Is a Man Kissing a Man OK?

No, no, no, I don’t mean what you just thought. I just wanted to ask if it is OK from a purely Western perspective to see Georgian male friends and acquaintances kissing each other every time they run into one another, regardless of the format of that occasion– formal or informal.

For us, the Georgian men, hugging and shoulder-patting are not enough as a tool to demonstrate delight at an encounter. I wonder what a regular Westerner would infer watching a Georgian male twosome kissing each other and sobbing into each other’s necks at a moment of mutual inebriation in a party as a finale of another wordy maudlin toast in our unique partying tradition.

I would not blame that curious eye of said outlandish observer for getting it wrong, because an intimate physical touch between two males, especially one which is ornately marked with a kiss, might definitely instigate a thought about untraditional male conduct. Don’t take my sarcastic approach wrong though – I myself behave exactly the same way, never recognizing that my habitual demeanor might look unattractive because I, too, am part of a tradition which persists and influences. On the other hand, I have always wondered why a handshake is not good enough a gesture in Georgia to symbolize sufficiently an encounter between men, and why a smooch on the cheek is reckoned indispensable even if the two parties are not closely associated in any possible way.

A qualified psychologist might patiently explain that the kissing encounter pattern is one of our social traditions, which purports nothing wrong on earth – just an emphasis to the degree of friendly feelings and the emotionality of the moment. Some would explain this as a sample of emulation, a kiss-and-hug being the Russian way of greeting. I have seen many times on the television Russian leaders, especially the late Secretary Brezhnev and other Russian bosses, kissing each other, and even some foreign dignitaries, on the lips at hello-goodbye ceremonies. I don’t know how fair it would be to say this, but I have also heard that the Georgians have been influenced by Russians in terms of utilizing the sultriest of swear words that all of us are now used to hurling at each other at times of brawl and quarrel. We can certainly say that without earning any punitive measures against us on the part of the Russians, but it will not change a thing.

By asking you the question, I simply wanted to know if such a big graphic and cultural difference between the Georgian and the Western behavioral patterns would act as an obstacle on our way into the European family of nations, be it EU, NATO or anything else. No tongue in cheek! I am asking this seriously. Or, if we were someday compelled to change our greeting manners to the best of our political advantage, would we cope with the hard task as easily as we might wish? As the saying goes, tradition is a second habit.

Let us forget politics for a second and the ugliness of straight men kissing each other every so often without any reason to do so, and turn to our elementary bodily cleanliness. Hygienically speaking, kissing as frequently as we do in Georgia might be damaging to all of us in our times of accelerated germ proliferation, and connected with that, a multiple explosion of illnesses. Why can’t we just go ahead and shake hands and put into this friendly gesture all our heart and mind as elegantly and munificently as we can? Summertime is approaching and taking this little piece of advice won’t hurt. Yes, summers make the worst time for those harmful and dangerous damp kisses, so let us kill the weird tradition if the weird tradition is hurting us. Trust me, friendships and love will not suffer for it.

Nugzar B. Ruhadze