The blog is called "depressing Finland" which is kind of a Finland meme. It's certainly played up on the Internet but it's got a kernel of truth. I have a couple of very good friends in Finland and I've visited the country and it's a lovely land filled with lovely people. But it's true they can be aloof to other people at first. My Finnish friend joked that Finnish people don't care about others until you get drunk with them, then you have a lifelong friend. That's actually true to an extent.
Finns can be very introverted, which leaves some more outgoing people with the feeling that Finns are anti- (or a-) social and depressed. That's not the case. The Finnish culture just values introversion, privacy, and polite public behavior. This contrasts sharply with the European meme of the loud, outgoing, and rude American, and the two cultures see each other in extremes and play up the differences for humor on the Internet.
Germany is that way to a lesser extent. I know my German friends visiting the US find it very odd that people who do not know each other well (or at all) will greet each other when passing by. It seems superficial and fake to them.
I'm from the Midwest and I find NYC and LA to be incredibly alienating for that reason. I'm surrounded by people but none of them acknowledge my existence. If I'm walking around my own downtown almost everyone who passes by will nod or wave or say "nice day isn't it?" just to be polite.
I held a door open for someone when I was in NYC last time, which turned into a big mistake. Everyone else hadn't been paying attention and when they saw me holding open the door they must have assumed I was a doorman and everyone flooded through the open door not giving me the chance to catch back up to my group. Meanwhile in the Midwest, if someone is a few steps behind you and you let the door close, they're going to be complaining about how rude you were for hours.
Thanks for the explanation! I am always curious to learn about other cultures. TBF I am an introvert myself but it was interesting to see the behavior extended to the mainstream.
Relatedly? "...an intact amygdala is necessary for feelings of discomfort following personal space violations, thus helping to automatically regulate interpersonal distance." - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4123873/
(Also, for those curious: Space Invaders: Personal Space and Autism "...it is possible that a dysfunction in the amygdala contributes to problems in maintaining an appropriate social distance in autism." - https://www.iancommunity.org/ssc/personal-space-autism)
