featuring Max Cherry, Black Vance,
and the Screaming Muslim Woman
The #14 bus serves downtown Seattle, the International and Central Districts, and the Mount Baker neighborhood. It’s a line I don’t often ride, and same as all my route reviews, the purpose of the journey was only to look out the window, see the sights, and jot down anything interesting for a possible follow-up visit.
Looking out the window was difficult, because a giant ad blocked the view, and I’d wanted to ride all the way to the end of the line, but the driver wouldn’t let me. Ah, but I’m getting ahead of myself, so let’s start at the start instead.
Southbound, it was the standard ride through Belltown and downtown, all via 3rd Avenue, same as most other city routes in Seattle. 3rd Avenue has been hermetically sealed off from car traffic, making it a busway, and lots of it is a wasteland for wasted people. That’s depressing, because it doesn’t have to be like this. America is the richest country in the world, and we could easily afford to help people who so obviously need help, but it’s more important that billionaires be billionaires, paying as little as possible in taxes, as little as nothing, so nothing is done.
Just south of that downtown hell, the bus turns west onto Jackson Street, and rolls through the International District. It’s a working, even thriving neighborhood full of mostly Asian people and mostly ethnic businesses.
At 5th & Jackson, an old sailor (judging by his hat) stepped onto the bus, and sat in a sideways seat directly in front of me. I liked his face, weathered but game for whatever’s next, and all the ride he wore half the hint of a smile. If you’ve seen the film Jackie Brown, this dude was almost exactly Robert Forster as Max Cherry.
To my right was a clear view of the buildings, shops, and people. To my left was only gray, because the bus was ‘wrapped’ with an ad for who knows what, who cares what. Ads wrapped around buses are effective attention-getters for folks driving or walking by, but they’re a nuisance for riders, and worse after dark — good luck finding any familiar landmark in the dark and through the back of a billboard.
We passed Dim Sum King, a tiny eatery with good prices and a wide selection, and Asia Bar-B-Cue, where I’ve had two terrific meals but eaten five times (’nuff said).
Perhaps it’s a side effect of taking this ride on Sunday, when there’s less traffic, but the bus was moving surprisingly fast. Three other routes run along this stretch of Jackson Street, and the normal is stop-and-go, but our bus was go-and-go.
We passed into the gloom under the gawdawful freeway, which obliterated several blocks at the heart of the Int’l District when it was built in the 1960s. Beyond the freeway’s shadow lies a lesser stretch of the Int’l District, including the very reasonably priced Ding Hong Market at 10th, and the perpetual open-air illegal drug market at 12th.
After a few more blocks traveled faster than expected, and with Max Cherry never losing his fraction of a smile, we crossed Rainier Avenue. All the other routes have broken away by this point, so for most of the rest of the route, the #14 is the only bus on the streets.
The neighborhood is mostly mid-rise apartments, with a smattering of older houses. At 20th & Jackson there’s Moonlight Cafe, which looks ancient and therefore interesting, despite a sign promising karaoke and dancing. The internet told me later that Moonlight is Vietnamese cuisine, which is mostly unknown to me, and the prices seem reasonable, so I might try ’em on a non-karaoke and non-dancing night.
Simply Soulful is at 23rd & Jackson, and might be a possibility one fine day. The storefront looks very ordinary and kinda boring, but a couple of middle-aged black ladies were walking out of the place wearing big smiles and wildly colorful African pant suits, so I’m guessing the food is good.
At 26th & Jackson, something called Howlin’ Bistro brags that they’re a dog-friendly tavern, and I was unsure about that. Sometimes I might like a beer, and sometimes I might like a dog, but I’m a cat person and not sure I want a beer and a dog at the same time and place. The website tells me they’re a doggy daycare that’s expanded and added a bar, offering “Open mic nights, live bands, breed meet-ups, Sniffari adventures, and more,” including “yappy hour” from 4-6 PM. Might give it a looksee if I’m allowed off-leash.
The neighborhood becomes low-rise, which slowly melts into old-ish housing and fewer businesses — the boring part of the ride, for me. The bus turns south onto 31st Avenue, and blitzed through a few miles of mostly nothing to see but houses.
The semi-smiley guy from Jackie Brown got off the bus at Plum Street. As he walked past me toward the door, I gave him the same hint of a smile he was giving everyone else, but he couldn’t tell, since I was wearing a mask. Been masked in public since the pandemic, which is probably why I’m still alive, but most folks show their faces.
At McClellan Street, the bus turns west and chugs along to where the ball park used to be, which is now the world’s largest Lowe’s Hardware, with no windows so it looks more like a prison. Down the street is the Mount Baker Transit Center, where several routes converge. That’s where the bus pulled in, and stopped, and the driver glared at me in the rear view mirror.
Having studied the route in advance of my trip, my expectation was that the #14 would then loop back to McClellan Street and the innards and gizzards of the Mount Baker neighborhood, ending at Hanford Street. That’s what the schedule says, and that’s where I’d been planning to take my midday walk, but nope. The driver ordered me & the five other passengers off the bus.
“I’m going to Hanford Street,” I said, but he replied, “I’m not.”
