DALIAN, China - At one of the first conferences of the World Economic Forum’s “Summer Davos” on Thursday, a large white elephant slowly materialized in the center of the room.

The financial crisis still looms large in the minds of participants, as evidenced by sessions like the morning conference on “Management Lessons from the Great Recession.” A word that appeared time and again at that talk: Transparency.

The CEOs on stage discussed how lack of transparency in financial markets helped lead to collapse. Maurice Levy, CEO and chairman of France’s Publicis Group, said in today’s media environment “every wrongdoing will be known,” making transparency crucial. Added Ben Verwaayen, CEO of Alcatel-Lucent: “In every industry, you have to increase transparency in every aspect of business.” 

Every time “transparency” was mentioned, however, a white elephant grew from a hint of a shadow into a full-blown pachyderm in the crowded conference hall. Finally the moderator, Helmutt Schutte, gently posed a question to the panel’s sole Chinese participant: How about transparency in China?

“We have too much transparency,” said Sun Hong, chairman of the Dalian Port Company, explaining the strength of the unions and importance in shared decision-making; state-owned companies have further oversight from Communist Party secretaries. He gave a detailed response to a difficult question – and yet, to me, the elephant remained in the room.

Concerns about the transparency in China remain high, especially in light of the recent arrests of Rio Tinto employees on charges of stealing state secrets. Yet the “Summer Davos” conference itself is a testament to the importance of China on the global economic stage. As one CEO said, the recession has accelerated the rise of China.

If transparency is a key lesson from the Great Recession, and if China is key player for the world economic rebound, then what will be the outcome when these divergent forces meet? I would have asked the white elephant, but he was in a rush: Too many meetings to attend.

DAVOS, Switzerland - Like all bosses, my editor likes to drop in the really irksome duties on top of those one has already willingly accepted, as if they were nothing to speak of. "Oh yes," she said nonchalantly, "you and Richard have to blog every day while you're in Davos, didn't I tell you?"

CNN's Nicki Goulding displays the work-related injury she received on the nose from her accreditation badge.

Keeping my grumbles to myself ("She expects me to get up at 5, work all day in the freezing cold and write some inane blog?"), I somehow manage to make my irritation look like mild surprise and decide to take the thing in good heart.

Little did I know that by the end of the week, I'd hardly be able to keep my hands off my trusty laptop and digital camera. As I prepare to return home, I have to be honest with myself about my new addiction: parties, hats, pedometers and daughters at Davos have been among the topics I've sounded off on this week.

Luckily for my readers there were also several items that never quite made it into blogdom.

There was going to be one about how Davos seems to produce more paper than ideas. Even before setting out, a huge consignment of documents from the World Economic Forum clunks onto my desk in London. Upon registration, participants are handed a handsome shoulder bag generously pre-packed with ring files, booklets and letters. And since it is impossible to attend every event at the Forum even if it is vitally important to you, progress around the Congress Centre is hampered by omnipresent racks full of press releases, transcripts of keynote speeches and other literature.

The crunch always comes at the end of the week. I have a large suitcase for trips like this, but it always ends up crammed full by the time I've put in all the warm clothing needed to handle broadcasting outdoors at 7 a.m. when the temperature is down to minus 16 degrees centigrade. Sticking in any extra stuff is not an option.

There was also going to be a blog about the mishaps that befell two of my colleagues here. I knew there was a lot of science, sociology and subterfuge associated with the different colored accreditation badges but never realized how downright dangerous they are.

The hazard resides in the piece of elastic you string round your neck, so the thing hangs at roughly the level of your third button down from the top. Security is very big here, and you frequently have to hold your accreditation up to electronic readers that verify your identity - for example, when entering the Congress Centre.

Last night CNN's Nicki Goulding did this a little carelessly, but with the elastic at full stretch the sharp-edged badge slipped from between her fingers, whizzed back and struck a vicious blow to the bridge of her nose.

Ouch. She appeared the next morning looking like she'd been in a fight.
The other unhappy incident concerned our Vicky Brown. She became the victim of abuse of monopoly power, proving that at the World Economic Forum, the microeconomics can be as bad as the macroeconomics.

Stepping into her taxi - ordered for 6:30 a.m. - at 6:32 a.m., she was subjected to a torrent of abuse in a language she does not understand. One thing the driver did make clear: She would have to pay more for keeping him waiting. Knowing that prices in Davos are systematically eased skywards when the World Economic Forum is in town, she stood her ground. More abuse, and the driver dropped her past the place she needed to be dropped, forcing her to walk back a couple of hundred yards.

