Hugging for us Chinese is as foreign a concept as, say, using knife and fork on the dinner table. But this alien custom has become popular of late as free hug campaigns spread across the country's major cities.

It's not so easy to cheer up strangers on the streets of China with just free hugs, something embraced now by enthusiastic youths from Beijing and Changsha to Nanjing and Guangzhou.

"We were inspired by an event in Changsha," said a young organizer. "Free hugs will bring people closer and make the world more like a big family."

Physically, maybe, my dear friend! But a big family is a matter of hearts coming together.

Many of these youths were discouraged by police from achieving their goal, mostly for blocking pedestrians' paths in the ever-more crowded cities. Their "care from strangers," and "refuse to be apathetic" messages drew attention from many passers-by, but not their participation.

Why would they? We have greeted each other for centuries in the traditional way: left hand palm covering that of the folded right near the chest, with the head slightly bowed.

Indians greet each other in much the same way, except that their palms are pressed together. The Japanese bow in greeting.

So where does that leave alien habits like hugs?

Well, even our closest relatives in the animal kingdom, chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans, don't seem to have this awfully unnecessary hugging habit. To know why, we may have to seek the help of "Leakey's Angels," as Jane Goodall, Diane Fossey and Birute Galdikas are known. But I doubt whether even these pioneering primatologists have devoted any part of their studies to "great ape hugs."

The little knowledge I have suggests that the great apes, which include the bonobos, see strangers either as a threat or as a nuisance. And how are threats and nuisances treated in the animal kingdom? With aggression and violence!

Sorry Juan Mann, hugging is not for us. Mann claims to have started all this hugging business in Australia two years ago. Well, that is what he told Oprah Winfrey on her programme recently.

That may not be true, after all. This free-hugging campaign has two claiming pioneers. For all intents and purposes, at least that's what the Free Hugs website says, American Jason Hunter started all this hugging business in 2001.

The death of his mother, when he realized her power to spread happiness among the people she met, inspired Hunter to set up Free Hugs.

But imagine what Free Hugs' motto is: "We are dedicated to letting every single person know that they matter through our commitment to the community. We will always strive to serve people without judgment by way of our loyalty to humanity." Hey, no mention of hugs!

I was right, you see! Hugs are not needed to make people feel they are wanted.

That's good news for us because a body contact business like hugging has been a big no-no in our other oriental cultures. Traditionally, Asians are not even supposed to shake hands while greeting each other.

But we do so now, don't we?

Yet we refuse a kind hug without a good explainable reason.

Maybe our apathy is because we have never thought like Leo Buscaglia, who writes in Free Hugs' Quote of November: "Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around."

You may not believe me after all that I have just said. But the truth is I've always been ready for a hug as long as it's not from a bear in the wild, or anywhere else (especially the stock exchange), for that matter.

Email: zouhr@chinadaily.com.hk

(China Daily 11/10/2006 page4)