In democratic circles, we have often heard calls for “a show of hands”. People signal their assent or dissent to a specific issue by a mere gesture. It is gestures I want to dwell on in the permitted space, because nothing does gestures better than the hands — the eyes may try but will always end up runner-up.

Using an assortment of five fingers on the one hand people and cultures have been able to come up with an amazing compendium of gestures. Some we recognise readily: The celebratory fist pump or the high five, crossed fingers when wishing good luck, the clenched fist signifying defiance or solidarity, the ‘blah blah’ gesture, which involves snapping the fingers and thumb together rapidly to indicate a mouth that won’t stop talking, holding the forefinger and thumb to form a circle while the other three are raised to say that everything is fine, extending the thumb, index and little fingers while the middle and ring fingers touch the palm to say, ‘I love you’.

Some we are not altogether sure of, or may not have encountered. Or, we need to know that their acceptance isn’t universal — the fig sign, for example, where the hand and fingers are curled and the thumb thrust so that it pokes out between the middle and index fingers. Only in half the world is this recognised as a sign of good luck. In the other half, you’d better be warned, for your intentions may be totally misconstrued and you could invite an insulting gesture in return, such as the loser sign, where the thumb is extended while the index is raised straight to form the letter L. Yes, the fig sign is best avoided.

Then, of course, there is that universal symbol of arrogance that would be found inadmissible in any courtroom. The one involving the middle finger. So, I am in my car, driving to the mall. It is a rainy morning and it is still peak hour. It is also the long weekend and traffic authorities have announced that double demerits apply. The authorities are apparently clamping down on offenders. The traffic light goes amber just as I begin to approach it and by the time I reach it to pass I know it will have gone red, so I do what I think is the safe thing and brake to a halt. Evidently the lady in the car behind me doesn’t agree with my judgement. Her tyres screech to a halt behind and as soon as that sound dies down her horn comes to life. I catch a two-second glimpse of her in the rearview mirror. In that fleeting instant I can tell she is not some teenage hothead with a need for speed. Probably in her 30s, I’d say.

At first glance you’d think she was practising some lengthy classical declamation or oratory. I, of course, realise, she is mouthing off. I am in her niger libri, or, in English, her black books judging by the black looks.

Anyway, the lights are kind, they don’t give me too much time to ponder other people’s irritability. They go green and away I go. And a-w-a-y she goes, first round me, at an incredible speed with tyres squealing, then in front of me, cutting in with, to be honest, an exhilarating display of lane-changing that would do any Formula 1 boss proud. I am unfortunately not a Formula 1 boss and I am not in the mood to appreciate dramatics or hysterics on the roads.

I switch lanes. She — who has been craving speed — actually slows until our vehicles are parallel, so that I may see her face properly, I assume. It is then that she gives me ‘the gesture’. She certainly is making an elaborate point on the virtues of rashness. And all of it in front of the little child that sits open mouthed in the seat beside her. A child not more than two years old.

Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia.