{"id":15334,"date":"2013-04-23T03:04:13","date_gmt":"2013-04-23T03:04:13","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2025-10-15T12:14:45","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T12:14:45","slug":"koreans-slap-bill-gates-for-rude-handshake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?p=15334","title":{"rendered":"Koreans Slap Bill Gates for \u2018Rude\u2019 Handshake"},"content":{"rendered":"

The buzz in town today is this photograph of Microsoft founder Bill Gates\u2019 shaking hands with South Korea President Park Geun-hye.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gates, 57, might have not realized it Monday, but a one-hand shake in Korean culture \u2013 and also in Asia \u2013 is notably casual, done only when the other party is a good friend, of the same or younger age. Using one hand with the other tucked in the pants pocket is considered rude here, done when one is expressing superiority to the other.<\/p>\n

\u201cPerhaps it was his all-American style but an open jacket with hand in pocket? That was way too casual. It was very regretful,\u201d said Chung Jin-suk, secretary general at the Korean National Assembly.<\/p>\n

President Park\u2019s office has not responded to the handshake and Gates is traveling today.<\/p>\n

But Internet chat rooms and social network sites are filled with views debating cultural differences and analyses of Gates\u2019 laid-back style.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if that was ignorance or just plain disrespect,\u201d Cho Park, a Korean student studying in New York, said. \u201cIt was pretty rude of him. The thing is I\u2019m not sure if it is rude in Western culture.\u201d<\/p>\n

The controversy doesn\u2019t end there. Gates had met with two other previous South Korean presidents: Kim Dae-jung and Lee Myung-Bak. He apparently gave the proper handshake with both hands to the late Kim in 2002 but was spotted giving an improper shake to President Lee in 2008. That also became a subject of debate.<\/p>\n

Some South Korean media have been speculating that perhaps it was intentional, showing his political preference; respect for the opposition leader Kim but disrespect for the ruling party leaders Lee and Park, 61.<\/p>\n

Gates was in South Korea on a three-day visit to promote his start-up TerraPower, which is developing next-generation nuclear reactors.<\/p>\n

You would think he would have been prepped properly.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Source www.abcnews.go.com<\/em>
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