Beginnings in Beijing: Four months in the Chinese capital (Part I)

When I landed in Beijing in late May, the first thing that struck me was the heat. Dry, biting, and sharp on the skin. It’s not the heavy humidity of Manila, but a sting that prickles. I had braced for pollution, having been warned about air quality many times before I left. Instead, the skies were surprisingly clear and often cloudless. The avenues were not only long but also deliberately wide. Massive buildings of marble, concrete, and glass stood on both sides, heavy and imposing. They seemed to mirror the strict order and weight of the Chinese capital. Yet amid this hardness were plenty of trees, manicured lawns, and spring flowers, carefully arranged to soften the edges and remind me that even in this immense, unyielding city, appearances are deliberately managed. It was overwhelming, impressive, and impersonal all at once.

The language barrier was just as impermeable. Not being fluent (yet) in Mandarin, every signage and every document felt like a riddle. Even something as simple as figuring out what an establishment was for or deciphering product labels on food and appliances became an exercise in guesswork. Today I still find myself hesitating at shopfronts, unsure whether I am about to walk into a clinic, a massage parlor, or a shop selling something I have absolutely no use for. In the supermarket, I often worry that what I think is soy sauce might turn out to be vinegar or something I should not ingest. It is a constant reminder that adjusting here would take more than diplomatic training, it would demand daily patience and humility of the sort that reduces me to the turo-turo school of acting, pantomiming, and looking a little silly just to communicate simple needs and run errands.

I came from three years at DFA Manila in the Maritime and Ocean Affairs Office, where the West Philippine Sea consumed my every workday, including many weekends. I thought I knew what ‘busy’ meant. But embassy work in Beijing quickly showed me a broader kind of busy. It has made me realize that what I once thought was one of the busiest desks in the DFA was only preparation for what lay ahead in China.

I have hesitated to put my impressions into writing. As a junior officer, I am mindful that I have to tread carefully, always aware of how words can be attributed to anything else besides my honest musings. Four months is a short time, barely the beginning of what is a six-year tour of duty overseas, and I know it is just a small fraction of the learnings and experiences that still await. I don’t pretend to speak authoritatively, and I want to avoid giving the impression that I know more than I actually do. Yet I also believe there is value in reflecting, if only to better understand my role at this early stage. Writing forces me to take a step back and see the broader arc of these first months. Foreign service work is often fragmentary: meetings, calls, reports, conversations, events, and various sorts of paperwork—because when you look at them in the day-to-day routine, they appear as disjointed tasks. Only with distance and retrospect do they come together into something coherent. This blog of sorts is my way of piecing them together into something more reflective. It also reminds me of the larger duty behind the daily rush: to stand here for the Philippines, with conviction, in the capital of what is arguably our most consequential neighbor.