The first vaccine-generated business trip

I wanted to fly to Barcelona to see my team. We grew significantly over the past few months, and there were people that I hadn’t even met in person yet. I wanted to put a real, physical face to the person I was seeing on Zoom. I had a severe case of Zoom fatigue!

Definitely. The thing is, this trip for me was the most valuable in terms of these human relationships. But that also comes with the territory of “productivity”.As an example, before I got to Barcelona, I spent weeks with a guy from the data team trying to figure something out. It was impossible. We really struggled with the project and made progress very slowly. Then when I got to Barcelona, we met in person, sat down next to each other, and powered through it. It felt like 5 online meetings weren't as effective as getting together in a room and hashing it out in 1 hour!"

I felt like Superman! I was never really afraid of the virus for myself, though. Of course, I worried for others and had heard of people having a really difficult time. But it wasn’t something that I worried about for myself.That being said, I didn’t want to catch (or spread) the virus. I always respected all the rules for the safety of everyone. But now, although I still do that, it feels different. It feels more like it did before. People also felt more comfortable around me, so some of them even took off their masks when we were together. It was amazing to finally see people’s faces, read their expressions, see them laugh. I mean, you can read people’s emotions through their eyes, but there’s something about seeing their mouth and their whole face that brings a more human quality to everything.

I see the future of business travel coming up soon. It will start coming back at the end of April, maybe the beginning of May. Because of the seasonality of the virus, I think this will continue through to the end of the summer. October will be a turning point I think. It’ll be when we really see if governments have vaccinated enough people, and if we’ll be stronger facing the next winter.I’m optimistic about that. I think we will go into the season more prepared. The reason for that is pretty simple—once enough at-risk individuals are vaccinated, the pandemic will basically be over. It’s over in Israel, for example. 50% of the population has been vaccinated, but the majority of those people were those who were most vulnerable.In terms of my own travel agenda, if all goes as I hope it does, I plan to come to Spain at least once a month for a week. My family and I are based in Israel for the time being, but I need to come and see my team regularly. I want to spend time with them, brainstorm with them, and have a beer with them! Otherwise it’s just a professional relationship, through screens, between two people in closed rooms hundreds of miles away. That’s depressing to me. But it made me appreciate the value of what we do here at Travelperk even more. Spending a year working with and talking to people on Zoom instead of face-to-face just goes to show how many interactions simply can't be done online. That's why I know that business travel will come back—it just has to because of our innate need to connect with others

I was among the first people in Israel to get vaccinated in the New Year! I got my first dose on January 1st. I got it a little sooner than my designated age group, though, mainly because I wanted to travel already. I read that every time you open a vaccine “container”, or take it out of the fridge, you have 72 hours to use it up before you have to throw it away. So, I went to a few health centers at the end of the day to see if they had any doses left that they wouldn’t use in that timeframe. I got lucky! Then, they automatically scheduled me for my second dose 3 weeks later. I felt fine, it’s just like a little pinch.

The “green passport” is a made-up phrase. It’s not a passport, and it’s not green! It’s just a paper that I printed off at home, kind of like a certificate that I got vaccinated. It has a QR code that allows you to travel without restrictions. It appeared automatically in my healthcare provider’s app. The purpose is more to allow you to re-enter Israel than anything else. They didn’t ask for it when I got to Spain.

Things weren’t that different to what we’re used to. I got to the airport 2 hours before my flight like I normally do. Since there were fewer flights, the security check process was even faster. I had to prepare my health declaration in advance, and then they scanned the QR code when I got to the airport. There were social distancing markers all over the terminal, hand sanitizing stations, and seats were blocked off. You could only sit on every second chair. The second we got onto the bridge, though, to actually board the plane, the scene was only too recognizable. No one was socially distancing, and everyone was basically on top of each other scrambling to get on the flight first. Just like old times.