How do you greet people in your homeland?

[Danik 2016]

A discussion I just had, reminded me that there are considerable cultural differences in the manner people greet each other from one country to the other, specially as regards physical contact.
In Brazil, where I am from, for example, shaking hands is normally only used in formal situations. In informal situations
men usually hug each other. The hug can be more theatrical or more affectionate, depending on the grade of intimacy between them. Or they pat each other on the breast pocket or on the back. The patting on the breast pocket, meant as a friendly gesture today, has a less friendly origin: it originated during some revolution and its aim was to verify if the other man was carrying an firearm hidden in his pocket.
Women used to greet each other with a kiss on each cheek but because of the many viruses we have today, this custom is fastly disapearing.
Now I should like to hear from you: how do you greet people in your homeland or in the country you live today?

[bounty]

danik if you are talking about friends---handshakes and hugs are also related to time and geographic distance apart.

that is, if you've not seen an old friend who comes home from far away in the same time frame that you've not seen an old friend who lives close, im more likely to handshake/hug the former as opposed to the latter.

with guys---handshakes always at least, and then hugs yes, depending on the level of intimacy.

with girls, never handshakes, always hugs, and lasting longer than with guys.

no one in my world does or has ever done cheek kissing really.

hugs go on in formal situations here, but less for greetings and more as parts of ceremonies.

ive spent time in the south, and I loved saying "howdy"

[Danik 2016]

Bounty, I think one of the main differences is that we usually shake the hands of strangers, for example at business meetings, but never of friends.
The other habit which often embarrasst me, was this cheek kissing between Brazilian woman. Sometimes you had to kiss someone you didn´t like or you weren´t intimate with or it might be taken as an offence.
It´s interesting that you also hug in formal situations. Brazilians sometimes hug at meetings but then it is a more formal kind of hug.

[YesNo]

I remember meeting a former co-worker for lunch. We shook hands. Generally, as bounty mentioned, I don't even shake hands with the person. A simple, "Hi", is adequate or a hand waving.

I do recall giving my aunts hugs, but not my uncles.

[Danik 2016]

In fact this thread was motivated by a comment you made elsewhere, about the way Europeans greeted each other. It suggested to me that male hugging, which is absolutelly usual in Brazil, might not be as usual in some other countries.

[YesNo]

I can't imagine why I would hug another man, but maybe my imagination isn't working at the moment.

[mona amon]

Mostly "hi", and if we're speaking in Tamil a smile followed by 'how are you?' in Tamil. Shaking hands or a 'Namaskaram' in formal situations. Male hugging is common out here as well.

[Lokasenna]

I'm from near Liverpool, where we greet people by punching them in the face and taking their wallets.

[Helga]

Here on the ice, I think we can be a little cold and physical contact as a greeting isn't that common. That being said, it also depends on families, my step-dad and his kids always kiss on the cheek when they meet, and they do it to me too. I don't like being that close to people. My friends tend to hug when they meet but they know I don't like it so they don't hug me.

A wave and a 'hi' is most common, but some people want to show more affection. One friend of mine insists on fist bumps, that is the most ridiculous thing ever! two 30 year old girls, fist bumping when they meet, I don't like it. I think she needs more contact than I do and this is a compromise I guess, a stupid one though.

It has become a comic and popular phrase to ask someone the minute they step onto the soil here on the ice if they like the country. A reporter did that to Ringo Starr years ago. He stepped of the plane and walked 20 metres to the reporters and got this question. His answer doesn't matter, the question was enough.

[Danik 2016]

Posted by Lokasenna:
"I'm from near Liverpool, where we greet people by punching them in the face and taking their wallets."


This kind of greeting you get in São Paulo too specially if you are a tourist, but nationals are very frequently subjected to this endearments too. But I think they concentrate more on cell phones than on wallets: wallets may disapoint.


