Dream Job

In English PIE, 304, J-Zone, and JJYY (my Communincative English classes) we've been talking about dream jobs. It is a concept most of my students have never thought about. What is it that I really want to do? If I could get paid for something I love doing, what would it be? In the U.S., at least among my friends, we talk about this a lot. Most of our dream jobs are to do nothing at all or to travel or to write. Last week I interviewed for an editing position at chinatravel.net, the latest English endeavor of a company called C-trip, which is the largest online seller of travel in China. The job sounds awesome. The site is an online guide to China directed at ex-pats and adventurous foreign travelers who want to get beyond Shanghai and Beijing. I would get to research all the great places to visit in China and work with Chinese travel agents and translators to create descriptions and details about every place worth seeing in China. Eventually there will be opportunities to travel around China and write feature articles and blog entries. It is essentially my dream job...except that it's in China.

I would be one of three foreigners working for a company of literally thousands of Chinese employees in one big building full of tiny cubicles, like a giant ant colony of travel agents. The commute would be almost an hour and a half by bike and metro. At the end of my interview, I was so fired up about the job I wanted to stay in Shanghai for years and years just for the opportunity to really get to know China. (Oh yeah, free language classes at lunch, too.) But then I stopped to think: didn't I leave a really great job because I wanted more of an adventure than the adventure travel business could offer me? I had a job where I got to learn about the whole world with remarkable travel opportunities (South Georgia!). But working full-time is not for me. I don't know what I was thinking applying for another job when I work 12 hours a week and make enough money for both of us to live a really fun life in Shanghai. I like sleeping in and drinking coffee and listening to podcasts with Peter in the morning and going to the dumpling shop for lunch before we have to go to school. I like to have time to work on my book and write, which was put on hold the whole time I was working full-time.

What to do? I have to decide next week. I think I will offer up my skills part-time. I know I can't commute for three hours every day of the week. No dream job is worth that to me. I would be working with a Canadian journalist and a fellow American MFA (my first MFA I've met in the wild). The pay is really good and it would be an opportunity to work for a Chinese company and the learning experiences and quirks that would offer.

Any advice would be appreciated as I face this decision. In the meantime I have a pretty sweet baby-sitting gig watching Winston every now and then. Gina pays me in homemade granola, which is worth its weight in gold to me.