Ancient orchids custom

Not sure how many of you watch Curb Your Enthusiasm with Larry David, nut there is an episode where he goes to a Japanese acupuncturist. They make a $5000 bet as to if he can cure Larry's problems or not. The next day after the appointment Larry receives orchids from him. He's unsure if this is a Japanese custom or if the acupuncturist is interested in him. At the end of the episode he says thank you for the orchids and then asks if he does that for all his patients. The acupuncturist doesn't give a straight answers and just says "Ancient Japanese custom." while awkwardly staring at Larry. I'm not sure if the joke was that this is really a custom and Larry, the self-absorbed man that he is, just assumes the acupuncturist is interested him in him like he assumed other men in the past were or if he genuinely was interested in him putting Larry in an awkward situation as usual. Can anyone shed light on this supposed custom?

I don't know that program, but maybe the whole flower episode is supposed to be a joke, right? I don't know where this was filmed in (in the States?), but orchid has never been a part of traditional Japanese culture, so I find it unlikely that anyone claims that this belong to any "ancient custom"...

Growing orchids only started around 250 years ago in Japan, and became common practices among commoners much later during the turn of the 20th century when Japan got the accesses to the mountain of Taiwan and the southern China.

It's never been an ancient tradition, and the presenting orchid doesn�ft mean anything particular. It's just the part of Asian-theme storyline I guess.

To begin with, acupuncturism is originally from China. You can go to any acupuncturist clinic in Japan and feel loads of Chinese influence. They's hardly any "Japanese" feel from a Japanese point of view. If any, it's only as old as our great grandparents.

At the same time, a lot of locals tend to say "this or that is an old Japanese custom" without thinking much. Hey, I know a lot of Americans would say "this or that is an American tradition" but how traditional is the U.S.A.? People just say that.

And acupuncturist and orchids? Wow, that probably sounds as Japanese as karate from the English speaking world's point of view. And karate to us Japanese is very non-ancient Japanese.