{"id":5951,"date":"2009-05-13T14:47:41","date_gmt":"2009-05-13T18:47:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=5951"},"modified":"2009-05-13T15:20:12","modified_gmt":"2009-05-13T19:20:12","slug":"bakers-dozen-%e4%ba%8c%e7%95%aa%ef%bc%9a-should-i-stay-or-should-i-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2009\/05\/13\/bakers-dozen-%e4%ba%8c%e7%95%aa%ef%bc%9a-should-i-stay-or-should-i-go\/","title":{"rendered":"Baker&#8217;s Dozen \u4e8c\u756a\uff1a Should I Stay or Should I Go?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>Eric Baker (Fukuoka-ken, 2006-08)<\/strong> hopes he is approaching the end of a year of travel and reconnecting. He\u2019ll be writing about his thoughts and experiences as he transitions back to working in the States.<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-5952\" src=\"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/05\/bill_clinton_biography_21.jpg\" alt=\"slick willy\" width=\"198\" height=\"209\" \/><!--[endif]--><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Should I stay or should I go now?&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">This indecision\u2019s bugging me.<span> <\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Post-JET I hit the road for five months and ran into all sorts of people. For the inevitable question \u201cwhere are you from?\u201d I kept stock answers based on who I was chatting with. So for the toothless Syrian shepherd who\u2019s English consisted of \u201cBush. Bad!\u201d\u2014vigorously illustrated with furrowed brow and shaking head\u2014followed by \u201cObama. Good!\u201d I threw out my vigorous nose point and Japanese accented \u201cAmerica.\u201d This built enough rapport to move on to higher-level discussions, like \u201cClinton! Very good!\u201d followed by suggestively arched bushy eyebrows, gaping smile and hip gyrations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">For the umpteenth hawker, I\u2019d occasionally throw out something exciting like \u201cI\u2019m Japanese\u201d or \u201cI\u2019m from Holland.\u201d Either they\u2019d be confused or annoyed and leave me alone or we\u2019d start in on a more interesting conversation. \u201c(playfully) Noooo. Really, where are you from?\u201d In a small Egyptian town I spent two insightful days hanging out with a shopkeeper and his friends after starting a conversation like this.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">I loved being able to connect with Japanese backpackers, who were universally <span style=\"font-family: &quot;MS Mincho&quot;;\" lang=\"JA\">\u3073\u3063\u304f\u308a\uff01<\/span> that I could speak Japanese. I often had to say a few sentences in Japanese before they could comprehend that this white face was<!--more--> speaking their language, not English or German. We\u2019ve all had those introductory conversations ad nauseum, which follow predictable patterns. But on the road post-Japan, I relished making the connection. A local celebrity one last time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Meeting people more familiar with cities in the United States should have been a walk in the park. It sometimes was, with people who were just chewing the fat or not as knowledgeable. But with many, I learned to prepare myself for an awkward pause if I told them my city. You see, I\u2019m from Detroit. When I told a stranger, I felt like I burdened them with too much personal information. As if I told them my grandma just died.<span> <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">So that\u2019s where The Clash comes in. I\u2019m back in Detroit, reconnecting with the few friends who are still around, but if I want a good job, I gotta go. Chrysler is in Chapter 11, and GM is next. I\u2019m proud of my roots, but Detroit\u2019s been on the decline since the race riots. So I\u2019m happy to move, but wonder if I can actually snag a job from here or if I\u2019m better off saying \u201cOkay, Boston it is\u201d and living off my pension until I land a job. After two relatively fruitless months of the former, I\u2019m leaning towards heading out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eric Baker (Fukuoka-ken, 2006-08) hopes he is approaching the end of a year of travel and reconnecting. He\u2019ll be writing about his thoughts and experiences as he transitions back to working in the States. Should I stay or should I go now?&#8230; This indecision\u2019s bugging me. Post-JET I hit the road for five months and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[42,112,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anecdote-article","category-bakers-dozen","category-career"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkZ7m-1xZ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5951"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5961,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5951\/revisions\/5961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}