Paris 2010

There are several direct flights a day from DC to Paris, on Air France. Therefore, I fly to Frankfurt and from there to Paris. Because Lufthansa gives the World Bank better prices.
This sort of thing has been remarked upon rather a lot by my colleagues. It seems rather counter-intuitive. But – the World Bank’s mission is to eradicate poverty. As usual, with really big public policy issues, this is being done by throwing money at the problem in the hope that it will go away. Only they’ve been throwing large amounts of money at the problem for quite a while now and it doesn’t seem to be quite on its way out the door yet.

So they’ve been looking at their programs for a while now, attempting to get higher efficiency out of lending and knowledge programs, or more colloquially put, trying to get more bang for the buck. Less of the sprinkler method, trying to deliver the needed – ahem – liquidity to more specific targets. The FPD-FI unit (Financial and Private Sector Development – Financial Integrity) that I am now proud to work for, in this metaphor is the semi-buried hose with tiny holes where water trickles directly to the root of the plant. The yearly budget for the whole team is smaller than most lending programs. The idea is that by delivering knowledge straight into the hands (or, rather, heads) of those who will be making important decisions for a country’s financial stability, we get a lot of leverage. But we, too, need to look at where we can do “more with less” (which wouldn’t be asked of everybody quite so often if the Pathfinder mission hadn’t been such a spectacular success, thus raising rather overblown and unfortunate expectations). And the travel budget of our unit is big. I assume our staff salary is a higher total, though I know the total cost of my travels for the unit so far already rivals that of my first year’s salary, and I haven’t even been here for half a year yet.

In fact, I’ve been here about half that – the rest I spent traveling. I notice that a lot, lately. Here is how you know if you’ve been traveling too much:

When the plane touches down and suddenly decelerates, you reach out and stop the closed laptop from sliding off the empty seat next to you without looking up from your book.

The first thing you check on the long-distance flights is whether there’s an electric socket at your seat, and if so, whether it has juice.

You not only know your passport number by heart, but also its issue and expiration dates.

Of the movies on offer during flight, you’ve seen every one that might be remotely interesting – and did so while flying.

You not only grab just the right number of trays at the security checkpoint to smoothly pass through that process, you get annoyed at people who don’t.

You don’t mind the small room, the ex-broom-closet bathroom or the lack of a gym or pool in the hotel, because hey – it’s got a stable WiFi connection.

For ten or more cities, you not only know the name of the airport, but its three-letter acronym (today I’m flying IAD-FRA-CDG).

But I digress. This trip to Paris is – weird. At first glance, it feels much like a vacation. The weather is simply gorgeous. After arriving on Sunday, knowing how good sunlight is to get into a different time zone, and needing some caffeine to keep me awake after a very short night on the transatlantic flight (sleeping in the afternoon would increase jet lag), I sit in an outdoor café with a cappuccino – strictly to make sure I can work the next day, right, no hedonism involved. ;) I also jog for a bit, down to the Seine and the Tour d’Eiffel and later spend an hour of the evening reading a book at the Seine.

Of course we work on Monday (and I’ve had a good bit to read up on – again – on the way over here to make sure I’m up to speed), but we only start at 9 and the OECD is only a 15 minute walk from the hotel (which is why I picked a small hotel way below the maximum rate for this trip). So I sleep until 07:30, which is practically a week-end for me. And I’m still back out of work by six in the evening or so. On Monday evening I go to the Tour d’Eiffel – I’ve never done this before. It really is quite impressive (though the flashing lights they put up there for the last celebration and re-installed after locals protested their removal don’t really do it for me).

The Seine at night (from the river bank)

and from higher up...

Tuesday we have a team dinner after our work – we meet at eight, which allows me to go for another small bit of jogging before we do. And dinner is nice. And fun.

And on Wednesday we’re done early as well, so I manage to write up all my changes (and hand them to our team leader) before leaving the OECD, and still manage to spend two hours with a book at the Seine before – supposedly – meeting two of our team for a well-deserved decompression beer in the Hard Rock Café. Sounds great. What’s to decompress, I wonder?

The talks actually went well. There was very little antagonism, lots of useful information. We had our stuff together, and when somebody needed to look something up for a bit, somebody else could smoothly step in so we never wasted time. When the other side asked for a run-down of everything they’d asked to be changed in the report that was NOT changed even though they requested it, and why it wasn’t, I could even do that – with enough clarity so no questions were left open, with enough firmness so no one started arguing the points, with enough diplomacy no one got angry (much) and with about five minutes preparation time. I actually impress myself and it seems I wasn’t the only one that was.

So everything worked just fine, like a well-oiled machine doing its thing. But I guess the lack of friction (which allowed us to get so much done so quickly) is due to intense preparation and focus, which is also pressure. I note my gut is more tense than it should be given what little obvious stress I feel (at home everything seems fine as well, yay!). And one of the two I was supposed to meet in the Hard Rock Café doesn’t show up because his back cramped up. I take it that’s a stress symptom, too. I don’t know what became of the other one, but I don’t find either one of them. I do find two people from the other delegation, and have a pleasant evening (and a few beers and a tequila) with them.

I get another dose of stress when I choose to take public transportation to get to Paris-Charles-de-Gaulle airport, rather than a taxi. I mean, 8.50 EUR vs 50 EUR – that’s just stupid. I’m not so spoiled that I need to be chauffeured around at the unit’s expense, now am I? Though even the tail end of Paris rush hour in the metro is no fun with luggage. Nor are the many stairs for the two train changes (no moving escalators here). Nor is the local train which brings me to CDG – slowly.I’m just lucky that I start this journey with the intra-European leg, and the concomitant shorter check-in and cutoff times. Everything’s all right. I’m coming home. J