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May 31, 2004

Sneeze & Gossip

Do you have the experience of sneezing continuously several times in a row and cannot make it stop? It happens to me a lot lately and my nose has been so itchy, yikes!!!

In American culture, people would say "God Bless You!" to the person who sneezes, and I guess the origin is because of the superstitious belief that your spirit will get "sneezed" out at the same time and hopefully God would come to your rescue!

In Japanese culture, the superstitious belief is that there must be somebody talking behind your back or gossiping "うわさ" (uwasa) about you. Chinese happen to have the same belief too about sneezing.

誰が私のうわさをしているのだろう。

Who is talking behind my back?