Oregon's Shangri-La

Tea in Portland, Oregon - New York Times: "For the past year, Mr. Wiseman has explored his ideas about social practice as art by staging color-themed tea parties in vacant lots, parks and public buses in Portland. 'My favorite was the midnight party on Burnside Bridge,' says one habitue, tonight wearing a Granny Smith green leisure suit and fuzzy white fedora. 'The theme was black, white and shades of gray. We drank Earl Grey tea, and some homeless people joined us before the police shut us down at 1:30.'"

Yes, the home of Tazo (for better or for worse) and other left-leaning, culturally/environmentally sensitive lifestyle tea brands has been lauded in the Times for its innovative, unique tea culture. A short but intriguing read, highly worth 60 seconds of your time. Link above.

But Portland is so much more...

I've only spent a single pleasant evening in this city (in search of a laundromat and en route to camp on the beach along Oregon's *beautiful* coast), but the city did have a sweet charm to it even then. Portland seems to fold together little bits of San Francisco and Seattle with the rusting steel of Pittsburgh's plentitude of bridges. Smaller and more intimate, the city of roses nonetheless absolutely explodes with flavor and vitality. O Portland.... city of indie rockers writ large (The Dandy Warhols, Decembrists, the late Elliott Smith, Pink Martini, the Shins, Stephen Malkmus etc), city by the Gorge, and city of tea.

Well, there's my humble ode from a shameless transient.