may day 2012

 

It's MayDay. This year, my friends made a bunch of signs with pictures of anarchists that have passed on. I met them down there and was handed a sign after a while along with zines which detailed who each of the anarchists were. It was a well-attended march and well received. I didn't truly celebrate since I didn't skip out on work but I did work half-assed. :)

What else?
Well, one thing I did do at work today was almost attack a 60 year old cowboy. He made a pass at one of my clients (who's 25) and it made her so uncomfortable she started crying. Unfortunately, he drove off before I could confront him.

what matters

Last month, a young man was shot due to racism and fear. Thanks to social and independent media, the event has made nationwide headlines and won't go away until answers are given. Today, Portland held it's own rally, discussing the racism involved in the situation and to mourn Trayvon Martin.

Ashes, Victory, Andrew, Dean and I went up to Peninsula Park this morning for the rally. There was a decent amount of people there but, as always, I'm surprised by who wasn't there. I'm surprised that more people in the social work field or school program weren't there. I'm surprised that more of my friends weren't there. I guess I just expect more out of people. However, there are probably many events that I don't attend for one reason or another so I shouldn't get judge-y. I am really glad that Andrew agreed to go with me. If he had said no, I would have accepted it but it would have been a mark against him. It's just that important to me that people stand in support of those organizing events like this even if there was a bit too much religiosity for me.

What else?
We met later for a Timbers game at Blitz and then I biked around for a bit. I went to Hollywood Vintage for the first time to check out their tweed in anticipation of the ride soon.

It was also BlowPony night!! I love love love dancing and Matt Bearaccuda was DJ'ing. I haven't gone to the Bearaccuda dance night before but I definitely will now since I know he'll be there. Erin brought her friend and her boyfriend and his friend. I also hung out with Tim and his friends. I danced long and hard, outlasting all of my friends. I really needed that!

Also, I forgot to note that yesterday I went to the Grilled Cheese Bus on Ankney for the first time and also Stacato Gelato. I thought each was okay but I'm just thankful that I got the bus out of my system. It's been on my to-do list for far too long.

it's the final countdown

Earlier this week, Portland's Mayor Sam Adams announced that people would have to evacuate the occupation by 12:01am on Sunday morning. While I am unsure about the exact intent of camping in a park, I agree with the general message of dissent and dissatisfaction with the current system. I also expected that there would be police violence. Why else would you evict someone in middle of the night? However, I didn't expect so much community support.

I don't want to write about the whole experience again as I have already posted a story about it here on Indymedia. I will however say that it was unbelievable. I spent all night downtown with a couple thousand people standing off against the cops until the sun came up. Absolutely surreal.

It wasn't easy. It was rainy and cold and I should have brought snacks. At around 2:30am, I was ready to go but instead I just took a break, got some food and cocoa, and went to the bathroom. I was able to last until dawn after that. Shortly after returning, I filmed this video:

After 6am, I hit my wall and had to go home. I was in the street for what would be an entire work day which also meant that I was also up for almost 24 hours. For the rest of today, I hung out at Long Haus, uploading my videos and pictures and writing the story.

my bad day

Sigh, today started off well enough. The Mars Hill Church had it's first mass today in my neighborhood. This church opposes queers and yoga so they're really in the wrong neighborhood and, while I'm all for freedom of religion, I don't care for someone telling me that I'm wrong in my own backyard. So, I met the protest outside the church where we listened to a lot of Rihanna really loudly. It was fun and the day proceeded to quickly go downhill from there. I guess that's what happens when you start a day picketing a church.

Sophia and I went to Circa 33 where I have always been impressed with the food but today I tried the Breakfast Bruschetta for the first time and it was almost impossible to eat. To help fill me up, I ordered a biscuit that ended up tasting more like chemicals than food. After that, I headed to Seven Corners where Corey got me a new tire. It sucked having to buy a new one but at least he had one readily available and I'm sure he gave me a good deal on it but it was still $92 that I shouldn't have had to spend. Then, while biking the tire home on my other bike, I ended up wrecking. It was like a dark cloud was hovering me today. Hopefully, my luck will change tomorrow.

What else?
The one shining bit of today that shined through all of the dark clouds was that Zachary Quinto (Sylar from Heroes and Spock in the new Star Trek) came out as a gay man. That's enough to make the dark clouds part and that angels sing in my world. Thank you Mr Quinto! You have made my day.

Also, I finished the Y series. So good but so hard to let go.

marathon marching

I made up for missing the big Occupy Portland march on Thursday by attending today's solidarity march(es). I believe there were two marches originally planned today, one heading from PSU south park blocks and one heading from the Rose Quarter. Ashes, Nathaniel and I met Victory down there to try to cover the marches for Indymedia but then I ran into at least two other marches besides the two that were initially scheduled. Add on top of that the Portland Marathon which was going on at the same time and it made for a busy day.

