I'm hesitant to move further from TFA, but a brief one-shot: Among Boston people who returned after "trying" SV/SF/California, I repeatedly heard of struggling, amidst an unfamiliar ambient "friendliness" culture, to recognize social signals around "actual" friendship - was someone "really" interested in becoming friends, or were they merely performing "friendly". AI tells me this is called peach vs coconut, nice vs kind, guess vs ask cultures.
Similarly, someone (with no family connection to China) learned Chinese, later married into a family from/in China, and would describe "Chinese" culture. Someone else from China glossed their insights with a dismissive 'their friends are criminals [sic], and they're over generalizing from that subculture'.
So amidst country-level cultural themes, and regional variations, and generational differences (and gender, hukou, ethnicity, etc), and subcultural diversity, it's sometimes a challenge to tell what is which.
My experience is that everyone from outside the Northeast thinks those of us from the Northeast are assholes, and we think they're all two-faced sociopaths.
This rings true. I came to Philly from England in 2004. I'm an outsider, but I get by socially.
Philly does not have a good rep. Sometimes people from elsewhere voice ghetto, hooligan, or snobby-suburban stereotypes. (Whatever! The worst thing is how they say the words "crayon" and "water".)
But whenever I visit California it feels superficial and fake.
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskAnAmerican/comments/ehe25w/why_a...
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskAnAmerican/comments/1k7sfbv/so_w...
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskAnAmerican/comments/1nq71lc/why_...
If my main consideration in an interaction with a stranger is to avoid its escalating to violence, I'm going to be polite, but I'm going to be a bit reserved, not enthusiastic or friendly.
In these discussions, non-Americans often describe Americans as always happy, which is another quality I'm going to tend to avoid showing in the hypothetical interaction with the stranger because if he is feeling bitter or resentful, my being happy might set him off.
That was jut to tell the author that i think he misread how Chineese are on this specific point. It wasn't a criticism of North Americans at all. Really, i think this is charming now (as long as we don't work together, then i will find this infuriating and bitch about it to my SO)