Galatea, you did mention earlier on that you were unable to smell. Your exploration of this subject is from a somewhat unique perspective - you have no idea what you are talking about (I don't mean that in bad way at all, I mean it in the sense that you have to rely on the advice of others for something which you can never experience yourself).

I interpreted your post to mean something along the lines of a far more subtle smell - like the way that pheromones have influences on our behaviour that we are not always aware of.

I think DaveA was referring more to stronger smells involved in stereotypes - people who may stink of garlic (some cultures do consume more garlic than others) or not wear deodorant or the like. I'm not sure if that's the direction you were going with your original post.

It's easy sometimes on these forums to quickly scan a thread or not fully appreciate what was trying to be conveyed in the original post. If you picked out the main message by looking at the words "foreigner" and "smell" it would be easy to get fired up and say something about racism, but I don't think that's where you were going in the first place.

Or alternatively I could have completely misunderstood the whole thing, in which case I apologise in advance.