Response #19 was in response to #9. I thought I replied directly.
“colored”…yikes. I think the OP is the one who might harbor some bias.
@WildestDream: The OP is a Korean student for whom English is not a native language and for whom the ongoing evolution of what counts as “correct” racial terminology in the US is not a matter of first-hand knowledge.
From the OP’s “other” perspective, I doubt that there is much to differentiate “colored person” (which you seem to regard as somehow indicative of bias or racial animus) from “person of color” (which is, apparently, quite acceptable to the polite classes). To the OP, this kerfuffle over word order and a preposition might well seem like a distinction without a difference.
In fact, one might make the case that an important benefit of having foreign students enroll at US universities is that their seeming “lack of understanding” of the nuances of American culture actually helps Americans to realize how historically contingent those nuances are.
As for the OP’s question, I would note that my daughter grew up in an extremely diverse area of Southern California. (She attended Asian-majority public schools through ninth grade.) She is now at student at Rice University, which is located in Houston–the fourth largest city in the US and the largest in the South. She finds both the cultural environment and the demographic profile of Rice to be, if anything, more diverse and open to multicultural exchanges than was the case at her schools in SoCal. In sum, the OP will find that many Southern cities are now quite ethnically diverse (having moved beyond the historic black-white divide) and globally connected; in addition, as others have noted, the OP will also find that college campuses in general tend towards openness and diversity.
“If I were Korean, I would not hesitate to attend a major university in the south like UNC or William and Mary. I probably would hesitate to attend a small college in a remote location.”
Well…it would depend on the small college:s Middlebury, for example, is small and remote, but very proud of it’s socially conscious staff & students.
OP, the bottom line is that it is very very hard to generalize in any direction. Violence towards you b/c of your ethnicity is exceptionally unlikely anywhere. Overtly racist behavior (such as specific rudeness) towards you as an Asian is also unlikely. Who is racist to whom can also have a regional component (eg, asians in CA, hispanics in some cities & the southwest, african-americans in the south) based on where there were historically comparatively high numbers of a low-social status group of people.
The question of where you will feel welcome / comfortable is too tied to you and your own temperament for any of us to be able to guess. I could say that, in general, southerners are (on average) more superficially welcoming- you get more chat in the check out line, for example. Does that translate into how fast you become actual friends, compared to people in the northeast? I’m not so sure about that (I think real friendship takes a time no matter where you are in the world).
Somebody upthread pointed out that international students often stick together by ethnicity (the Korean students at one table, the Chinese students at another, for example)- a readily observable phenomenon. That doesn’t necessarily mean that nobody else wants to be friends with them- it can speak to how they have been told to behave by people at home or to insecurity (not having confidence in your language skills, not understanding cultural references, shyness in starting conversations with strangers, etc). Note that these things are often true for new domestic students!
Having been the (very obvious) foreigner, and lived in places where nobody looks like me, speaks my language etc, I understand the comfort that comes from finding somebody from ‘home’. When you get to wherever you end up going, my advice is to push yourself to have more than one friend group. That is hard, especially at the beginning, when you feel pulled in opposite directions. The easiest way I found was to have a social group from my home country and both academic and activity-based friend groups made up of whoever was in those groups already. Over time some of the groups start to overlap, which was great.
The term “colored” isn’t pejorative everywhere. It’s used in South Africa for people of mixed race. They use it themselves. My parents support a church consisting mostly of colored people outside of Cape Town. I love visiting them. It never ceases to amaze me how the black and colored people I talk to down there hold no bitterness for their mistreatment during apartheid.
I’ve seen more racial problems in Maine than I saw growing up in Texas, by the way.
you attract what you anticipate
What about the NAACP (the “The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People”)? Can we really be too harsh on a Korean national when one of the most prominent internationally known organizations for African American interests uses the term in its name? (I understand the historical aspect of the name, no need to flame, but would a Korean?)
I would agree with the observation of Texas versus Maine, btw. I have personally seen much worse race relations and racism in the Northeast and California, both of which places I lived for many years, than in the South, where I have also lived.
@Publisher - agreed on the SPLC, they can paint with a very broad brush. Didn’t they put Ben Carson on their “Extremist Watch List”?
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
A Bloom County cartoon from the 8/28/1988:
Steve Dallas’s Mom: That’s the most adorable little colored girl playing outside.
Steve: “Colored”? You’re saying “colored people” in 1988? You know better, Ma.
Mom: Then why the “National Association for the Advancement of Colored People”? I don’t think Negroes mind at all.
Steve: DON’T say “Negroes,” Ma! You can’t say “Negroes”!
Mom: Can I say “United Negro College Fund”?
Steve: You are baiting me, Ma!
Dad (from his EZ Boy) That’s it, we’re leaving.
Mom: Stay put, Reginald. Mister “Socially Sensitive” isn’t through shaming his parents into enlightenment.
Steve: Everybody just calm down. Let’s agree to use the new-age term “people of color.”
Mom: People of color.
Steve: People of color.
Mom: Colored people.
Steve: NO!!
Dad: We’re leaving.
@Sue22, you made my day 
I’m an asian born and raised in Texas, people here are friendly.
I didn’t mean any offense with the word “colored people”, I assumed it was the same meaning as “people of color” (which is what seems to be the appropriate word). I apologize if anyone was mistaken, I just wanted to use a term that combines all non-white people (Asians, African-Americans, Latinos, etc) to skip the listing.
The better phrase is : “people of color”.
If you read Jeremy Lin’s book, in it he mentions that at many of the Ivy League schools, racial epithets were thrown at him all game in those gyms. Now this was less than 10 years ago and not 100 years ago. He didn’t name the worst offender school but it doesn’t take a genius to narrow down the schools - rural schools, of which there are only a couple of them.
The fact of the matter is, racism exists everywhere. Even in California. All you have to look at is how the blacks used an excuse to go after Korean places during the Rodney King riots. But I’m sure someone will point out things that Asians in general do that are racist as well.
Generally, for not just race but also things such as disabilities mainly but also traits generally, often including religion, race, etc, it has been more accepted these days to use “person first” language. While it may seem like an inconsequential distinction, the idea is that putting “person with x” or “person of religion X faith” implicitly breaks stereotypes associated with discrimination. The short version is that rather than defining a person by the characteristic, you list the characteristic as a single trait or part of a person. This is pretty new though and it’s 100% understandable to not be up to date on these things. Hopefully this is helpful 
Link for context/further reading if desired: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People-first_language
There is a pretty vibrant Korean community in Atlanta (and suburbs).
that vibrant Asian community is that way in part because many show their true colors, so to speak:
https://psmag.com/news/ghosts-of-white-people-past-witnessing-white-flight-from-an-asian-ethnoburb
Atlanta’s Korean community is not that town (or county), but the larger point is the flight away from Asians is not unique to Atlanta. It’s in other major cities, not just in the south.
@ProfessorPlum168 - your “orange face” comment seems to be showing your true colors.
Happily, most posters on here seem to be above such callous rhetoric.
Yeah you got me, I’m showing my true colors. Whatever you mean by that. Too bad orange face seems to favor only one color.