Be prepared for life-enhancing camaraderie when you attend the Eugene International Film Festival. To help you get a good start, here are some tips on the local language. “Oregon” is pronounced “Or-e-gun.” “Willamette” is pronounced “Will-AM-it.” If you go to Florence on the Oregon coast as part of your visit you will find yourself driving alongside the Siuslaw River. That’s “Sigh-oos-law. Florence is an hour and some minutes west of Eugene.

Life in Eugene includes: Brewpubs, Wine tasting, hiking, bicycling, sports (the University of Oregon “Ducks,” fatherland of Nike), easy diving to the Cascade Mountains (volcanoes and lava flows), two hours north to Portland, two-and-a-half hours south to Ashland (Shakespeare and more) and we already mentioned Florence on the coast.

The Eugene International Film Festival is at the center of all that is good about Oregon.