If everyone is your friend then no-one is. I wouldn't say curt and standoffish, but it's good to keep a certain amount of distance and formality with people you're not actually friends with so that you both know where you stand.
Unless friendliness is an expected social signal, and there's a separate signal, known to the local culture, but not to you, that says, "I'm being nice but we aren't actually friends".
Same happened when I had interviews for American companies. They were so excited about everything and overly enthusiastic I can't help but thing I'm being interviewed by psychos.
In the United States this is considered a "normal" amount of politeness. In some other cultures it is considered weird and fake. Some Americans go abroad and complain everyone was "rude" to them not realizing the cultural differences.
Why should one need a reason to be friendly? Would you rather people be curt and standoffish by default?