clique-oriented, where you have your close friends from a very young age, but casual acquaintances keep each other at arms length much moreso That's how I feel

clique-oriented, where you have your close friends from a very young age, but casual acquaintances keep each other at arms length much moreso That's how I feel in Vienna, too, despite making huge efforts to find/make friends (like throwing conferences, hosting UGs, parties, etc). Even my Austrian friends who are from outside the city have the same problems. I've decided to give up. It seems to be tied to a fear of novelty… people are too comfortable, but they complain about the advantages they have. Everything here is so goshdarn nice and even that it seems like people have lost the ability to "stretch" to deal with something new, different, or unexpected. (And sadly that seems to extend to people.) In fact, even their own emotions seem muted -- rather than excitement, or passion, or even hate, or joy, everything seems to be fairly even. Simple example: it's very rare to find someone laughing in a restaurant or cafe, and if you do, others will stare. This social posture seems to be a lot more common in Europe than in, say, the US. And more common yet again in the Germanic cultures (incl. Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Netherlands, and most of Scandinavia) than in the Latin cultures. Who knows if it's echoes from the war or something else.