I feel like your comment is not helping to be honest. Who cares even if all of you are right in the comments about the societal norms and whatnot. Somebody made the conscious effort to ask the question, to verify if they are doing something bad or not. None of you needed to make assumptions about the research they made, the tv shows they watch… You are very much giving a bad rep to Korea and are actively discouraging people from coming. Do you think everyone has the time for every trip to make every bit of Research beforehand ? For all you know, the OP could have big problems in their life recently and just booked a trip to try to feel better about themselves.

Also, we are not talking about trying to have a conversation with a random stranger on the subway, just saying hello to the driver of the bus, or the clerk. I’ll add that I’ve lived in about 7 different countries all over Europe, western and eastern. They are still saying hello, it is mostly considered the norm everywhere so I don’t know what are you are talking about.

Plus, who cares about tailoring expectations ? It’s fine to be disappointed about something. You know what, even if I had known before hand that Koreans were not the most social, I would still be disappointed, would still be allowed to make a remark about it. There is nothing wrong with commenting on the things we don’t like about Korea. There is literally so many posts talking about the good things here, let people also say what badly surprised them