I’ve since doublechecked the map and schedule, and near as I can ascertain, he was being a jackass. The driver decides where he’s driving, though, so he parked the bus, and instead of walking around Mount Baker, I was instead stuck at the Mount Baker Transit Station, a far uglier walk in an ugly place along an ugly stretch of Rainier Avenue.
My disappointment was set to the tune of a middle-aged black woman screaming from inside one of the bus shelters. She seemed to be screaming at the world, not anyone in particular, and there was no guessing what she was screaming, since it wasn’t in English.
Screams are an ordinary element of life in the big city, but unnerving in a different way was a quiet man with gangly hair, who was waiting for a bus. He neither said nor did anything interesting, but I could hardly take my eyes off him, because he looked exactly like my long-dead brother-in-law Vance would’ve looked if Vance had been black. Right up until the day he died, though, circa 1985, Vance was always white.
I couldn’t stop staring, but eventually not-Vance noticed and glared at me, so I turned my back and concentrated on the screaming lady.
She was wearing a hajib and a long wrap-around dress, announcing she was Muslim. Her language was unintelligible to me, but from the inflection, her screams sounded like abject panic, more than preaching. Me being a smartass and atheist, the thought that mostly came to mind was, “Oh, I need the peace and tranquility your religion brings…”
I am, however, making a conscious effort to be less of an asshole, so I tried to imagine what someone much nicer than myself might say to her. I wouldn’t have said anything if she’d been a man, but she was smallish and I was 80% sure I could defend myself if she attacked, so I maneuvered myself into her line of sight, ten feet away. Then I dropped my mask, letting her see what I hoped was a kind smile. When we made eye contact, she took a breather from the screaming, and I said softly, “Is there anything I can do to help?”
She only looked at me, and probably didn’t understand what I’d said. She didn’t smile back or anything, but she wasn’t screaming and didn’t start again, as we held eye contact for gosh I dunno, fifteen seconds.
Then I walked over to where I’d be catching the #14 back to the heart of the city, and as I waited she began screaming again. Those fifteen seconds, though, had seemed slightly helpful, maybe for both of us, and even earned me a nod from not-Vance.
My return ride was on the same bus, with the same driver, but headed north I could see what had been hidden by the ad-wrap southbound, while everything I’d been able to see riding southbound was now blank to me, riding northbound. Capitalism, what a concept — bus advertisers take priority over bus customers.
A long stretch of 31st shows a view of Lake Washington to the west, which I hadn’t been able to see southbound because of the ad-wrap. It’s moderately lovely, several blocks down to the lake, all downhill, with numerous public and private stairways leading down to the houses, streets, and lakefront below. Looks like a sweet place to live, if you’re rich, and if you’re healthy enough to climb a lot of stairs.
At MLK & Jackson, a squat, plain building calls itself Quick Pack Food Mart and promises “the best fried chicken in town.” I was skeptical. It doesn’t look like much, but I’ve been unable to find good fried chicken anywhere in Seattle, so I jotted Quick Pack Food Mart into my notebook and looked it up when I got home. It doesn’t have a website, but it has a Wikipedia page that makes the chicken sound better than finger-lickin’ good, so I’ll definitely try it.
At 23rd & Jackson, Xing Long Chinese Eatery looks like nothing much from outside, but the same could be said for Quick Pack Food Mart, and most of my favorite restaurants. It’s takeout only, says their website, and the priciest item on the menu is $17, which means it’s either a bargain or they haven’t updated the website in years.
At 22nd & Jackson, Mediterranean Mix offers assorted gyros and falafel. Checking the menu online, prices seem a buck or two more than cheap, but everything everywhere costs at least a few dollars more than it should. I’m old — I remember 49¢ cheeseburgers.
Near 19th & Jackson is Pratt Fine Arts Center, a non-profit arts school and hangout that seems cool. The website says you can schedule “art parties” and “Pratt takes care of all the details!”
At 17th & Jackson, Cheeky Cafe was semi-familiar. Never been there, but I’d once thought of going there, before something came up or I just decided to stay in my recliner that day. It’s an Asian fusion place, mixing Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Italian, and American cuisines, and I might want to try the pan-seared spam and eggs over rice.
As the bus hurried along, always quicker than I’d expected, we passed Dang Tax & Accounting near 12th & Jackson. I’ve never set foot inside, but the name amuses me.
Then we were back in the heart of the International District, and riding all the way to the north end of the line seemed pointless. There’s nothing to be seen along the corpse of 3rd Avenue that I haven’t seen already, every time I ride a bus downtown.
So I hopped off instead, and walked the neighborhood looking for pastries or something Asian to go. Which was a delightful adventure in itself, especially the weird and unexpected food, but this page is too long already so I’ll save the lunch report for a different day.
As for the #14 bus, it’s a workable ride at a good speed, for seeing Jackson Street and the International District. It offers easy connections to the #7, #36, and #106 in Chinatown, the #60 at 12th, the #4 and #48 at 23rd, the #8 at MLK, and the #7, #8, #48, and #106 again at Mount Baker Transit Center, where there’s a light rail station across the street. Good luck getting to the south end of the #14 line, though. The bus only goes there when the driver is in the mood.
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