Here on the ice, I think we can be a little cold and physical contact as a greeting isn't that common. That being said, it also depends on families, my step-dad and his kids always kiss on the cheek when they meet, and they do it to me too. I don't like being that close to people. My friends tend to hug when they meet but they know I don't like it so they don't hug me.

A wave and a 'hi' is most common, but some people want to show more affection. One friend of mine insists on fist bumps, that is the most ridiculous thing ever! two 30 year old girls, fist bumping when they meet, I don't like it. I think she needs more contact than I do and this is a compromise I guess, a stupid one though.

It has become a comic and popular phrase to ask someone the minute they step onto the soil here on the ice if they like the country. A reporter did that to Ringo Starr years ago. He stepped of the plane and walked 20 metres to the reporters and got this question. His answer doesn't matter, the question was enough.
My idea about people on the ice, was in fact that they are more reserved, but that doesn´t sound necessarily cold to me.
Fist bumping on the ice is a surprise. It reminds me of a joking greeting form I had with my close friends at university. We used to touch with the finger tips and then "clean" the fingers on the clothes to eliminate the other energy. But when I was a teacher at school, some of my students liked to fist bump.

The question "Do you like our country?" is absolutely standard here too. Of course, foreigners are usually polite and answer in the afirmative. If they want to be very, very polite indeed they say some words in Portuguese.

[Helga]

what people found funny about the reporter asking this question was that she did when he had been here for about two minuets and could probably not say anything except cold, which he did.

Some say that we are quiet and kinda cold until we start drinking and then we are loud and affectionate, I think that can be true at times.

[Danik 2016]

Yes I got your point, Helga! Maybe the reporter hadn´t done her homework on the Beatles.:lol:
Seen as a people people we are loud and we are crowdy. But, owning to my German ascendency I am rather reserved myself.

[August Guelfen]

I seem to suggest the impression that I am probably cold like etarnal ice, but I tend to answer, I am cold and silent like death
for the most, but my blood is the eternal fire and my bones are the grace of purest love. So why should I try to be false like
you ? So even here in Germany it is possible to find miracles from time to time.

[Danik 2016]

I can't imagine why I would hug another man, but maybe my imagination isn't working at the moment.
I think this is a matter of social convention, Yes/No. It´s not usual in your country, that´s all.

[Danik 2016]

Posted by Mona Amon:

"Mostly "hi", and if we're speaking in Tamil a smile followed by 'how are you?' in Tamil. Shaking hands or a 'Namaskaram' in formal situations. Male hugging is common out here as well."


So it´s similar to Brazil, Mona, except that the language is different, of course.

Sorry, it seems I got a bit mixed up with the sequence of my answers.

.....


I seem to suggest the impression that I am probably cold like etarnal ice, but I tend to answer, I am cold and silent like death
for the most, but my blood is the eternal fire and my bones are the grace of purest love. So why should I try to be false like
you ? So even here in Germany it is possible to find miracles from time to time.
You centainly don´t suggest that you are cold, August!

[bounty]

I am head over heels, absolutely unequivocally in love with a tv show on nbc called "the voice."

I notice there is a lot of hugging between the contestants and the coaches, even when at the very beginning of the show the two sides are complete strangers to each other.

its fascinating to consider why that is...

[Danik 2016]

If it is a singer contest, we had a very similar one here some weeks ago. In fact we had "The Voice" and "The Voice Kids", the second one for children and teens. I didn´t watch it but there usually is a lot of emotional display, the coaches dance to the sound of the songs.
Here you have a bit of a good presentation of "The Voice Kids"+hug:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qDCobFGdgM

[Goodman Brown]

I can't imagine why I would hug another man, but maybe my imagination isn't working at the moment.

The hugs come from the heart,,,,,, meaning long true feelings as friends

[YesNo]

The hugs come from the heart,,,,,, meaning long true feelings as friends

Good point. I probably don't have that many friends or maybe I don't want to presume that other person is a friend.

