Smashed Starbucks

I lived in Seattle for about two years, and for the first 15 months was right downtown.

As I moved there in the summer of 1999, this put me smack in the middle of the World Trade Organization riots in December 1999. These were amazing to witness. Not only were there demonstrations all day long in the streets and constant updates on the news, but when the police had to enforce the nighttime curfew and started using teargas on the crowd, I could watch the action on TV, then turn around and watch it some more a couple blocks away outside my window!

From my work in Seattle, I knew to avoid getting involved. But, I was an adventurous bachelor and this was probably a once-in-a-lifetime experience, so it was hard to avoid taking a peak. I headed down one afternoon and took several pictures -- among them, these pictures of smashed windows. You can see that Starbucks tried boarding up but still had a window broken. (Of course this was Seattle, and there were two other Starbucks stores within a couple blocks. One that was about a block away from this was later ransacked.)

While I was down there, the crowd actually got startled by something and I was actually caught in a momentary stampede. I accidentally caught this picture whilst running. It was at that time that I decided I probably ought to head back to my apartment and spend the evening listening to the distant sound of police marching rioters off the streets.