08/07/2014 Day 1. Portland and the long awaited train

 My day started at 6 am with the amazing view over Columbia River Gorge, which constitutes the border between Oregon and Washington State.

On the first day we had a very comprehensive tour of Portland given by the city’s first lady Nancy Hales. We learned about the services of an incredible organization called Portland Parks & Recreation, which maintains all of the city’s numerous parks and green streets and is in charge of Pioneer Courthouse Square. This place is so special because it changes its ‘face’ 340 times a year on average: it hosts all kind of events, from flowers festival to India festivals to farmers markets. The day before we arrived there was a soccer field there!

Our field trip continued on Portland aerial tram, which brings you to Oregon Health & Science University, providing a stunning view over Portland and specifically its bridges. One of them is a replica of Boston’s Zakim Bridge, what really surprised me. Later on I saw another bridge like this on the way to Seattle, which made me think that it’s not that the Bostonian Zakim Bridge isn’t just unique, there is plenty of such bridges all over the U.S.

The only thing Portland might not be proud of is the traces of segregation, specifically of African-Americans, that are still very noticeable. The African-American family would have a lot of trouble when buying a house or finding jobs in Portland, OR, and this explains why there are NO African-American families living there. This whole story made me think that sometimes our society is incredible hypocritical: we fight for human rights, women's rights, gays' rights... and end up with a city where African-Americans are not welcome? Just because of their skin color? Excuse me, Portland, but that's INSANE!!! And all the advantages of this clean and beautiful city were torn apart by this only fact.

Project time!

As I mentioned before, my project would cover coolest startups and small businesses you can imagine in all the cities we are going to visit.

Portland was a perfect place to start! The first startup I went to was Hotlips Pizza, pizzeria that purchases locally-grown ingredients, uses waste heat from its pizza ovens to heat water, and makes deliveries in electric cars. Should I add that their pizza is 100% organic and incredibly tasty?

Organic plates:

Check out the videos from Hotlips Pizza, leather shop Will and salt and chocolate shop The Meadow later.

And, finally today we got on the train!!!!!

Check out the first video from the train!

What is especially great about MTP project is speakers that we have on the train. Today it was Andy Rabens from the U.S. State Department who talked about global youth and Robert Reid, travel journalist for National Geographic, who was speaking about the whole notion of travelling, here are his most interesting quotes:

-       Train is the most social type of travel

-       Travel is not a contest, it doesn’t matter how many stamps you have in your passport (totally agree with this one)

-       Travel is a rare opportunity for us to play

-       We have limited time to travel, and it’s all about fun

-       Travel = Curiosity + Communication.

I feel like the guy who visited most countries of this world should be right J

Photo: Convo with Jack Bienko from US Small Business Administration. Photo credits: Patrick Dowd

Apart from speakers, we have a group discussion every day. What we do is just talking for an hour or so about the leadership, contemporary problems, or how different people and countries deal with these problems, etc. Today I told my group mates that I enjoy listening more rather than speaking because it allows me to absorb more information. It might seem quite egocentric, but I feel like that’s the way you learn the most, just talk to new people, and you will learn so much new stuff.

The new story about Seattle coming up tomorrow!