Comment by toomim
4 hours ago
It depends strongly on the city, and became more pronounced since covid.
Seattle is the worst. They call it the "seattle freeze." The San Francisco Bay Area became almost as bad in covid.
The south is still friendly. Austin is incredibly friendly with strangers. Miami has strong stranger vibe. NYC is still alive, too.
It may also depend on where you're from. I'm British, have travelled around the US, and never had problem engaging in chit chat with all sorts of people, big cities or not. But there's a strong disarming undercurrent of "oh wow, you're from England" through the whole experience that I expect most Americans never experience, at least within their own country.