I am a Chinese language student. You may wonder what that has to do with either this node, or our party plans. Be patient, I will explain it.
At Portland State University, our first year Chinese textbooks were written a few years after the Cultural Revolution, and are chalk full of socialist realism goodness, including Ali, the foreign exchange student from Arabia touring China and learning about constructing socialism. As such, in my first year of studying Chinese, I learned how to say "Touring the industrial exhibitions gave me a good understanding of the progress of the Chinese people towards socialism" before I learned to say "I want to drink a cup of coffee".
Well, somehow that dorky socialist realist attitude stuck, and although the only industrial exhibition in Portland is the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, I still would like to introduce our out of towners (and in of towners) to Portland's unique social, political and environmental situation. Given, of course, the beauty of Portland's environmental treasures, touring Powell Butte, West Hayden Island, Jackson Bottom and the like will hardly be a boring educational chore. I would also like to educate people about the importance Portland puts on Mass Transit, the current situation with Dignity Village, and the Portland Development Commisions (gentrification\revitalization) of North Portland, just for starters. So who wants to learn about these things? For some, it might be a star attraction, while for others, it may be like the 30 second lesson tacked on to the end of the wild He-Man episode that the weekend will be.