The fact is, there aren't many taxis or taxi companies in Davos, and there is a lot of demand for them during the Forum. It's a seller's market, and first-year undergraduate microeconomic theory prepares you for such behavior. But it is still a pity to meet such a grouch in a country famed for its courtesy and hospitality.

Ho hum. Enough complaining. I'm off to work out a way of squeezing all those precious press releases into my poor old suitcase.

DAVOS, Switzerland - Luckily, not everybody here at the World Economic Forum fits the stereotype of the standard corporate "suit."

MIT Professor Robert Langer and daughter Susan.

I have just bumped into a charming 18-year-old who must be just about the youngest person ever to wear the coveted white badge of the Forum.

For those not familiar with the ways of Davos, the white accreditation badge is only issued to full participants and their spouses, a category that stands nearly at the apex of the elaborate and rigid caste system that applies here.

If Susan Langer does not fit the corporate stereotype, she isn't exactly your average American high school senior, either. Not many teenagers anywhere have two scientific patents to their name. But then she does have a lot of parental encouragement: her father Robert is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a world leader in the use of nanotechnology to treat cancer and regarded as one of the most brilliant minds in the biotech world.

It is as his "spouse" that Susan is here. But she is clearly far from being in awe of all these eminent and powerful people. "It's totally cool," she tells me, unfazed by my request for her take on Davos. "I got to meet the person who started YouTube, and I ran into Al Gore and got my photograph taken with him."

Ever the proud father, Robert fishes out his cellphone, leans across and shows me the shot of Susan with the former vice-president turned environmental campaigner.

So how did the idea of sneaking young Susan into Davos come about? "He got invited and I wanted to come," she explains simply, adding that she had accompanied him on two previous overseas trips.

It's not just about meeting celebrities, either. Susan Langer's longer-term ambitions also lie in the biotech field but economics is another subject she's interested in. She's taking advantage of exam leave to learn about it from the horse's mouth.

"It's been great," says her high-flying father, "People have been very nice, and I get to spend some time with my daughter."

Now I've heard of "Bring Your Daughter to Work Day", and I think it's a great idea. So why not "Bring Your Daughter to Davos"?

Mind you, if there is still a World Economic Forum in, say, 2020... I for one would bet that this accomplished and personable teenager will be here - this time with her very own white badge.

If Angelina or Brad had been at Davos this year, they would have been given the treatment ‘Royal celebs' deserve. But they are not here, so in the absence of glitz we have to find other ‘stars' to hang onto.

Thankfully there are plenty of alternative delegates worthy of our attention. For instance, economists like Stephen Roach of Morgan Stanley Asia and Joseph Stiglitz formerly of the World Bank. Not heard of them? Not hanging on to their every utterance? Tut tut. No wonder you're in this mess!

These men may not have the good looks or dashing manner of Hollywood stars, but here at Davos this year they are ‘rock stars' in their own right.

When they walk through the hallways they are feted. Crowds gather to hear the words from their lips. A private chat with one or the other is economic nirvana.

Just this morning as I walked through the lobby, there was Roach holding court; cameras recording his words, journalists jostling to hear his view on how bad things would get.

For some time both men have been forecasting the horrible financial disaster we now face and were sneered at. They said it was going to get worse...and it did. And now at Davos both men can look us in the face and say "told you so." Neither is actually saying that of course. Instead they are putting forward ideas and solutions to get us out of the mess.

What worries me is Roach and Stiglitz are saying the plans on the table won't work, from stimulus packages, to co-ordination, to regulatory reform – they claim more needs to be done. We have ignored these economic rock stars before, to our cost. Let's not make THAT mistake again.

Tune in to CNN International each evening at 1900 GMT to catch Richard's new show, ‘Quest Means Business'.

For more coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos page.

DAVOS, Switzerland - The new Davos zeitgeist is everywhere. Even the technology is deleveraging.

Charles Hodson shows off his Davos pedometer.

Once upon a time, about a year ago, this was the place to learn about new gadgets. The iPaq passes as almost quaint these days but it was here that I for one first used one, linked in through a whizzy wireless network. A few years later I made friends with an iPod.

But this year a rather less exotic gadget was handed to me with my accreditation badge, forum program and briefing documents. Small, blue, plastic and emblazoned with the World Economic Forum logo, it was introduced as ... a pedometer.

It has a little display showing the number of steps taken since it was last reset and the idea is, you clip it onto your waistband, go about your business at Davos and then at the end of the week there's a prize for the person who has walked the farthest.

What better way of underlining the new austerity that now clings to Davos as tightly as its winter coating of thick snow! Had it not been for the absence of an airfield up here, we'd have been treated to opulent displays of executive jets in previous years; instead, though, the real movers and shakers swung in and out in noisy helicopters, while the merely influential slummed in it up the mountains in limos and luxury German sedans.

