In the United States, as in most places around the globe, the handshake is a universal greeting, representing the emotional connection between two people with a physical clasping of hands. But in many places, things can get much more complicated. People of many countries, especially those in Europe, like to kiss upon greeting, and most of them have very strict rules about how many times to kiss someone’s cheek and on which cheek to start. Even a handshake is not so simple in some places; in the Central African Republic, for example, friends enact a complicated ritual greeting that involves slapping right hands, grabbing each other’s middle fingers using one’s thumbs and middle fingers, and snapping them.
Globetrotters are wise to keep abreast of greeting differences in order not to appear rude on arrival. Sure, a simple handshake will do in most places, but embracing indigenous customs will always get you some appreciation from locals. Besides, you wouldn’t want your ignorance of greeting customs in, say, Tuvalu, to catch you off guard if someone there presses his face to your cheek and sniffs deeply, as Tuvaluans are wont to do.
Shake Hands and Say Hello
The ancient Greeks shook hands much as we do now, as a gesture of friendliness, hospitality, and trust. In medieval Europe, kings and knights would extend their hands to one another to show that they were not carrying a weapon and bore the other party no harm. The gesture was also one of equality, different from bowing and kissing hands, which shows deference by one party and dominance by the other. Shaking hands, however, requires both participants to be on the same level and to show each other the same degree of respect. It also lowers the physical barrier that normally separates and protects one from the world by touching another’s hand. The other person does the same, forming a bond of mutual security.
Shaking hands can also be a way of sizing up someone you’re meeting for the first time. Everyone who’s ever gone to a job interview or business meeting knows the value of the “firm handshake,” which shows that you are confident and in command, as opposed to the “wet noodle,” which indicates indecisiveness and lack of ability. I once got myself into some major trouble at a job interview by shaking too firmly—how was I supposed to know the interviewer had terrible arthritis in her hands?
