Tibet's exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has opened a three-week tour of North America in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was introduced to a new type of welcome.
Memphis Mayor Myron Lowery greeted the Dalai Lama with the "fist bump," where instead of a handshake, two people touch fists.
The Dalai Lama laughed, but later said the gesture reminds him of violence.
He will be honored Wednesday at the National Civil Rights Museum, the former Memphis motel where civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in 1968.
The Dalai Lama's North American tour will also take him to California, New York City, the capital Washington, and three Canadian cities.
But he will not meet with U.S. President Barack Obama during the visit.
That meeting will likely come after Mr. Obama's trip to China in November.
China regards the Dalai Lama as a Tibetan separatist, which the Dalai Lama denies.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and Bloomberg.
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