Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Around the world with Hillary Clinton
Has anyone in the world traveled as widely in recent years as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and the aides who accompany her? Philippe Reines, her chief spokesman and “the deputy assistant secretary for Doing Hillary’s Bidding,” as The Washington Post once called him, logged 111 countries with Clinton in four years (the one country he missed was Hungary) before she was grounded with a health scare.
In travel terms, he’s “hardpressed to think of another job that’s comparable” to Clinton’s, he said, noting that even commercial pilots have consistent routes and guaranteed breaks. In contrast, in a single trip over 12 days last summer, Clinton and her team flew to France to Afghanistan to Japan to Mongolia to Vietnam to Laos to Cambodia to Egypt to Israel.
Below are edited excerpts from a conversation with Reines on what travelers can learn from the nation’s top diplomatic team.
Q: How do you keep your bearings on a trip like the one you described?
A: No one could keep track of the time. During the Arab Spring, they had made a decision in Egypt about daylight saving time, and the Air Force computer didn’t know it. So you’ve got a plane full of people Googling the time. She had a meeting with the president, and we couldn’t figure out if we were on time or an hour late. Q: Any packing tips? A: The key to packing is to never unpack. Clothes aside, I don’t take anything out of my bags. I have a toiletry bag that is a mir
ror image of my bathroom at home. I am incredibly heat intolerant, so I don’t wear a coat. I spend as much time on Amazon. com trying to miniaturize commonly used travel items as some rogue nations do trying to miniaturize warheads.
Q: So what’s always in your bag?
A: Universal power adapters, a Tide to Go Instant Stain Remover pen, a dozen spare BlackBerry batteries, collar stays and disposable travel toothbrushes.
Q: Say Mrs. Clinton has a 17-hour flight ahead of her. Once her work is done, how does she pass the time?
A: She sleeps a tremendous amount of time — by her own admission — on flights. We’ll get on a plane somewhere and land to refuel, fly another seven hours, land and refuel and you won’t even see her. It’s possible we left her behind and we don’t know it.
Q: I recently learned that some royalty are addressed as “Your Highness” and some as “Your Royal Highness.” Who reminds Mrs. Clinton?
A: She tends to know this stuff. It’s the rest of us who have to be told. Getting out of the van, someone may say, “Hey, it’s ‘Your Majesty.”’
Q: Surely you’ve played a little hooky on one trip or another.
A: Never. The fabulous stuff we’ve done has been scheduled. You’ll go someplace, and they’ll want you to see the shrine or the temple. The first time we were in Moscow our hotel was only a block or two from the Kremlin, and we went at midnight and just walked around Red Square and were tourists for half an hour.
Q: What place do you most want to return to?
A: Melbourne. A beautiful city, with the sprawling charm of London, the energy of New York and the weather and attitude and feeling of being on the other side of the earth that only comes in Australia.