[August Guelfen]

Thank you Danik,

your words let me beleave that not everyone thinks I am the antichrist. I am only Christian in the authentic interpretation. Just not a servant of the beast's servants, like the catholic or the protestant church all over the planet. Well, honestly, I don't know, what people like me would say about me, because I never meet an other person like me. Even my biologic parents never loved me and they can't love me today, too. All because they are not able to love, what they don't understand. I don't love them, because they are not valuable enough for the truth of love. So, this little excuse about etarnal ice will continue.

[Dreamwoven]

I think August hit the nail on the head with:

"Well, honestly, I don't know, what people like me would say about me, because I never meet an other person like me."

We are each unique in all our quirks and characteristics.

[August Guelfen]

Yes Dreamwoven, you are right in some kind of hoping the best about everyone. But what if I would tell you that nearly every human on earth is a mechanical man built by the weakness of mortal flesh and programed to get the illusion to think that there is freedom outside the holy rules and laws of god. Etarnal love and harmony are the harmony of his heavens and nobody should try to butcher his being into materialistic populism. But that happened all over the time, done by nearly everyone breathing on this planet. So the dogma about predestination is so strange ? Their is nothing like equality. Neither on earth, nor in hell, nor in heavens.

[Goodman Brown]

Good point. I probably don't have that many friends or maybe I don't want to presume that other person is a friend.

Yesno you give the impression of being a very poor person,,,,

[Danik 2016]

A bit off topic as the discussion is turning in this direction:
For several reasons I have been forced to stay much at home lately. One of these reasons is that I work at home. And I noticed something interesting:while my virtual communication increased a lot I was having much less contact to my real life friends.
Those of us who grew up without PC and internet, probably miss the time when to meet some one you had to go somewhere, or you would invite your friends to your home and provide some snacks and drinks. Now if you want to talk to someone you just open your PC. And, very often, there is no one else in the room. The question is: have we become more or less lonely than before with virtual reality?

[YesNo]

Yesno you give the impression of being a very poor person,,,,

Poor but happy.

[August Guelfen]

Hello Danik,

I wish dearly to say, your thoughts about the computer evolution are right, but I can't do that, because I don't want to be false. In my whole life machines and toy pets are my only and best friends and books about the chants of truth in each direction, which exists out there and inside. But who likes a master of theoretic math also loving Emily Dickinson and understanding her too ? Well, I think nobody. But I will continue to search my baptise by fire and gasolin. God showed me
that way of martyr. I heartly love this thought to leave my body prison by burning like a torch, but we will see when who ever will appear to execute me. I don't care who will do it, or where, or even what will be his motivation. It doesn't matter. It is god's will and also mine, it's my way to freedom.

[Helga]

A bit off topic as the discussion is turning in this direction:
For several reasons I have been forced to stay much at home lately. One of these reasons is that I work at home. And I noticed something interesting:while my virtual communication increased a lot I was having much less contact to my real life friends.
Those of us who grew up without PC and internet, probably miss the time when to meet some one you had to go somewhere, or you would invite your friends to your home and provide some snacks and drinks. Now if you want to talk to someone you just open your PC. And, very often, there is no one else in the room. The question is: have we become more or less lonely than before with virtual reality?

There have been so many changes in our lives in the last 2 decades, and even just in the last decade when it comes to technology. I grew up in a house with a tv and a vcr. I remember when we got our first computer and it only had word and paint in it. There was no internet at the time. Now I describe this to my son who is almost 10 and in our home we have a flatscreen tv, playstation 4, laptop and an ideapad. A life without these things seem impossible, even to me (well some of these things).

It's not just that we are able to communicate with the world when we are alone but also entertainment comes in abundance. When I was a kid there were two tv stations on the ice and you had to pay for one of them so in my home there was just one. If there was nothing on tv you went outside and met up with friends, or as it was more often in my case, read a book or did something else.

