In western countries, when you shake hands with someone, and
the handshake you receive is weak and uncertain, the mood it gives off is
something along the lines of shy or uneasy, lacking confidence and perhaps
grace. And sometimes, when there’s no handshake offered at all, the air can get
a bit cold.
It’s rather like this in Japan, only you must remove
handshakes altogether and replace them with bows.
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| This view from Matsue Castle has nothing to do with bowing, but I did go to Matsue last weekend to take a Japanese exam. Matsue is the capital city of the Shimane prefecture in which I live. So, in this loose geographical sense, it relates. |
As we all know, a good handshake has good grip, and involves
a sort of moving-forward of your upper body, as if you’re powering up a punch
with your other arm but decide against it last minute and smile amiably and
genuinely (with your eyes as well as your mouth) instead. This is a confident
handshake. It’s something like a dance move, not that I can dance.
But a good handshake is a bit different to a good bow,
because one doesn’t think of bowing in terms of confidence, but respect. And
you must be aware of the amount of respect you owe the person you’re bowing to.
Certainly reciprocate a bow like you would a handshake, and perhaps bow a
little more than the person bowing to you.
And there are other things to consider. There’s age, social
rank, and familiarity. In the least, consider whether you’re a customer and
they’re a clerk, in which case you wouldn’t be expected to bow back at all. You
should bow when thanking someone for a service they did you, and recognise that
the depth of your bow is proportional to your gratitude. At least, that’s how
it'll be read. Thus more bow is better than less bow. You know, like how
smiling at someone and intonating lots when you thank them is better than not
smiling much and not intonating at all.
You should keep your back straight if you wish to bow
properly, and if you’re bowing more out of respect than out of gratitude (such
as if you’re a student and they’re a teacher), you might prop your hands at
your sides and tense your whole body, like a Pikachu from behind has
electrocuted you and you’re about to collapse! But there’s a twist, see, for
you only collapse half your body – that is, you perform your graceful,
90-degree bow in flawless deference.
But students don’t bow like this very often. Only if
they’re new to the school, or in baseball uniform (because any shortage of respect will be a
stain on the whole team).
Bow when someone opens the door for you, lets you go first,
or hands you the wallet you dropped. Though, when I dropped my wallet at a cafe
in Tokyo, the opposite happened: the guy in the adjacent table picked it up,
handed it to me in two proffered palms and bowed profusely. I thanked him
profusely, and then I thanked God for putting that kind man there. On a different occasion, when I picked up a ticket someone
dropped and handed it to them, they bowed and thanked me, and I just smiled and
said “iie, iie” (not at all). This is also fine.
Of course, as the familiarity increases, the bowing decreases. If a
teacher at school drops something, and I pick it up and pass it to them, they
might, as they thank me, laugh at their clumsiness, and then feign further
clumsiness before continuing the rush to their next class. It’s like any
relationship, working or otherwise: when you’re comfortable with each other,
you replace formalities with humour. It makes the atmosphere a little more
cosy, and life a little more, I don’t know, breathable.
But bowing isn't always so uptight. Take for instance the bowing that occurs from car to car, such as when the road is
narrow and you stop to let the wider vehicle through. You’ll get a slow bow,
and you should give a slow bow back. The slowness in these latter bows denotes sincerity and gentleness, whereas a rushed bow indicates either
impatience or nervousness. So try to take your time with them.
After a casual sports match, face the opposing team, say
“arigato gozaimashita” (thank you very much) and bow properly. And if it’s
formal, run up to them and shake their hands as well. (This is one of the only occasions in which people shake hands in Japan, and due to the lack of practice, these handshakes are usually weak.)
And either bow or wave (or both) when seeing someone off
after having them round for dinner. And bow if you’re the guest, too.
Bowing, unlike a handshake, is an inseparable mix of code
and intuition. Sort of like English grammar (teaching when and how to use the word 'the' is quite the nightmare). But it is just one small piece of Japanese culture; and there
are countless other pieces. Culture comes forth in promises and patience, in
nature, customer service, schedules, tidiness, quietness, slowness of driving,
organisation, school cleaning, staying at work late, the lack of
complaining, and the instinctive, quickfire decision to ‘fight’ (a better
translation: persevere) with every new challenge. And each of these aspects is
inseparable from the whole, an intricate tapestry that can be neither dissected
nor unravelled.
Japan isn’t merely a peculiar island with busy people, big
cities, trains, anime, sushi, theme parks and hilarious game shows. These are
just the strokes of make-up on a face. Japan is peculiar in a thousand deeper,
more sensual ways. Compared to the west, to New Zealand, it’s an entirely
different world. But it’s different in the way two people’s faces are
different, despite them having the same parts. You know they’re different, but
if you were asked how, and to put that in words, you would struggle to respond.
So, I’m also struggling. I can explain bowing, perhaps, but I can’t explain it
within the context of everything else. I can’t show it to you amidst the rest of
the tapestry. The concept of bowing, on its own, might seem a bit tedious, and
the idea of willingly working overtime merely ridiculous. But if you were to come here,
to live here, you might see that each aspect makes sense within the broader framework.
For now, all I can say is that a handshake isn’t a bow, and
Japan isn’t the rest of the world. To see exactly why, I recommend coming over.
This is Matthew, bowing out.
