there goes my handshake.

I am proud of my handshake. And I like shaking hands. It's a personal, jovial touch to interacting with people.

Recently, in an interactive role-play, my English friends let me know that they wouldn't offer a hand shake in a situation where I did. "It's very formal," they told me. Oh.

Not quite finished with my Jeremy Paxman's The English: A Portrait of a People, I am moving on to Kate Fox's Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behavior.

Fox is an anthropologist who, like Paxman, is herself English.

She says, in general, "There is no universal prescription of handshakes on initial introduction- indeed, they may be regarded as too "businesslike" - and the normal business practice of giving one's name at this point is also regarded as inappropriate (Fox 39)."

Got it. No handshakes and don't start off with names; ease into it. Glad I am learning this two weeks before I leave.