"What a lovely necklace!" Do you compliment strangers?

I have a tattoo that get complimented all the time, yet I rarely venture to compliment others…

It seems unless I already have a dialogue going, a very large, bearded man with tattoos saying the same isn’t received quite as well. I’ve gotten a mixture of creepy and/or frightened.

Why not in Korea?

They don’t speak English, so they wouldn’t understand what I’m telling them.

“Nice shoes.”

“???”

“I said, ‘Nice shoes!’”

“???”

“never mind …”

j/k