You see it practiced everywhere in Thailand.

Tuk-tuk drivers. Hotel staff. Food vendors on the street. People you know. People you don’t.

It’s called a wai.

It’s a simple enough gesture:

Two hands pressed together.

A slight bow of the head.

A few spoken syllables.

Physically tiny. Socially enormous.

That’s the wai.

You might think of it as the Thai version of a handshake.

But the wai is more than a greeting.

It can express gratitude.

Offer an apology.

Show respect.

Demonstrate reverence.

Talk about an all-purpose gesture.

But most importantly, the wai is a physical expression of relationship.

A wai acknowledges who you are, who the other person is, and the relationship between you.

A child to a parent.

A student to a teacher.

A salesperson to a customer.

A Buddhist to a monk.

And then there is the other side of the wai.

The receiving end.

Something happens when someone gives you one.

Trust me. I’ve been on the receiving end of thousands of them.

You feel noticed.

You feel less like a stranger.

You feel appreciated.

It’s remarkable how such a simple gesture can communicate something that our increasingly frantic world seems to have misplaced:

I see you.

I recognize you.

You matter enough for me to pause for a moment.

Perhaps that’s what I’ve come to appreciate most about the wai.

It takes almost nothing to perform.

But it can mean so much to the person receiving it.

I think our world could use more of that.

Until next time.

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