Wilson PonThe Accidental Life of a Diplomat
January 17th 2009 03:05
I've long wondered what it would be like to be a foreign diplomat. There are such stories of glamour interspersed with dire responsibility that it's hard to discern whether it would be terrifying or fantastic or both, to represent the government in a foreign land, deciding on policy and relations.
Sure, diplomats are wined and dined, they swirl wine in deep glasses as they converse with leaders of the world and they occupy sumptuous apartments if they are posted somewhere with a semblence of luxury. Their meetings often take place over delicious meals and they can siddle in closer and closer still to the ear of the prime minister, trade commissioner or ambassador.
I started work yesterday (as part of a fellowship placement from the Australia Korea Foundation) in Austrade in Seoul, under the wing of a kind and erudite trade comissioner who let me dabble in politics and press releases. My fellow fellows and I were treated to a delicious lunch and invited to Australia Day celebrations, which sound elaborate and fantastic, this week.
We met with ambassadors and diplomats, all of whom were every bit as adept at small talk and offering advice as they were managing and shaping trade, political and economic policy between the two countries.
The best bit, to me, being a staunch feminist beneath my gentle exterior, was that most of these diplomats were women. Sure, the ambassador is male, the trade comissioner is male and the president of the chamber of commerce is. But sitting in important positions were women not much older than me; women who had studied at ANU and applied to learn Korean and work here in an tight-knit and exciting embassy environment.
We have been afforded a brief but delicious sneak-peek at the life of a diplomat. It's pretty sweet. Intellectually stimulating, empowering, deeply challenging, relentlessly interesting, enjoyable, terrifying, wonderful, awful... It's a complicated life and it will only get moreso as these women acquire family members and continue to bound from assignment to assignment. But if you're a citizen of the world, keen to equip yourself with a new and possibly completely foreign langauge, someone who wants to have a say in the way our government disperses its power and resources, then the job of a diplomat, and the accidental oppulence that may accompany that job, is the place to be.
Seoul is a fascinating land. A land of neon, kimshi, taekwondo, high fashion, low birth rates, quickly spoken words with many syllables, speedy subways and overcrowded streets and buses. A land of enormous economic potential (the rate of its development is staggering, it is the model of a near-unbelievable hike in wealth and stability, a power in the Asian region virtually unlike any other). Above all, a land of kindness and care, feverish intelligence and very, very hard work. Diplomat or street-sweeper, Koreans and ex-pats alike work themselves into a frenzy of productivity and it promises to be a great adventure.
More tales soon.
Adventuretoes,
Kate Leaver
Sure, diplomats are wined and dined, they swirl wine in deep glasses as they converse with leaders of the world and they occupy sumptuous apartments if they are posted somewhere with a semblence of luxury. Their meetings often take place over delicious meals and they can siddle in closer and closer still to the ear of the prime minister, trade commissioner or ambassador.
I started work yesterday (as part of a fellowship placement from the Australia Korea Foundation) in Austrade in Seoul, under the wing of a kind and erudite trade comissioner who let me dabble in politics and press releases. My fellow fellows and I were treated to a delicious lunch and invited to Australia Day celebrations, which sound elaborate and fantastic, this week.
We met with ambassadors and diplomats, all of whom were every bit as adept at small talk and offering advice as they were managing and shaping trade, political and economic policy between the two countries.
The best bit, to me, being a staunch feminist beneath my gentle exterior, was that most of these diplomats were women. Sure, the ambassador is male, the trade comissioner is male and the president of the chamber of commerce is. But sitting in important positions were women not much older than me; women who had studied at ANU and applied to learn Korean and work here in an tight-knit and exciting embassy environment.
We have been afforded a brief but delicious sneak-peek at the life of a diplomat. It's pretty sweet. Intellectually stimulating, empowering, deeply challenging, relentlessly interesting, enjoyable, terrifying, wonderful, awful... It's a complicated life and it will only get moreso as these women acquire family members and continue to bound from assignment to assignment. But if you're a citizen of the world, keen to equip yourself with a new and possibly completely foreign langauge, someone who wants to have a say in the way our government disperses its power and resources, then the job of a diplomat, and the accidental oppulence that may accompany that job, is the place to be.
Seoul is a fascinating land. A land of neon, kimshi, taekwondo, high fashion, low birth rates, quickly spoken words with many syllables, speedy subways and overcrowded streets and buses. A land of enormous economic potential (the rate of its development is staggering, it is the model of a near-unbelievable hike in wealth and stability, a power in the Asian region virtually unlike any other). Above all, a land of kindness and care, feverish intelligence and very, very hard work. Diplomat or street-sweeper, Koreans and ex-pats alike work themselves into a frenzy of productivity and it promises to be a great adventure.
More tales soon.
Adventuretoes,
Kate Leaver
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