Gnarlydorkette: I check this place infrequently as of late so please do forgive the slow responses, but I wanted to ask you about being accused of behaving like a hearing person. Did somebody come up to you and say it? Talk about lacking tact! :P If some people refuse to see positive things about you, that is their loss. 
Never been to DPHH myself, but maybe I will one day when I'm in USA. Yeah, some people can be a bit self absorbed in a concentrated group, but they seem to be friendly if they are by themselves. I guess some people might be too shy to get out of their "group" and tend to stick together. The unknown is scary. I dunno. 
I know for myself if I were chatting in a group, you and others are more than welcome to come up and join me!
Did you mean you walked all the way from US to Gally? Wow. I did that a few times. LOL. Good thing you did it during daylights.. not at 2am when you can expect sleazebags trying to pick you up (speaking from experience).
I also want to say one visit at face's value doesn't really give an objective understanding. I went to Gallaudet for 4 years, and I thought it had its pros and cons. What doesn't? Serious people tend to study in well hidden places, and I have to say I was one of them. I wasn't very social. Always studied and worked. The social butterflies are more... visual, and I think that gives off some kind of impression.
I did think RIT/NTID was nice when I visited it once. Jeeze, their store had everything from photography equipment to textbook!
