During several of our visits to Indonesia I was surprised with how the children greeted me. After distributing gifts that were made from school children in the U.S., they lined up to honor and thank me. What they did was not a typical handshake that we are familiar with here in the West. They held my hand, then some of them would kiss the back of it and then place it to their forehead. Others would touch the back of my hand with their nose and then place it on their forehead.

I didn’t have the time to investigate the explanation for this cultural norm, but I am very interested in learning about it in the future. I look forward to passing along many more of these interesting cultural curiosities in the future, and would welcome anybody to inform or correct me if I have incorrectly understood something.