Why Namaste?
In India, people were reluctant to shake hands. This is not an idle fancy or superstition, because every person has a magnetic exhalation.
A person may be in perfect physical health, but his exhalation may be harmful for others who are sensitive to such subtle influences. These magnetic exhalations are more intense from the eyes, palms, fingers, soles of the feet, etc. Hence the reluctance to shake hands. Careful physicians wash their hands before leaving each patient. Just like physical disease, impure magnetism can be communicated by touch.
Again, we see that superstition/tradition, among the Hindus, of not shaking hands with others, is the foundation for spiritual life, of not allowing one's magnetism to become impure by external influences !