Before we moved to Beijing we spent quite a few months trying to learn Mandarin.

I did Saturday classes and Alex found a podcast which he would listen to with his headphones on, randomly saying Mandarin phrases, with exaggerated tones. Bless him.

He was particularly pleased with all the greetings he mastered. Nihao which is, of course, hello. Zaoshang hao for good morning, Wanshang hao for goodnight and Ziajian for goodbye.

He practised quite a bit and once we got to China he was all geared up to try them out. It didn’t take Alex’s colleagues long to take him to one side and let him in on a little secret.

You had to chuck out your expectations and your plans and just go with the flow. And that was especially the case with the air.

Is the air bad?

Many days the air in Beijing was ‘can’t see out the window because the sky is full of fog’ bad.

On those days you could see the smog in the halls of our apartment building and feel it in the back of your throat. I didn’t go outside, but the rest of the city did.

Me and Suzy risking life and limb about to bike up to the British Society coffee morning in Liangmaqiao. Beijing August 2012

I met Suzy while I was looking for the rubbish chute in our building.

Margaret I discovered in a cafe while searching out the stitch and bitch crafting group.

Margot was a fellow pregnant expat in a mums-to-be seminar at the local health clinic.

And then there was Aleasha, who I began emailing after she posted questions to a parenting forum about moving to Beijing while pregnant.

In hindsight, making friends in Beijing was easy because of the expat community was so welcoming, but it took a while to gain the confidence and the courage to just say hi, to strike up a conversation, to turn up to a get-together alone without the comfort of familiar face by your side.

Just say hi

When I came across Suzy in the hallway of our serviced accommodation in week two of being in Beijing, I was brave enough to ask her if she knew where the rubbish chute was, but nothing more.

She didn’t know where it was. We had a quick look around the floor together, tried a few doors, had an embarrassed giggle and said our goodbyes.

I returned to our little unit feeling really cross with myself. A friendly, English-speaking gal in this huge scary and very strange city, and I hadn’t asked why she was here, what she was doing now, and, most importantly, did she want to be my friend?

I spent the afternoon watching a knock-off Downton Abbey DVD, eating lychees and feeling sorry for myself. When Alex got in that night, I told him about my encounter in the hallway and we decided it was my mission to find that lady and make her my friend.

I did a small amount of loitering in the hallway the next day, but no Suzy. I was pretty sure I knew which flat she was in but what should I do? Knock on the door? Slip her a note? I was just feeling too shy. What if she was just on holiday here? What if she didn’t need any more friends, thanks very much.

The next night I was getting in the lift with Alex, when who do we bump into but Suzy and her hubby.  I was still letting shyness get the better of me, but thankfully Suzy was not. By the time the lift had got to our floor we’d exchanged life stories and made a date for dinner the following night.

Like us they had just arrived in Beijing, like us they had been living in Sydney and just like us were originally from Europe. Happy dance. I had a friend.

In the four months we spent together in Beijing, Suzy made life so much fun. Suzy was a people magnet, she made friends anywhere she went and thanks to her many connections my own little social circle grew.

What would have happened had neither of said anything in the lift that night? I can’t imagine Beijing without Suzy. So the moral of the story is; don’t be shy – just say hi.

5. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

Remember how making friends is a bit like dating? There will be times when for all your efforts you just don’t hit off with some of the people you meet. Don’t be disheartened: it’s not you, it’s them! Really. Dust yourself off and keep trying.

Now go and make some friends. That’s an order from Suzy Fun at the James Bond-themed British Ball,  Beijing, 2012.

It’s so easy to feel like an outsider when you first arrive in a new place – whether you’ve just moved across a county, a state, a country or a continent. Sitting on the sidelines, it can look like everyone has a friend except for you. But trust me, they don’t. So turn off Downton Abbey, put down those lychees and get yourself along to something, anything, now. You never know, you might just run into your very own Suzy.

This is how you hold a baby.  Beijing, June 2013.

I learned pretty quickly when I was pregnant that ‘Beijingren’ love babies! They really love them. And they know all about them. Even better they are very happy to share all that information with you. Whether you’d like to hear it or not.

This might sound like any other country, but I think perhaps people were just a bit pushier with their unsolicited advice in China.

One friend couldn’t leave her apartment without well-meaning neighbours chiding her for not putting socks on her newborn infant. They didn’t care it was 35C outside. Another was told off for taking her daughter out the house before she was a year old. (I exaggerate, but I did tell people Ted was three months old when he was closer to four weeks, to avoid the tutting).

So it was, I found myself taking Ted for an early morning walk in his pram through our apartment complex.

I was pretty excited as we’d barely left the house since he’d been born thanks to the terrible air pollution. Ted, however, wasn’t playing ball and started wailing within minutes of leaving the apartment.

I hoiked him out of the pram and onto my shoulder to calm him down. So I’d got baby in one hand and I was pushing the pram with the other.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a couple of ladies out for their morning exercise.

I gave my smug new mother smile, knowing they would probably want to come and have a chat. One of them seemed particularly keen, and started making a bee line for us, so I slowed down ready to say how old Ted was in my best Mandarin. “Yes, he really is three months!”

No sooner had I stopped than Lady Number One was tapping me on the arm with a very cross look on her face. I couldn’t understand what she was saying, but clearly something was offending her.

As we weren’t getting anywhere with words, she took matters into her own hands and prised Ted from my shoulder. With great exaggeration she turned him around and cradled him in her arms, looking at me pointedly. Clearly, I had been taking huge liberties with the welfare of my child by holding him upright against my shoulder. Babies should be held firmly in the crook of your arm.

I was kind of shocked by this whole exchange and a little bit nervous, but I still had the presence of mind to take a photo. Or two. It’s not everyday you get an impromptu lesson in baby care on the street from two little old ladies. Ted, sensing he was finally in the hands of someone who knew what they were doing, instantly calmed down and did a model baby impression while I worked out how to ask for him back.

Lady Number One holding Ted in the correct position.