This year, I realise, it's what we Brits call "Shanks's pony" that is the vehicle of choice for the Davos glitterati: your own two feet. Even a lift in one of the courtesy World Economic Forum shuttle buses might undo any cred you might have had here.

The high-speed, high-spending, high-lending economy is dead. It's the good old-fashioned footslog that will get us all out of jail: no excessive cost, no impact on global warming and no undue risk - unless of course you fall victim to the many icy pavements.

To keep us all on our toes, the security officers have instituted a serious of pointless detours: entrances to the congress center that were open to all yesterday are now only for VIPs, and the rest of us are asked (with impeccable Swiss courtesy) to use another one several hundred yards away.

As one of life's great pedestrians, it all comes naturally to me, I must say. For the record, I have taken 9,918 steps since this time yesterday - and counting.

For more coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos page.

DAVOS, Switzerland - I often ask myself why do I bother to come here? Then I remember, I am here as a journalist covering what the leaders say and do. But why do so many delegates, who have a choice, come here? Surely they would be better off tending to their business back home?

Ordinary delegates say they want to hear what world leaders say about crisis.

This morning I got the official schedule. Some of the sessions are extremely timely and relevant. The "Brainstorm - What happened to the Global Economy?" panel promises to be good. But other sessions, like "What is Good Design?" or "Political Art: What Now?" while interesting in an esoteric way, are hardly vital at this time of crisis.

In the registration hall I asked "ordinary" delegates why they came. Not the high and mighty - just mid-level executives and officials who make up the bulk of Davos.

Some said they wanted to hear world leaders and decision makers talk about the best way out of the financial mess (after all Vladmir Putin, Angela Merkel, Gordon Brown Wen Jiabao are all scheduled to speak). Others come to continue their dialogue with clients and suppliers and discuss what they need to do next.

Representatives from NGOs and aid groups like UNICEF attend, to make sure their causes are not forgotten in this moment of crisis. One lucky businessman is here to talk to investors in medical research - yes, there are still some people with money to invest.

Lots of delegates have been coming to Davos for many years - this event is part of their calendar. Just as you don't stop going to visit relatives at Christmas, so you still come to Davos in a crisis; even more so, they would say.

Perhaps the real reason to be here is summed up by the delegate from Asia who said "opportunity is the opposite of crisis." Quite!

Tune in to CNN International each evening at 1900 GMT to catch Richard’s new show, ‘Quest Means Business.’

For more coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos page.

DAVOS, Switzerland - OK, OK, so Davos is known for its parties. And even in these hard times, a few social shindigs are bound to survive the blizzard of bad news that is blowing through the World Economic Forum.

Workers install chairs at the Davos Congress Center in advance of the opening of the World Economic Forum.

There are, in fact, four parties written into the official program: the "welcome reception" as participants arrive on the Tuesday night, the "opening buffet" on the Wednesday, the lavish "cultural soiree" on the Saturday night and the "farewell buffet lunch" on the Sunday.

Even in 2009, all four are there in black and white. But on the basis of the first of them, those who come here for a break from the recession will be badly disappointed.

Even the space in which the first reception was held – in the plush Hotel Belvedere - tonight seemed somehow shrunken, if not misshapen. The proffered glass was modest, and the canapés (some of which I remembered as being so large and extravagant as to challenge one's dignity and good manners) positively normal in their dimensions.

As in previous years, CNN had asked permission to send in a camera to shoot some footage of participants enjoying their happy reunion. "No," came the polite reply, to our initial puzzlement.

Then the Swiss centime dropped. Davos is not about having a glass in one's hand any more. Parties are off-limits to our lenses; the WEF doubtless frets that such images sit badly with the image of an earnest and penitent gathering of business and political leaders, bent on finding The Way Out Of This.

Eager to relax after a long day but shamed into doing something more worthy, I take out my notepad, cross the hall and join what is billed as a cocktail party cum press briefing by a large consultancy firm.

CEOs, I learn, have never been so glum about their prospects, and expect any recovery to be protracted and hesitant. They are losing sleep at the thought of disruption to capital markets (the credit crunch, to you and me), over-regulation burgeoning energy costs and a lack of key talent. This clearly was never a party intended to go with a swing.

And why should it? Welcome to Davos in the recession. These truly are different times.

If we needed reminding why this week's World Economic Forum  is important, look at the pages of any newspaper: job losses, bank  write downs, economic collapse and no end in sight.

