Marae

I had no idea what the word Marae means. The decant label shows a dancing woman and a Tiki. But a marae is 'a communal or sacred place that serves religious and social purposes in Polynesian societies'. (source) The word also means 'cleared, clean of weeds, trees, ect.' and that is what it generally is: a cleared area, usually rectangular, bordered with stones or wooden posts. It can have terraces which are used for ceremonial purposes and there can be a central stone. In Tahiti marae were dedicated to specific deities and also connected to specific lineages said to have built them. The war god 'Oro, who as 'Oro-of-the-laid-down-spear was transformed into a god of peace, was ritually demanded to stay at home in the marae when the people set out on a journey, to safeguard them. (source)

Vanilla orchid, Monoi tiare, gardenia, and light incense.

That is the description of the 2008 Atomic Luau Lounge LE Marae from Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab. Not surprisingly the first thing I smell is gardenia, but not quite as heavily as gardenia can be. After a while it retreats a little and I smell the monoi tiare and vanilla orchid. I know I smell monoi tiare, because I recently bought a very lovely cream from Romantic Nature which has monoi as a base (tiare flowers are put in a semi-wax coconut oil until they have given it their scent and then the oil is used). The tiare is the Tahitian gardenia, monoi means scented oil but it is always scented by the tiare. The second stage is much lighter and has less throw than the earlier stage with the more obvious gardenia smell. I wonder if there is actually monoi in this perfume, which I would expect would make it more greasy, or if there are merely coconut and tiare notes in it.