So it would appear that funding for some of our international clients is starting to lazily make its way to the right places to kick start some projects. In the last few weeks we’ve secured work in Belgium, Holland, Moscow, Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
I’m starting to feel like Uncle Travelling Mac (perhaps Matt) from the Fraggles –(showing my age), sending postcards home and dealing with a lot remotely.
This week, I got to travel on the A380 with Emirates for the first time. I’ve been testing ways to get bounced into Business Class and so far the conclusion is offering Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut to the duty manager is the most effective strategy – unless you know a pilot of course…
Sadly on this occasion my efforts were thwarted as I was caught short with just a raisin and biscuit Yorkie which was deemed a sub-standard bribe and did not do the trick…
The other thing to note is that more people, means longer to do everything: checking in, registering at the gate, boarding – it took ages and every single seat on the entire aircraft was taken and there was a long standby list to boot.
Nevertheless, I was excited about the prospect of getting on the most spacious passenger aircraft ever built, that was until I reached my seat to find that the three of us that were due to sit with each other could have played front row for Leicester this weekend. Marvellous, and an overnighter to boot...
What is interesting to note is that 6 months ago, all outbound flights to Dubai were practically empty and all the inbound ones from Dubai were heaving – symptomatic of the exodus of ex-pats fleeing an ailing economy. I was therefore not looking forward to the return journey either.
The main reason for my trip was to assist our Creative Director and General Manager, Jon Wells, launch our long awaited new office in the media freezone within Abu Dhabi, TwoFour54, and to attend Cityscape Global to check out other international opportunities.
Straight from Dubai airport, I travelled to Abu Dhabi by car which is an hour and a half on one of the most aggressively (and badly) driven stretches of motorway you will ever experience. A mixture of locals and ex-pats that choose to live in the livelier Dubai and work in the more prosperous Abu Dhabi, driving at high speed – often on the hard shoulder at 100MPH less than a foot from the car in front. I’ve stopped sitting in the front as I keep imaginary braking – if you try and sleep, you dream about car crashes which really doesn’t help…
The quarterly Twofour54 event was well attended – the media zone itself now has over 90 partners all from the creative services and early indications are proving that this was a good business decision despite the time it has taken to set up there. TDIC (Abu Dhabi’s tourist board) overviewed their museum and cultural development programme which was interesting and we met some great potential partners along the way. I drunkenly dared a PR Consultant to get as many people to our new studio as possible (for a “map warming ceremony”) to view our newly installed world domination map vinyl that we had proudly put up that day…
To be continued….
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