The good thing about having this technology is that you can be in contact with the world in a simple way. As a kid I had about 30 penpals from different countries, but when I got an e-mail and learned how to use the internet it opened a whole new world.

I think people, and especially kids, need a bit of both.

We can get lonely in front of a computer alone at home, but it can also be lonely in a crowded room.

[Dreamwoven]

"Penpals: Helga, I've entirely forgotten the meaning of that word...

[August Guelfen]

Oh Helga, mignon, here at the worst asylum known to me, the welfare appartement of my parents, my kind of home from birth until now, I am happy I could cry, each time my "dad" ignores me being only 3 meters away from him for sometime. The other option is, that he gets angry and abuse me with his insane sadistic behaviour like he always did in my 25 years and he did it extremly often and multiple times a day. The only help my depressive borderline mother gives me to date is, that I should stop showing some kind of emotions, because she can't see any kind of feelings without losing control, too. Well, all that happens the last time around 30 minutes ago, but it is inpolite to speak about that, isn't it ? Why I share that here is quite simple, someone could react with empathy. Something I never saw til date from face to face. I tell this everyone since nearly 10 years, who could perhabs help, for example teachers, psychiatrists, psychologists and so on. Everybody tells the same thing. This thing is, why do you thing I would care ? That is note my departement. Sorry and Goodbye. Even the police never did anything for me. All that stuff is only a small part I live everyday with. The are so much more traumas and rape abuse I got from everyone I ever get to know in my live. The whole reason is terrible and simple, nobody like brillant eccentrics as classmate or a son like that. Well they tortured everything like human behaviour out of me. But, at least the proof with a psychologic test, that I am completly sane. Did I hear something like sorry ? No, they only say nobody like brillants they can't understand, so what you want ? At least the try to solve the riddle with some kind of I.Q. test. The result was on the one hand, that I am even more brillant than Albert Einstein, but on the other hand they admit that their test moduls are not so perfect they thought they were. So my gift is probably much higher they can calculate with this kind of math. So I crushed Gauß Bell curve, but does it matter ? No, because life criped me nearly to autism.

[YesNo]

We can get lonely in front of a computer alone at home, but it can also be lonely in a crowded room.

That reminds me of being in a crowded bar with three or four co-workers talking about office politics that I couldn't care less about, but I still had to make sure I didn't step on the wrong side of the political divide. Of course, what else do we have to talk about? I didn't feel lonely at the time, but I would have preferred being in front of a computer alone.

[Ecurb]

Here in the Western United States, where everyone carries handguns, the standard greetings are, "Slap leather!" or "Draw!"

[Danik 2016]

Maybe thats the point, Yes/No. We sometimes converse better with our virtual friends than with our real ones. The ideal thing to me seems to have enough friends in both territories as Helga puts it.

[Danik 2016]

Here in the Western United States, where everyone carries handguns, the standard greetings are, "Slap leather!" or "Draw!"
Do you live in the region known to foreigners as the wild west? What does "Slap leather!"mean?

[Ecurb]

"Slap leather" means "draw".

[prendrelemick]

"Ay-up."

"Nah then."

[Danik 2016]

"Slap leather" means "draw".
Fine! So either you "draw" or you "slap leather"!;)

[YesNo]

Maybe thats the point, Yes/No. We sometimes converse better with our virtual friends than with our real ones. The ideal thing to me seems to have enough friends in both territories as Helga puts it.

We visited some neighbors who were moving today and on leaving I shook the man's hand and I gave the female a hug because that is what she expected me to do. So I guess I do give hugs, but only on special occasions. This was no kiss on each cheek sort of thing, just a quick hug.

[Dreamwoven]

YesNo is right. There are gender specific greeting forms not covered in this thread. In Hungary, men greet women by saying "I kiss your hand" (kezetcsokolom, with an accent over the second e), or at least they used to half a century ago.

