Kiss On My List

The kiss. It is of course a social grace here, and is becoming so in countries where previously the notion of puckering up to a relative stranger would once have been considered the height or low of poor hygiene or the grounds for a visit from the men in heavy boots with a sex offence warrant. Let us put it all down to holidays abroad, Princess Diana, cross-cultural business advice seminars and the Spice Girls. The kiss, the social kiss, is on everyone's lips and all over their cheeks as well.

The Mallorcan and Spanish kiss is a relatively straightforward affair - one, two. Done. There is though the protocol. Always lead with your right, as it were. Whether one kisses air or flesh is largely immaterial. The local kiss does not have to become an interruption, unlike the French kiss, by which I mean ... oh, come on. Depending upon which part of France the kissers come from, the exchange of pecks can amount to not far short of douze points-squared of slobbering. I have witnessed communes of French people coming together on a beach. The time it takes to perform the multiple kissing with every single member of the groups and then the repetition just to make sure no one was missed out first time means that by the end of the procedure it's time to pack up and go - not before going through the whole rigmarole again however.

The northern European, in particular the stiff upper-lipped Brits whose stiff upper lips do not make for good social kissing or indeed any come to that, can find all this carry-on slightly embarrassing, even if it is now becoming more widely accepted. It is perhaps one thing for men to kiss women and for women to kiss women, but for men to kiss men? Lighten up, it isn't the precursor for a good rogering; well not usually anyway. Not that men-on-men kissing is widely practised except between family members and good friends, but it can happen outside of such relationships. I have engaged in some male bonding by means of the social kiss, not at my instigation, and it does take one aback a tad. But, hey, we're all metrosexuals now, whatever they are. And expressions of affection between and across the genders are to be found in the language as well. "Un abrazo" (hug), "un beso" (kiss) and even "un besito" (little kiss) are commonly used as a goodbye.

Perhaps the greatest challenge of protocol is knowing who to kiss and who not to. And I, like many I suspect, don't really have the answer. Should I , for instance, kiss my female bank manager? I mean, I get on fine with her, but one still has the nagging fear that to go for the air kiss might be interpreted in a way it is not meant to be, though with a bank manager it might infer a request for a substantial interest-free loan with no payback. There again, shaking hands with women has always seemed a rather strange thing - to me at any rate.

You can sometimes witness unease. I was once with someone who might vaguely be described as a business contact. He had a reputation, one largely fostered by himself, of being a between-the-sheets athlete on a Casanovan scale. When we met up with a couple (not Spanish), he instantly dived into a hug and a right and left with the lady whom he had not previously met, unlike her husband whose face suggested that his missus had just been propositioned. Reputation in the social kissing arena can count for much especially if the advance comes from one with a history of rapid bedding. The social kiss should not be treated as an invitation to a shag, but some may actually see it like that.

The rules of kissing are hard to define. Perhaps one should have a sort of checklist to swiftly mentally activate when confronted by a potential kiss situation. The possibility of contracting a disease or a severe case of halitosis may well be grounds for spurning the offer, but decorum suggests that such a list should not include do I fancy so-and-so. And remember that leading from the right. Go for a left-right combination and chances are that the confusion will result in your nose-butting your partner, and it's no good saying that this is how the Eskimos do it unless you are carrying an ice-pick and have a pack of howling huskies behind you. I guess you will just have to use your judgement. Just don't go kissing the wrong person.

* Some of this takes as reference a piece from "The Guardian" (5 August), "A Moment On The Lips", .....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/aug/05/humanbehaviour.familyandrelationships.

And while with "The Guardian", there was a piece yesterday about a German woman who, for the last ten years, has lived in Palma airport. She had no home and no money, so she just started living there. Can't say I've ever seen her. There again, I don't suppose you would necessarily notice. Extraordinary story. Go here for the whole thing: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/aug/09/spain.germany.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Doobie Brothers - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMHFmr5fuyc. Today's title - white soul.

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