In previous years at Davos there has been the feeling that the delegates have been deciding the best way to improve the world;  rarely tempered by doubts of failure or mistake. Now the errors, the failures, the disasters of decision making are as evident as the mountain itself. So this year when some delegates sound off about what must be done, they might be met with, "You got us into this  mess in the first place."

Klaus Schwab the founder of the WEF recognises this, telling me this year's forum will be "...more modest. People see that they have  failed to a certain extent as leaders. Even in Davos ...nobody was really listening."

Which begs the question why we are bothering to listen to these people again? Simple. They are the ones who have to get us out of  the mess. Schwab points out "take the bankers, they are part of the problem but they are also part of the solution so that's the reason we still integrate them here. "

Klaus Schwab agreed that there had to be more humility at this years forum. Ultimately he admits that means hearing bankers and leaders say "sorry."

Tune in to CNN International each evening at 1900 GMT to catch  Richard's new show, 'Quest Means Business.'

For more coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos page.

DAVOS, Switzerland – It's the contrasts that hit you when you come to Davos. All those mountains and snow, all that Swiss cleanliness - it all feels a long way from the gloom and mud of winter in the English countryside, which is where I was only 36 hours ago.But there are some other big contrasts, too. Even before the World Economic Forum begins, Davos 2009 feels a lot more than 12 months away from Davos 2008. Then, we thought we'd get away with a bit of a slowdown, and emerging economies like China would take over as the engines of global growth and save us from recession. Now, that recession is a reality, and today my inbox is clogged with internal CNN e-mails confirming tens of thousands of job losses: Home Depot, Deere, Sprint Nextel, Caterpillar and on and on and on.

A worker clears away snow ahead of the Davos 2009 forum.

So this year's Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum will be a rather more austere affair than its predecessors – even more sober than last year's. Old hands who've been here many times before agree that growth has given way to decline much faster than they ever expected. That has frankly awed participants into a more businesslike attitude towards their annual jolly to Switzerland.

Not that it looks that way if you go down to the kitchens of, say, the Arabella Sheraton in Davos. Amid the bustle of preparing for six days of non-stop catering, an assistant chef shows me storerooms full of gourmet supplies. My eye alights on one carton full of something pink and white and shrunk-wrapped: lobster, I ask? Nothing so mean, laughs my guide. Kamchatka crab legs, apparently, a Russian delicacy.

Oh yes, there will be quite some parties here, as every year. But some of the biggest names are canceling or cutting back. Goldman Sachs is reported to have nixed its bash for this year, and a lot of others are wary of being seen to live it up in the Swiss mountains while the world economy crumbles.

Nevertheless, the numbers of participants and hangers-on (like me) will be broadly similar to the turnout last year. For corporate leaders, there is a genuine reason for abandoning their desks and sneaking off to the mountains: we are in uncharted economic waters, and anyone who looks like they might know how to sail us back to growth will be seized on and pumped for ideas.

In Davos, dinners, drinks and deals usually win out over debates, deliberations and discussions. But in 2009 the boot will be on the other foot. With uncertainty clouding the global outlook, the networking will be about what was always originally intended: trading ideas. Trimmed of its excesses, and focused sharply on the economy, this time the World Economic Forum will be about listening.

For more coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos  page.

DAVOS, Switzerland - I like to arrive in Davos a few days before the World Economic Forum begins when I can experience the picturesque Swiss town without the thousands of delegates. During the Davos week, getting a hotel room here is impossible.

Many stay in apartments, or worse, in nearby towns (oh the shame of it!). This year I made a bit of Quest Personal History (QPH)! I am so early I am the only person staying in my hotel. The existing guests checked out (a group of German skiers) and the manager asked me what time I wanted him to come in to make my breakfast, since I am the only person here.

In all my years of travel for CNN Business Traveller, I have stayed in big hotels, small hotels, grand hotels, shocking hotels… but I have never been the ONLY guest staying in a hotel.

By this evening, other early birders will have arrived and I shall have to ‘share’ my hotel! In the days ahead I shall write about the issues at Davos.

Until then I shall enjoy another moment of QPH… today I will ski! I know of no real research into this, but delegates always ask each other, “have you ever actually skied during Davos?” The answer is usually long and rambling about why best intentions have been thwarted; panels, meetings, lunches “got in the way."

This year I will get up the mountain, then when the question is asked I can be very smug and say “of course I have skied, oh, and I even had the hotel to myself!”

Hotels and skiing… this is indeed going to be an historic Davos meeting!

Tune in to CNN International each evening at 1900 GMT to catch Richard’s new show, Quest Means Business.

For more coverage of this year's World Economic Forum, go to our special Davos page.