Anyway, I bussed around for a while, trying to chase after the marches and I ended up just meeting them when they all came together at Natio Parkway, following the main group of Marathon runners. It was pretty impressive in size and I saw a lot of people there that I don't normally see at protests, including classmates from school and neighbors. Whatever becomes of this movement, it's good that people are finally paying attention.

Here is a quick youtube video of the march:



What else?
After a long day of marching and marathons, I met up with Justin, Jesse and Sophia for drinks and I got to ride in Justin's new car for the first time.

encamping

Today, I checked my cynical ass at the door and went into the encampment for the first time. Wow. Okay, so yesterday, having not walked through the camp, my perception of it all was that it was some punk squatters saying they wouldn't move until everything was fixed for them and they didn't have to pay their college loans back. Well, that was exactly what I DIDN'T see there. Instead, I saw a community full of a variety of ages, classes, races and backgrounds coming together to voice their frustrations with the system and to brainstorm how change can happen. Just...wow!

It really reminded me of the Oregon Country Fair, except nobody was trying to sell me a three dollar lemonade and I wasn't wearing a skirt. And it wasn't just because I saw Jimi Hendrix (pictured in the third-from-the-top photo. As Community Village is, the Occupy Portland encampment was full of caring, awesome and organized people. They weren't an elite group that had survived camp and now only identify with other campers. They were people doing outreach and just talking to one another and whoever came through the park. In fact, they were having sanitation issues so they were encouraging people to not camp if they didn't have to but to come, learn, talk, hang out and then participate in support activities like the marches and rallies going on tomorrow.

This really put my mind at ease and blew it away at the same time. They had committees organized, they had an information booth, a safety booth, a library with rotating speakers (and anyone could sign up), a food booth with free food and people designated to help if you experienced conflict with anyone, sexual assault or just needed medical attention. And this is ALL in this one little park. It was beautiful. I am soooo damn proud of this city!

Also, the occupy movement has won me over as well. Almost every state has at least one Occupied city (c'mon Wyoming and South Dakota, North Dakota is making you look bad!). Oregon has a few Occupied cities. One of them is Seaside. This surprised me but Ashes filled me in on what is happening in Seaside. It's a very sought after vacation spot where people own beach houses. Therefore, the rent is high and the land is expensive. So expensive in fact that people who work in Seaside can't afford to live there. There have been reports of people having to camp in the woods outside of Seaside and then hike into work each morning. Part of their Occupation revolves around finding a solution to this problem. That's inspiring and so awesome. On a side note, maybe I should have done some remote reporting for Indymedia and headed to Seaside to do report from there for the weekend.

What else?
It was a clear and sunny day for the most part today and I spent it chilling with Dean. I also cooked breakfast today using potatoes that Tim had planted in our front yard when he lived here. He comes over and digs them up on occasion. They were really good and it's awesome that they grow under my bedroom window

preoccupied with yesterdays

s

When all you've got is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.

I screwed that phrase up last time I blogged it out (which was more than 2 years ago) so I decided to restate it after today's experience.

Portland Indymedia's webradio has been in a state of transition for the past year and a half. Because of that, new content hasn't been generated and I'm sure that any listeners we did have have moved on to new sources and grown with the new technologies. In today's world of technological advances, a year and a half is a pretty significant period of time. Factor into that the fact that we weren't really up-to-date before we stopped broadcasting and we have almost become obsolete.

Today, the occupation of Portland continued and we had radio coverage of the event in a different space for the first time. We are using twitter and AIM so I guess we are evolving but Atomic and I had a discussion about whether or not we're just looking for nails in a world that has moved onto screws. As I have demonstrated, it's easy to get your voice out there. Indymedia was developed at a time when blogs and social networking sites weren't common and information didn't spread like wildfire. Still, I think that Indymedia, specifically Portland Indymedia is somewhat relevant right now because it is a central source for information that people can turn to. I'm not Facebook friends with more than 120 ppl and a lot of those people don't regularly update their status and, when they do, it's usually just how they are feeling, not breaking news information. If I really wanted to know what was going on right now, I would follow PortlandIMC through twitter or I would log onto the website.

I just think that we need to reexamine what we are doing, why we are doing it and if it is effective. I think that about the occupation though too. I biked by there today and was thrilled to see that they still had the street between Chapman Park and the other block occupied. Barricades are up and it looks very well put together. I found out later that the barricades are actually for the Portland Marathon which happens on Sunday but it still looks cool. However, all I know is that it's a bunch of people down there who want an end to debt and the 1% to stop lording over the rest of us. Um...how? I want world peace or at least an end to animal/environmental suffering but, again, how? How is camping in a park going to bring that about?

