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Work and travel, travel and work

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Notes from Underneath: Work and travel, travel and work

Notes from Underneath

A California girl in Chilsters (that's Chile to you)

Saturday, October 30, 2010

 

Work and travel, travel and work

My husband's a busy guy. On top of that, he actually loves to work. So when it came time to plan yet another business trip to China to attend the Canton Fair, he went full throttle and built his agenda to include back-to-back meetings with suppliers, as well as back-to-back viewings of showrooms, booths and, in some cases, even factories. Meaning that even though he'll be in China (including fabulously sophisticated Hong Kong) for two weekends, he's left himself absolutely no time to sightsee, let alone rest.

Such a 180 from my days of international business travel. There were many times when I found myself working over the weekend and I've most certainly had my share of working on major holidays. Running from one meeting to another, schmoozing and negotiating from one client to the next, waking up at 6 am and going to bed at 1 am, and in between sitting in absurd Latin American traffic for hours on end. But despite this, I always found time to dabble in the sights, sounds, food and culture of the different countries where I had the privilege to do business. In fact, even my superiors were ok with mixing business with cultural expansion. Maybe it had to do with the fact that in knowing the culture, we were learning how to sell and market to said culture. Whatever the real reason (maybe we were all just slackers?) I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to travel for work for a good part of my career. Moreover, I'm in eternal debt to those who sidelined slave work for a moment and who shared the experience of being tourists with me, if only for a few hours.

Coworker and me on the beach in Cannes, France.

At Monserrate, a Church overlooking Bogota, Colombia.

Banderitas Mexicanas ... yes, that's Tequila and yes it was lunch time.

Well hello, Louvre!

Intersection outside the Shibuya station in Tokyo, quite possibly the most
congested pedestrian crossing in the world.

I see you Cristo Redentor!

And a dabble here and there in Leblon.

Hey, I know you!

Viva LV! I started with US$15 at the roulette table and proceeded to win US$420.

Traveling for work might seem 100% fabulous to those whose job doesn't require them to travel. I agree. To a certain extent it IS fabulous. But it's more like 20% fabulous, 50% stressful, 30% exhausting. The kind of exhaustion you just don't recognize in your day-to-day life because when you're at home you usually aren't trying to adapt to different cultures, languages, business etiquette and so on. When traveling for work, you have to be on your toes, 100% of the time. Even sleeping isn't necessarily all that great since half the time the hotel bed is a lumpy ol' mess, no matter how fancy the hotel.

I hope that G finds a balance during his million-hour stay in China and that he comes back telling me about something amazing he saw, ate or did while he was there. So far, I've heard some stories but unfortunately they're all still related to work. I guess it's a good thing I'm not there with him right now ... I'm not sure he'd really get the work done that he's expecting of himself.

Actually, I'm pretty sure that if I ever traveled with him for work, I'd be the rotten apple, bad influence, Chileans-Gone-Wild instigator of the trip. As depicted below:

Downtime during a layover in Sydney before heading off to China (about three years ago.)

My version of downtime (business trip in Buenos Aires, night before heading home) About 2 years ago.

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Comments:
i want to travel for work! sounds fun though i know it's probably exhausting. will you be traveling at the new job? when do you start?
 
I always thought that business travel sounded so glamorous, but as I've gotten older I've realized that as you say, it's mostly still work plus the hassle and exhaustion of travel. That said, I'd still like to get the chance someday - even if it's just adding in a weekend here and there or having dinner at a place you've heard good things about, every little bit of soaking up another culture counts, right?

Also, based on that last picture, I think I would like to do business travel with you :)
 
you really need to blog. seriously.
 

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