But the adjustment was a hard slog.
This will be a long slog.
“It’s going to be a very long slog, ” he predicts.
The recovery will be a longer slog than many expect.
So, it could be a hard slog for investors.
After the slog of the previous 12 years they feel they deserve a break.
Of course Doha must succeed, goes the mantra; yes, it will be a hard slog.
Visitors slog up a crowded, hillside holding hands with strangers like worker ants on a particularly gruesome mission.
"There is no silver bullet," says Devarajan, "just the hard slog of reforming institutions and power relations."
A hard slog, but at least I now have enough cherries to last me about half the way.
Everyone worries about Iraq, either because they think the war should never have been fought, or because of the long, costly and thankless slog it has turned into.
To be fair, many scientists at the time were warning that it would be a long, slow slog to reap clinical benefits.
So it's been a great journey, however, having said that, the resistance to change has also been considerable and it's been a hard slog to change mindsets.
Wild behaviour hurt his form; punishment meant long bans and lossof rankings, so that he had to slog time and again through grimy qualifying rounds.
The long-awaited recovery is now under way, but it's a slow, painful slog that's short on animal spirits and long on a drumbeat of numbers that mostly shift from dreadful to less depressing.
Unlike some games where you can jump to your favourite levels from a handy home screen, there are no shortcuts in Hyrule, just the long, hard slog of the road, be it by foot or on horseback.
The alternative course, and the one he put forward this week, is to slog it out. That may be realistic but it also suggests a siege that could outlast Troy's.