There is a debate raging in Sweden over whether men can shake hands with a woman, especially with large number of refugees from lands in the middle east invaded by the US. Well, if a Swede met a fully veiled and covered woman, would you extend your hand expecting her to shake yours? That is not discussed, on the principle that strangers in Sweden should do as everyone else does. It is hazed over, the issue is not pc.

[AndyRoo]

Greeting is a complicated topic. I live in Portland, Oregon, USA in a large building with 100 artists, and when I saw people in the hallways, maybe half of them never said hello. Even people outside our building in Portland, often would not say hello. Now I live in another part of the country, and many of my neighbors say hello. There are many factors involved I think. Economic, racial, geography, social situation....

I heard that hand waving came from people originally showing that they don't have a weapon - it's a show of non-agression.

[AndyRoo]

Oh Helga, mignon, here at the worst asylum known to me, the welfare appartement of my parents, my kind of home from birth until now, I am happy I could cry, each time my "dad" ignores me being only 3 meters away from him for sometime...
You sound very unhappy. I am sorry if you are unhappy. Much of my life I was unhappy also, but I worked very hard, and it took me many years to find the answers I needed. I hope you find peace. Maybe changing your life is a good idea? Move away from your parents may help you? Living alone might make you feel better.

[YesNo]

Greeting is a complicated topic. I live in Portland, Oregon, USA in a large building with 100 artists, and when I saw people in the hallways, maybe half of them never said hello. Even people outside our building in Portland, often would not say hello. Now I live in another part of the country, and many of my neighbors say hello. There are many factors involved I think. Economic, racial, geography, social situation....


Saying hello or acknowledging someone or not is more problematic than hugging for me. When I am walking on the path in the park behind our home, most everyone I pass, even those I don't know, gives and expects some greeting. When I am walking down the street in front of our home, I only greet those people I know.

Generally, I do not greet students because of the age difference and there are many of them going to and from the middle and high schools nearby. Also since our children are no longer in those schools, I don't know these students.

[Iain Sparrow]

Do you live in the region known to foreigners as the wild west? What does "Slap leather!"mean?

I lived in the Western United States most of my life, and in all that time not a once did anyone greet me with "slap leather" or "draw".

"Open Carry", and even "Concealed Carry", is very rare, indeed I never ran across any average citizen in California, Oregon, or Washington State who was "packing heat".
There is no Wild West in the United States. Mostly just a bunch of fat ***, ignorant Americans.

I live in the Deep South, where greetings are friendly and without much formality.
The rest of you could take a lesson from that.

[Danik 2016]

If greetings are friendly in your part of the world why not be friendly too?

[Dreamwoven]

I think that is what Iain Sparrow is saying. A couple of other examples come to mind. Making a sucking sound with the mouth instead of kissing, putting our arm around the neck in mid-air, as it were, without touching the person you are greeting or leaving.

[MANICHAEAN]

Depends where I am.

In France I kiss men I am friends with on two cheeks & hug / with women on all four cheeks.
In Africa one tends to have exotic complicated handshakes, then do not release contact.
In Italy you keep your hands to yourself, as they are used more for waving around in an emphatic manner.
In Russia I hug
Never had to rub noses with an Eskimo yet.

[Delta40]

Handshakes are formal and casual. Hugging between men does happen but the more common greet is a couple of back slaps. Women will hug or kiss cheeks but just saying g'day will do it.

[Dreamwoven]

YesNo is right. There are gender specific greeting forms not covered in this thread. In Hungary, men greet women by saying "I kiss your hand" (kezetcsokolom, with an accent over the second e), or at least they used to half a century ago.

I've been reading Thunder Twilight: Vienna 1913-1914 for a second time.

It is clear that in Austria-Hungary they did kiss hands. There is a photo of a young man (one of the Archduke's sons) kissing the hand of the German Kaiser between pp. 210-211. This was probably a Central European custom. Even in 1950 it was archaic and the act of hand-kissing was probably not done at all by then, just a verbal greeting.