Portland Oregon's City Repair paid Seattle a visit in the form of Mark Lakeman, who presented a slideshow at Panama Coffee and Tea tonight. The grid design of cities originated with a prison camp 5,000 years ago. The Roman Empire adopted the plan as it eased conquest and erased the traditional features of the cultures it replaced--the winding paths and gathering places built up over centuries of habitation (illustrated by the slide of a waterhole in Africa at left; the glyph on the right is an ancient Egyptian symbol for city where the order of right angles is imposed on the naturally occurring circle).