Bellevue
A city across Lake Washington from Seattle. Bellevue used to just be "Microsoft Town" but over the past couple of decades it has gone into a boom. Like New York City, Bellevue has several "boroughs" that people like to just consider part of the actual city itself in a broad sense.
Mercer Island: This is where all the Jews live. Housing prices here are a fucking joke, and the ongoing gentrification isn't helping. Probably the snobbiest of the boroughs, if only because the truly rich people on Medina and Clyde Hill don't need to reassure themselves of their superiority. Home to Mercer Island High School, pitiful rivals against the almighty Bellevue High.
Sammamish: Sits on a plateau just outside Kirkland. For this reason, people in Sammamish like to quip "We're above the guys in Bellevue. LOLOL, GET IT?". The town has a good mix of poor and rich, and actually has entertainment venues. Sammamish High School looks outright space-age and has an 8-story auditorium that I doubt has ever even been 1/3 of the way full. Bellevue Community College is located in Sammamish, and it is mostly a mix of fob Asian students and kids who couldn't get into UW but still want to say they're going to school.
Kirkland: The most polarized of the boroughs. Kirkland has two main groups of people; the California-obsessed preppy kids, and the scenester/gangster kids. I don't mean scene in the harmless cute way, I mean it in the "those kids are probably passed out naked every Friday night from a combination of meth and sex" way. The edge of downtown is on the waterfront, so people from the other boroughs and even parts of Seattle flock here during the summer. Less than a mile east of the beach, however, is the inner part of downtown, which is constantly sprawling with the aforementioned sketchy kids who don't seem to realize it isn't Halloween. Kirkland has Lake Washington High School and Juanita High School, both decent academically but nothing special, and also has BEST High School, where the sketchiest of the sketchy go. Oh, and there's ICS, but let's not give them the honor of being mentioned. Nerds.
Redmond: Go like 3 minutes East of Lake Washington High and you're here. When people who don't work at Microsoft actually started living in Bellevue, the Microsoft employees all flipped shit and decided to bunker up in here. The entirety of Redmond is almost indistinguishable from the landlocked portions of Kirkland, so honestly you might not even realize you're here until you hit the town center. Home to Redmond High School, again, nothing special.
Medina, Clyde Hill, and those other rich places: The richest of the rich at Microsoft decided they were too good for Redmond, so they all bought giant lots here. There isn't much else to say, really. All the kids here just go to Bellevue High anyway.
Downtown Bellevue itself: There are constantly a bunch of cranes parked every which way, giving the impression that there is construction, but in my 3 years of living here I haven't noticed any difference in all those skeletons-of-skyscrapers. Bellevue has a pretty nice, big mall and a square where there is a Cheesecake Factory and Red Robin. Mmm. Junior High kids tend to hang out there like every day because they think it makes them look cooler, but once you're in high school you tend not to leave your borough. Go figure.
Mercer Island: This is where all the Jews live. Housing prices here are a fucking joke, and the ongoing gentrification isn't helping. Probably the snobbiest of the boroughs, if only because the truly rich people on Medina and Clyde Hill don't need to reassure themselves of their superiority. Home to Mercer Island High School, pitiful rivals against the almighty Bellevue High.
Sammamish: Sits on a plateau just outside Kirkland. For this reason, people in Sammamish like to quip "We're above the guys in Bellevue. LOLOL, GET IT?". The town has a good mix of poor and rich, and actually has entertainment venues. Sammamish High School looks outright space-age and has an 8-story auditorium that I doubt has ever even been 1/3 of the way full. Bellevue Community College is located in Sammamish, and it is mostly a mix of fob Asian students and kids who couldn't get into UW but still want to say they're going to school.
Kirkland: The most polarized of the boroughs. Kirkland has two main groups of people; the California-obsessed preppy kids, and the scenester/gangster kids. I don't mean scene in the harmless cute way, I mean it in the "those kids are probably passed out naked every Friday night from a combination of meth and sex" way. The edge of downtown is on the waterfront, so people from the other boroughs and even parts of Seattle flock here during the summer. Less than a mile east of the beach, however, is the inner part of downtown, which is constantly sprawling with the aforementioned sketchy kids who don't seem to realize it isn't Halloween. Kirkland has Lake Washington High School and Juanita High School, both decent academically but nothing special, and also has BEST High School, where the sketchiest of the sketchy go. Oh, and there's ICS, but let's not give them the honor of being mentioned. Nerds.
Redmond: Go like 3 minutes East of Lake Washington High and you're here. When people who don't work at Microsoft actually started living in Bellevue, the Microsoft employees all flipped shit and decided to bunker up in here. The entirety of Redmond is almost indistinguishable from the landlocked portions of Kirkland, so honestly you might not even realize you're here until you hit the town center. Home to Redmond High School, again, nothing special.
Medina, Clyde Hill, and those other rich places: The richest of the rich at Microsoft decided they were too good for Redmond, so they all bought giant lots here. There isn't much else to say, really. All the kids here just go to Bellevue High anyway.
Downtown Bellevue itself: There are constantly a bunch of cranes parked every which way, giving the impression that there is construction, but in my 3 years of living here I haven't noticed any difference in all those skeletons-of-skyscrapers. Bellevue has a pretty nice, big mall and a square where there is a Cheesecake Factory and Red Robin. Mmm. Junior High kids tend to hang out there like every day because they think it makes them look cooler, but once you're in high school you tend not to leave your borough. Go figure.
Bellevue is yawn.
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