I don't know. Maybe I'm just frustrated with my inability to do anything. Shit, I couldn't even get out of my job today to come down and join but really I don't even know what I would have done down there if I was able to come down.

What else?

Although I am frustrated with a lot of things right now, I don't want anyone to think that I didn't enjoy today because I did. Capping it all off was an awesome conversation that I had with our friend Kim. She's a great source of comfort and a great listener. If nothing else, talking with her made my whole night worthwhile. 

occupy portland

The Occupy Portland protest happened today in conjunction with Occupy Wallstreet movement and several other cities (there's a good but not completely comprehensive list here at the Detroit site). I fully support this movement but I don't quite understand how people sitting in a park in Portland are going to eliminate debt. I guess you've got to start somewhere though and this movement has got more people talking about the financial inconsistencies. Big businesses get bailed out, get tax breaks and the people get screwed over, thrown out of their houses, laid off, and/or go hungry. It's not a clear and visible path that we're moving down, toppling the 1% that oppress the 99% but it's uplifting to see that there's movement in that direction.

What else?

The march started at 12pm. I was originally planning on taking a long lunch break and heading down there to see it. However, I was eating lunch with four of the clients, including G and W. G's girlfriend asked me when our next inservice was and, although we were all just told not to be on our phones during client breaks, I had to glance down at my phone to get the date for her. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the assistant to the president of the company do a double-take by my table. I looked up and W was flipping off the clock on the wall and the assistant was standing between him and the clock.

I immediately told him to drop his hand and he started screaming, "F*** you, you motherf***ing b****!" W has screamed before but never this long of a string of profanities and never in the presence of the assistant to the president of the company who, by all measures, actually runs the company and could fire anyone at anytime. Luckily, W is a client and he can get away with this. In a way, I'm jealous.

I did head to down to the protest right after work, experienced it for a little bit but then biked over to Seven Corners where I got new pedals for the first time. They switched it out quick and even fixed two broken spokes for me. Those people are awesome!

on the lighter side of hate

After yesterday's heavy queer forum, it was refreshing to see so much love and support this morning at a counter-protest to GodHatesFags (the Westboro Baptist Church) this morning.  They are truly evil as they made me get to northeast Portland by 7AM this morning.  Still, any day that can start off with a klingon, a monkey and Devo can't be all that bad.

may day 2010

Happy May Day!

I took a break from school work today and went to the May Day rally and march and then to the events afterwards.  May Day's great because it brings all of these different groups together.  It's an anarchist holiday, a worker's holiday, more recently it's become an immigrant's right day and the hippies celebrate it as Beltane.  At the march, I saw people from school, work, Country Fair, Radical Faerie Land and various activist circles.  There were socialists, feminists, anarchists, liberals, radical queers, immigrants rights activists, police accountability activists, laborers and many more people, around 5000 in all, out to say, "This isn't working."

There was a big recognition of the fucked-up-ness of Arizona's racial profiling, anti-immigrant law.  Even though the message was pretty diverse in what we wanted, most people were in support of one another.  And it's always nice to march in the streets.

After the march, everyone took a little time to recuperate and then went to the Red and Black for fun times.  In the school near the R&B, there was a housing rights encampment going on.  Right2Survive, a housing advocacy group was educating people on their rights as far as squatting goes.  I attended that for a bit but it was getting cold, I didn't dress for the weather and I am fighting off being sick so I left.  I just have a minor throat irritation and I'm tired easily so I went back to the R&B.  I had my first Kombucha on tap.  It was such a good alternative to drinking because it tastes kinda nasty like beer but it's supposedly good for you.

All in all, it was a good day.  It's nice to see people out and about, including myself.

spring quarter

Man, winter break was actually too long but spring break was too short.  I started classes again today.  Mondays are my class days now.  I had two new professors today and one different classroom with several new classmates.  I'm not so sure about this quarter.  My theory professor appears to be tough and assigns a lot but my my statistics (yes, I have to take f*ing statistics) professor seems easy and there's not a long paper.

With a new quarter, I decided to try out a new restaurant.  I went to Broadway Coffee and Tea and had an awesome crepe and lentil soup.  It was weird though afterwards because I realized that the protest was just kicking off then.  I would've had enough time to hear the speakers before my class would start and I would have to leave.  Still, it's weird to be eating crepes when friends are facing police danger.  I guess priorities take place and this is where I'm at in life.

