In Thailand, an old woman passes, and so goes the way she has made sweets all her life. Especially in a place like Phetchaburi; once a sleepy city with a two-lane highway running through it, economic growth has brought in sweeping changes. What were once roadside stands and small storefronts are now huge confectionery industrial complexes with dozens of tour buses arriving on the hour for the requisite shopping stop. There’s more ja mongkut than ever—most stores now sell their own version—but these are lumpy specimens that look like they’re stamped out of a mold, and with today’s prices, the dot of gold leaf is often nowhere to be found. You can identify them as ja mongkut should you have a taste, but their fragrance underwhelms. The melon seeds look as if they are just stabbed into the golden flesh. A ja mongkut circa 2050 might exist as foamy protein suspension to be eaten out of a tube. Should I still be around, my Proustian moment would no longer be possible.