In a time of coronavirus, when we all wish we had shares in facemasks and hand sanitiser, a Facebook post from an Indian school friend suggests that ‘Namaste’ should become the normative greeting of our era.
Research indicates that we carry 3,200 bacteria from 150 different species on our hands. A high-five, it seems, exchanges eight times the bacteria of a fist bump; a handshake twice as many again. Namaste, a strictly non-touch affair, results in zero bacterial transfer.
Being an Anglo-Celt who grew up in the Subcontinent, I have an attachment to both handshakes and Namastes. A firm handshake has a bluff, no-nonsense honesty about it. In young womanhood, pre-feminist awakening, a handshake made me feel business-like and serious, more (I’m embarrassed to admit) like a bloke. It was more assertive than the alternatives, such as a gawky grin, or an awkward, waist high wave, taking me back to being a shy kid at a school concert, peeking out at her parents.
Namaste, however, is the queen of greetings. It is elegant and eloquent. Traditionally it symbolises saluting the divine in the other, and is normally accompanied by a slight bow of the head. In my childhood memories, exquisite Air India hostesses in shimmering saris greeted passengers at the door of the plane with a graceful Namaste.
Namaste has become accepted around the world as an expression of gratitude and respect; even becoming the emoticon for ‘thank you’ on our smart phones. If a person thanks me for something or expresses appreciation in front of others, it feels the most natural thing to do. When someone has done something for me, I join my palms and do the mini-head bow. It speaks of humility and interconnectedness, the opposite of the fist pumping so ubiquitous in the sports arena, beloved of athletes of every kind, a gesture I find repellent and oozing with arrogance.
In appropriate circumstances I am an enthusiastic hugger, but these days we are aware that for many people, an embrace can be an invasion of personal space akin to a minor assault. Even a handshake may be problematic. The beautiful Namaste honours the individual’s need for space at the same time as it connects us as human beings, recognising what is wonderful and unique in the other.
So, in a world where pandemics loom as yet another thing to make us anxious, we could do worse than forgoing handshakes, high fives and fist bumps for a gracious Namaste.
This was published in The Melbourne Age on 9 March 2020