A Day In Beijing with Chen

What was daily life actually like inside the Forbidden City? This episode answers that — through four lives you won't forget. EP3 is the final part of our Forbidden City series, and it's the one where we go inside. Your walking companion from the south entrance to the north exit — or a virtual tour if you're nowhere near Beijing. We walk through the architecture. We follow the routes. But to bring...

Part 2 of the Forbidden City series — a deep dive into Beijing's history, Chinese culture, and the stories behind the architecture. Every colour, number, and rooftop creature in the Forbidden City was a deliberate choice. This episode decodes the architecture and how the building communicates power, class, and gender roles — for example, the concubine system. And one woman, Cixi, who entered the p...

A man stole the throne from his own nephew. And to prove he deserved it, he built the largest palace in human history. One million workers. Fourteen years. And a canal that carried an empire's resources halfway across China to one construction site. But to understand why, you need a bit of context first — and I promise I'll make it painless. So I start with the basics: what a dynasty actually is,...

I spent 10 years in London doing brand strategy. Won awards, led massive teams, made business director before 30 — but mostly was selling things I didn't believe in. Hit my mid-30s, came back to my beloved hometown with my husband. Beijing's independent businesses are disappearing. 3 million restaurants, cafés and bars closed across China last year. And the tourists who do come? They're stuck in a...

A Day In Beijing is an English podcast about Beijing, about China. Our history. Our culture. Our stories. Told in English — but told by us. I got tired of watching our 5,000 years of civilisation get reduced to 30-second TikToks by people who visited once. Got tired of AI-generated travel guides speaking for us. Got tired of the same lazy stereotypes being recycled as "China content." So I thought...