After class got out, I checked indymedia quick and saw that the protest had turned into a jail support so I walked down that way and walked through the crowd.  Everyone was doing their thing and had the time invested then.  I had just got there and was not prepared to deal with the situation.  I was in my school clothes, my camera battery wasn't charged and I really didn't know what was going on right then.  As I was talking to someone who was there earlier on the phone, a cop came up to me and asked me what I was doing.  I realized that everyone else had moved on and I was by myself and not prepared.  I quickly left and decided that I would be no good to anyone there so I left.  It had been a long day.  I still plan to get involved but only when I have time to properly invest myself in it.  With the school work I got already, I don't plan on being free until June.

m23

So it turns out that the man a cop murdered yesterday was a homeless man who was self-injuring himself in a public restroom at a park.  "Hey, stop cutting yourself or I'll shoot."

I work with people with self-injurious behavior.  I have friends who work with people with self-injurious behavior.  Nobody has ever got shot and we've never even had to call the police.  I realize that I have more training at dealing with this behavior than your average beat cop would but then again, should they really have guns and be called to such situations if they can't disarm a drunk man with an exacto knife without shooting him three times?

So tonight, we marched again.  We took Hawthorne to try to spread the word of the cops' latest kill to the bystanders and we picked up some people along the way.  I was covering the cops with my camera which I think actually stopped one pig from clubbing a cyclist.  I yelled, "You're on camera, m*therf*cker!" which may seem harsh but it stopped him.

Anyway, I didn't get arrested and there's another plan to march next Monday.  Unfortunately, my spring break will be over by then and I again turn into a Masters student.  Here's hoping that summer break will be more peaceful.

must be spring in portland

It happens about once a year during Spring.  That's the scary thing. It's something that we can almost set our calendars to.

Earlier this year, the cops killed Aaron Campbell who wasn't doing anything but being black when confronted by the cops.  Earlier today, a cop shot someone in a park.  That's all that's being released at this time but I'd wager it was unjustified.

That may sound biased, given I've made such an assumption on so little information.  However, history is backing me up.  The cops here have shot and tazered people that have been on fire, handcuffed or just plain innocent of any wrong doing.  Hell, the cops pepper-sprayed one guy who had set himself on fire last year.  So yeah, I think that it was unwarranted.

Even if it wasn't, the police have a lot to answer for so we marched tonight.  There was a quick gathering at Colonel Summers Park to discuss the issue.  I thought this would be just talk which it was so I brought Dean to this park for the first time.  After they decided to march, we ran home, dropped him off, grabbed a camera and a megaphone and hit the streets.  This isn't my first march nor will it be my last but the circumstances were different.

The cops were caught off-guard and our outrage was expressed and our point was made.  We are mad and tired of this.  There's going to be another march tomorrow so I'll post more info then.

may day 2009

This is supposed to be the worker's holiday but I had a lot of stuff to do so I worked...for a while. By the afternoon, I had most of my busy tasks done so I took it easy the rest of the day and then went downtown to the May Day march.

Really, it feels like I only go to marches now to see friends that I don't see regularly. This one was fun but felt relatively purposeless. However, I did get to walk in the streets. Later on, while heading to the Red and Black to listen to Adelitas, I got to see the Cinco de Mayo fireworks which was probably the highlight of my evening. That and having a really good conversation with a friend that I hadn't seen for a while. I guess that's what May Day's about to me now, reconnecting.

However, I did also get this good picture of this cop. Hee hee.

scandal?

Usually, I'm not one to defend politicians but tonight, I went to a rally to support one.

Sam Adams, the newly elected gay mayor (and first gay mayor of a major US city), admitted to having slept with an 18 yr old. Ummm...why is this an issue?

People say they're upset that Adams lied about sleeping with the guy when he was running for mayor. Ummm...why was he asked in the first place?

A straight man would never EVER be asked if he slept with an 18 yr old female just because he had been acquainted with her. However, since Sam's gay, people think that his sexual life is up for public discussion.

I've seen this a lot. Out queers are often asked about their sex life as if it's okay because, well, the person already knows a little bit about your sexual proclivities so why shouldn't they know more? Because it's none of their damn business. Sam Adams' is Portland's mayor, not Portland's boyfriend.

recent regional history

Today, I went to a showing of 'Battle in Seattle' at the Red and Black cafe. It was great because a few people that were at the packed showing were in Seattle and could say what parts of the movie were right and which parts were wrong and what was left out. I got to meet several new people as well.

It's nice to be able to get a taste of local recent history from people that were actually there and not just from some major movie release. However, I did like the movie. It was overly dramatic at parts and the love story was crap but it came across with a good message and Jennifer Carpenter from Dexter was in it!