When I was a bales teshuva, I thought this practice (as described by the OP- of ignoring another Yid) must be normal amongst the heimishe because that was the way they welcomed me. I got stares, I got cold unsmiling faces staring at me in public, at parties, on the street, in the grocery store lines, but never a hello. I felt very sad and alone.
Some even had the ill manners and chutzpah to whisper right in front of me, to one another about who and what I was.
One of the only and very few women who did approach me in the shul shabbos did so only to inform me, by whispering in my ear after davening “You need to cover your sheital with a tichel”.
After I had already been coming to shul for some time, I saw how they welcomed another stranger. SHe was obviously an Israeli, a new comer, she didn’t have a clue as to the halachas of tznius, she sat in Eliyhu Ha Navi’s beinkel in the Vobish, (since she didn’t know what it was for).
After davening she was surrounded by a few yentas interrogating her as to who she was, and (what she was doing there). What made me sick and angry was afterwards, a conversation I overheard by some of the posh and snobby better ladies during the Kiddush. One was saying “Yes, but WHY would she COME here?”
I mean, it is a shul isn’t it? It is after all G-d’s house isn’t it? I mean it is shabbos isn’t it? I mean she did say she was an out of towner, staying alone in a hostel, didn’t she? I mean we are all jews, aren’t we? OK…SO …whats her question again?
Not one person invited her. Not one person even asked her to join the kiddush. They just do not know how to do it. THis culture has no idea of how to welcome a stranger. Its not a part of this culture. Even though we were once strangers in Mitzrayim.
Although ok, don’t get me wrong, there are always just people with bad middos, and then there are those who absolutely step up and go the extra mile. Its just that its the exception and not the rule, which is the problem, and its also a problem that when they do act this way its very very disturbing.
Let me not make it look that EVERYONE IS THE SAME. some folks were nice to me. Some tried to talk to me. But most stayed away.