Seattle overview

It’s hard to imagine this sprawling megalopolis as a once humble fishing village, but that is how it all began. Once a dried up, uninhabitable swamp, Dubai was first settled by wandering cattle farmers, who were the first to use the site for agriculture.

The history books suggest that a couple of millennia later, the area where Jumeirah is now, was a caravan site along the trading route from Oman to what is now Iraq.

It is suggested that the earliest mention of Dubai was in 1095 in a book by Abu Abdullah Al Bakri, an Andulasian-Arab geographer, while there was another notation by a Venetian pearl trader in 1580. During this time the area was reliant on fishing, pearl diving, boat building and food and accommodation for those on the trade route.

It made another leap forward in 1793 when the Sir Bani Yas tribe settled in Abu Dhabi, taking political power and Dubai as a dependency. In about 1800, Dubai was fortified, with the Al Fahidi Fort at its core. The areas of Bur Dubai and Al Ras were also walled until 1820, when Britain was able to negotiate a maritime truce and the trading routes were open once again. From then on, Dubai became what was known as ‘a center for crucial activity’.

In 1833, Dubai became independent of Abu Dhabi, and the Al Maktoum dynasty began, one that still has a presence to this day. It was at this time that the leader of the Bani Yas tribe, Maktoum Bin Butti relocated his people to the Shindagha Peninsula and a fishing village was born.

The discovery of oil kicked off the building boom and the once little old fishing village was transformed into what it is today.

It often surprises people when I tell them I am a lifelong Seattleite: The city’s rapid change over the last half-century means that it’s mostly a city of transplants. Only about a third of adults here were born in Washington State, and even fewer in the city.

But the reasons people move here tend to keep much of the city’s inherent characteristics intact. Tech company recruits cement Seattle’s status as one of the most educated big cities in the nation, and young graduates drawn to great nearby nature or the independent and accessible music scene help perpetuate and strengthen each of those subcultures.

About 725,000 people live in the city itself, but combined into a metropolitan area with Tacoma to the south, Bellevue to the east, and a handful of suburbs to the north, it consists of around four million people. About a fifth of the city and metro area is foreign-born, with more than half of those immigrants coming from Asia, while Seattle has a notably smaller Hispanic immigrant population than most parts of the country.

English is the predominant language in Seattle, and the only language spoken by three-quarters of the population. However, the city aspires to multicultural ideals, which means that many signs on public transportation and information online, as well as many documents from city-run services, are all translated into the major second languages here: Chinese, Spanish, Vietnamese, Amharic, Korean, and Taga log. In the Chinatown-International District, South End, and other neighborhoods with concentrated immigrant populations, many restaurant and business signs are in those languages as well. Tourist facilities, including hotels and museums, also have translated materials, especially into Chinese languages and Japanese.

A newer movement has brought the Salish languages of local Indigenous tribes to some signage, but so far that is fairly sparse and mostly outside the city, near tribal lands.

About a third of Seattle’s population considers itself religiously unaffiliated. About half of Seattle is nominally Christian (heavily Protestant), but when it comes to belief in God or participation in organized religion, Seattle consistently ranks among the lowest in the U.S. Other religions with notable populations in the city include Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism. The lack of religion and religious diversity does not signify hostility, but rather the opposite: Few people feel strongly about the importance of religion other than that people should be able to practice openly as they choose.

Anything goes in Seattle, and if you do something wrong, the worst thing you’ll get is a quizzical look. But if you’re looking to fit in with the locals, leave the suit at home, ditch the umbrella, and don’t smoke. Seattle’s casual culture makes packing easy: No need to worry about wrinkled shirts or dress codes at restaurants (there’s only one place in town that requires men to wear a jacket, and it keeps a stash of loaners). Even at the opera or ballet, more than a few patrons will be wearing jeans and their “fancy” flip-flops, and all of them will have outdoorsy fleece or down coats, rather than tailored jackets.

Those coats also play into another Seattle quirk: Because the bulk of the rain here comes in the form of constant light drizzle, umbrellas tend to be overkill. It’s a long-running joke that umbrellas are how we spot tourists, but the reality is that most locals just choose a jacket that has a bit of waterproofing and saves the bulk of carrying something extra. In the occasional winter downpour, though, please know we are all very envious of those “outcasts” carrying their umbrellas!

One thing broadcasts your outsider status more clearly than your rain gear, though: smoking cigarettes. King County has some of the lowest smoking rates in the country. Smoking tobacco in any form (including vapes and e-cigarettes) is illegal in any public place or place of employment, which rules out just about every building outside of a stand-alone private house. The law also extends to within 25 feet of an entrance, exit, or air intake. In parks, smoking is illegal within 25 feet of other people, near playgrounds, picnic areas, and beaches. Even in a city only semi-dense, like Seattle, that eliminates most of the city. If you do find a place to smoke a cigarette, you still may not endear yourself to locals.

Seattle’s been booming and busting since its founding in the mid-19th century. It thrived during gold rushes, logging frenzies, wartime manufacturing, and most recently, the explosion of the tech sector. A bust followed each of these booms, but never enough to destroy the city’s strong economy.

On the shoulders of modern tech companies, particularly Amazon and Microsoft, Seattle’s economy weathered well the recent downturns and recessions. Other companies founded here, including Starbucks, Costco, and Nordstrom, round out the economy and continue to highlight the city’s role in their success in their brand storytelling.

The economic success does make the city somewhat expensive, with a very tight labor market making it hard for businesses to use low-wage workers to tamp down prices. In other words, one of the reasons meals here are expensive is that restaurants have to pay their dishwashers decent wages.

Seattle’s decades of growth and rapidly increasing cost of living have left many people behind, and the city has sadly failed to support those struggling here. The city’s homeless population is very visible, especially on Downtown streets, and many lack the care needed for their mental health or addiction issues. As someone who has lived here my whole life, I make a personal plea to visitors to understand that these people represent a systemic failure, rather than a moral one.

Seattle is, overall, extremely safe, and while it can be scary to see someone struggling, crime rates (and particularly those of a violent nature) are fairly low, and the crimes that do happen tend to be concentrated in a few small areas that can be easily avoided at night.

In 2012, Washington became one of the first two states in the country to legalize adult-use (sometimes called “recreational”) cannabis, which means the industry here has had time to mature. Shopping for cannabis edibles, smokeables, sippables, and more, requires two important items: a state-issued ID (usually a passport for foreigners) and cash – dispensaries can’t take credit cards. Your ID won’t be recorded, so don’t worry about traceability, it’s just to make sure you are 21 years of age or older. Local budtenders can then direct you to an ideal product based on your budget, desired high, flavor preferences, and method of intake.

While it’s legal for anyone of age to buy, possess, and use cannabis, it is not legal to use in public – though this doesn’t stop the city from constantly smelling like pot smoke. Other related laws to be aware of include that it is prohibited to drive while using cannabis, give cannabis products to minors, transport products across state lines (and more seriously, the national border just to the north), and bring products onto cruise ships or into national parks.

Remember, finding a place to smoke anything legally in the city is really hard, and consuming cannabis in public is prohibited, so purchasing edible forms of pot is way easier for visitors. Just make sure to discuss the strength, dosage, and expected timeline of a product with the experts at the shop.