Welcome to Desto3’s new series, ADVENTURES IN PORTLANDIA. Or, as we like to think of it, A YEAR OF LIVING WEIRD. (For those who do not know…the city’s motto is “Keep Portland Weird”.)
Portland, Oregon is the 26th largest U.S. city in terms of human population (a little over 630,000 residents) but it is #8 in terms of popularity as judged by the numbers of people choosing to move there. (If you trust the people at the PEW Research joint.) Portland’s growing popularity and its growing population is a very hot, hot, hot topic among Portlanders. Many are not exactly thrilled with the changes to the city that such quick growth brings. Many say the TV series, Portlandia is to blame for the population boom, making the city look just too, too cool to resist. Historically speaking, that is just hogwash.
Portland’s population, dating back well into the mid-nineteenth century has experienced many cycles of manic growth. (One such spurt saw the population of the city triple between 1900 and 1930 and in that time the city’s deserved reputation as an edgy and cool place got well established. It’s cool still.
During prohibition especially, Portland was a wild and lawless town. You can still visit underground tunnels and secret chambers in many of the old buildings in Portland that functioned as speakeasies and passageways for the patrons to arrive and depart without detection. If you take a walking tour or a bike tour of Portlandia your guide will proudly point out the many buildings that served up sex for money to the locals and the itinerant port of call workers back when and they will also assert that Portland’s sex trade business is reputed to be ever booming to this very day. Another quirky distinction of the city, oft cited by proud citizens, is the vast number of strip joints in Portland. (More per capita than any other city in America.) We have not researched these claims and part of me (the part that’s been to Vegas) thinks this is impossible, but if true, it’s not the in your face kind of industry that one finds in Nevada the second you cross the state line. The only naked Portlanders I’ve seen with my own eyeballs so far were the several hundred folks riding bare-assed across the Tilikum Bridge one fine Saturday afternoon en masse as a contingent of the famed Annual Naked Bike Ride. (Completely accidental siting.)
We here at Desto3.com have a commitment to integrity so we shall make an effort soon to report with some other eyeball witnessing, just so you know, you know. Stay tuned to this channel. We’re on the job for you.
Meanwhile, what we can already report from personal experience, Portland is the kind of town where you can find a mural like this on a main drag building and on a given Sunday morning in the parking lot out front you might be fortunate enough find a spectacular live music performance* going on absolutely FREE to the public. If this is weird…sign me up!
This will be a great year, folks.
*This band is Portland’s Bright and Shiny, Not certain what the genre would be called but the vocals are some kind of Leonard Cohen and The Boss. Lyrics are killer.
