As an academic, summer is the only time when I can justify thinking about work for less than 40 hours a week. It's also a wonderful season of business and personal travel, brainstorming of new projects, and with strategic planning, opportunities to explore aspects of life that are utterly self-gratifying. Therefore, the whole slew of posts to follow in the next few weeks describe episodes in the Scholar's Summer from May to August.
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A constant in my life that I have yet to forget or refute is that I left my hometown, Portland, Oregon, to seek exposure to more culturally diverse environments. Many native Oregonians and one-time visitors to the Beaver State tell me that "everything is so hip" now -- a state of being that evolved after I started my life away from home 17 years ago. Every time I return to visit my parents, I feel like my sense of distance from the city, even the archetypical sleepy suburb where I was literally born and raised, is increasing. I even caught myself stuttering multiple times when trying to order food and purchase things -- despite having spoken English for all but two years of my life, I was not quite sure how to phrase expressions according to the latest colloquial linguistic trends in Portland.
But all snobbery aside, I am glad that Portland's cultural renaissance, or in my dim view, positive move towards cultural heterogeneity, has received much recognition and therefore further momentum to continue. Non-chain establishments, environmentally sound practices are commonplace and beneficial for social well-being.
Thanks to an old friend (we met sometime in elementary school -- so wonderfully long ago, the exact circumstances are ancient history), I visited Stumptown Coffee in downtown Portland. I am not sure why Portland is called Stumptown (go ahead and Google it, all I know is that when the Trailblazers were having great seasons, there were many interesting songs about "Stumptown") but I was very happy to see that the cafe was full but not overflowing with people. A loft on the ground, seating seems to be deliberately sparse. One can choose a small table, comfortably accommodating two people, or a stool at the bar.
I do not want this blog to become a tasting site, since I am neither a coffee professional nor a person who believes that my taste buds are much more sophisticated than other people's. Yet I will throw in comments about good coffee, not because I receive compensation, not because I'm trying to endorse certain coffee beans/establishments and to criticize others. I agree with my Wiser Half's assessment about tea, namely that a good tea is one that tastes good to the person drinking it. Same with coffee...but at Stumptown, besides being initially impressed by the wide open space of Stumptown Coffee, then frustrated when it seemed that I could not secure a table to accommodate self, friend, and Wiser Half, and finally relieved when we could all sit down together, I was happy to have a cup of Ethiopian coffee that is just as distinctive, fair-minded, and multifaceted as my hometown is working hard to be -- Nano Challa.
http://stumptowncoffee.com/coffee/ethiopia-nano-challa-2/
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A constant in my life that I have yet to forget or refute is that I left my hometown, Portland, Oregon, to seek exposure to more culturally diverse environments. Many native Oregonians and one-time visitors to the Beaver State tell me that "everything is so hip" now -- a state of being that evolved after I started my life away from home 17 years ago. Every time I return to visit my parents, I feel like my sense of distance from the city, even the archetypical sleepy suburb where I was literally born and raised, is increasing. I even caught myself stuttering multiple times when trying to order food and purchase things -- despite having spoken English for all but two years of my life, I was not quite sure how to phrase expressions according to the latest colloquial linguistic trends in Portland.
But all snobbery aside, I am glad that Portland's cultural renaissance, or in my dim view, positive move towards cultural heterogeneity, has received much recognition and therefore further momentum to continue. Non-chain establishments, environmentally sound practices are commonplace and beneficial for social well-being.
Thanks to an old friend (we met sometime in elementary school -- so wonderfully long ago, the exact circumstances are ancient history), I visited Stumptown Coffee in downtown Portland. I am not sure why Portland is called Stumptown (go ahead and Google it, all I know is that when the Trailblazers were having great seasons, there were many interesting songs about "Stumptown") but I was very happy to see that the cafe was full but not overflowing with people. A loft on the ground, seating seems to be deliberately sparse. One can choose a small table, comfortably accommodating two people, or a stool at the bar.
I do not want this blog to become a tasting site, since I am neither a coffee professional nor a person who believes that my taste buds are much more sophisticated than other people's. Yet I will throw in comments about good coffee, not because I receive compensation, not because I'm trying to endorse certain coffee beans/establishments and to criticize others. I agree with my Wiser Half's assessment about tea, namely that a good tea is one that tastes good to the person drinking it. Same with coffee...but at Stumptown, besides being initially impressed by the wide open space of Stumptown Coffee, then frustrated when it seemed that I could not secure a table to accommodate self, friend, and Wiser Half, and finally relieved when we could all sit down together, I was happy to have a cup of Ethiopian coffee that is just as distinctive, fair-minded, and multifaceted as my hometown is working hard to be -- Nano Challa.
http://stumptowncoffee.com/coffee/ethiopia-nano-challa-2/
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