I'm having the exact same issue you guys haveYou could be on to something. That sounds like the exact same issue I had. Let my try connecting to my Linux server from my Linux client box and see if I can reproduce the issue.
-----EDIT #1-----
It's definitely something related to non-Windows computers, then. I just tried connecting to both a Linux server and a Windows server via a Linux client, and both times the client failed to load. At this point I really do believe it's something with the Mono that Terraria ships with. Any chance you could get your friend to host a server with Magic Storage and see if you end up with the same issue?
My client is Linux, and I am connecting to my friends server (Windows)
He can use the storage fine, but my storage heart says "0/0 items"