Cultural differences

[indigo_rose99]

In my time in France I have several times walked by people doing the alternating cheek kisses.  Sometimes it was at work, and just now two people standing in the airplane aisle next to me did it.  What is surprising to me is not that they did it, it is my own reaction:  I look away in... Something.  Embarrassment.  Dismay.  My gut reacts to it in the same way I react to a couple exporing each other's tonsils in public.  I have no idea why I react this way.  Intellectually, I know this is a greeting between people who are not necessarily intimate.  But still, this is my instinct.

Is it just me?  Is this a Texan thing?  A US thing? An N.American thing? 

Comments

[pamwheatfree.livejournal.com]

I take the double cheek kiss to be a hug in American. The Swiss kiss three times and that confuses me, but it doesn't make me embarrassed. I found that I actually like it. I am trying to teach others to do the alternate cheek kiss. It really isn't as intimate as a hug at all. You do not kiss them on the lips unless you are really good friends. I got used to it on the first try. I was surprised by someone I had talked to on the QE2 a few times. Right before we were all getting off the ship he kissed me on the cheek and it felt nice.

It is just you. It is not as intimate as a hug where you press your body into someone else's.

[ovrclokd.livejournal.com]

i think both north american and the US are too big and too diverse to have "things" in general... texas may be small enough / homogeneous enough, but even there, what would you call a "standard" texan?

however, to answer your questions, i would say no, insufficient data, probably not, and probably not. it seems statistically improbable that you're the only one to have that reaction; i don't know enough about texans to characterize; and i would guess that the majority of US or north american residents don't share your reaction.

for me, it just looks like a handshake, with a small added element of "oh, shit, which side do we kiss first??" if the people in question are known to me and likely to move on to me next...

[clubjuggler.livejournal.com]

In Spain they do the "kiss" (which really isn't a kiss, it's more of a cheek-to-cheek thing) once on each cheek but only between men and women and sometimes women and women. Men and men shake hands. It kind of through me when I went to France and they did it three times (where I was, but they told me four times in other locations) and everyone does it, even men with men.

But, it didn't bother me that much. *shrug*

[reedrover]

Since I'm a personal-space-is-sacred kind of person, I'd much rather go with bowing and nodding than even shaking hands.

Growing up in / with Californians, kissing was reserved for near-and-dear relatives. Grandma kissed everyone, Grandpa kissed everyone under the age of 10, and Mom and Dad kissed each other.

Watching people air-kiss at each other annoys me because it seems like it cheapens kissing. Due to the silliness that has infected America, it also annoys me because I translate back that these people are indulging in an affectation rather than a reality... So yea, I look away from the obnoxious people spitting on each other's ears.