted!

[ND¢]

Light, green sweet fruit and tea. It does have that bit of sandalwood shoring it up. Perfectly blended, nothing eclipsing any other note. 

[forspecial_plate]

I guess I never reviewed this...might as well since I'm wearing it.  

 

Heavily applied from a very aged decant, I'm smelling mostly a warm sweet vanilla scent, with some of the ginger candy coming through.  I remember it used to be more complex and this decant has faded a lot over time, but the scent is still there, more than I would have expected. 

 

After a while I think the leaf and wood notes are coming out a bit more.  Still very vanilla forward.  I think I'm getting more of the complexity that I remember when it was newer.  I think I can pick out the rice wine, too.  

 

Wear your decants while they're young and fresh, if you can!  But having said that, this isn't bad at all.