Yeah, so that's what people from Seattle are called. I'm still trying to get used to their strange mixture of niceness and reserve. Seattlites don't get involved. It's none of their business. Even when that business involves a frail old woman in a scooter that has tipped over while riding a bus, which i witnessed today.
The riders in the woman's immediate vicinity just looked at her with disgust as she slipped closer to the floor of the bus. I stood up and tried to help as much as i could (while still blocked into my seat by the woman next to me), and after a few moments a man came up from further back to help.
Once upright the woman had to maneuver her scooter into a better riding position, and it soon became clear that she was not a skilled scooter driver. The bus driver helped her steer while the other passengers continued to look on, apparently exasperated that this woman was taking up so much time.
I will readily agree that she should not have been riding the bus alone and that further scooter practice was warranted before attempting this trip, but the lack of human decency in my fellow bus riders shocked me (yes, even i, a devout misanthropist, was disappointed in their behavior).
This is only one example of the thoughtlessness i have seen here, a thoughtlessness that often gets glossed over as "Scandinavian reserve" by people I talk to about it. I just can't help thinking that if the same situation had arisen in Atlanta, people would still have been annoyed at the delay, but many more of them would have stood up to help. Atlantans may be pushy, but they are essentially human. I'm not so sure about these Seattle-bots.
