I survived Beijing’s smog. Why can’t I stand Singapore’s haze?
The return of polluted skies has brought back old habits – and reminded me how easily we learn to live with what we should never have to accept.
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Smog in Beijing on Oct 26, 2024, when the Air Quality Index hit 250.
ST PHOTO: TAN DAWN WEI
When I landed in Beijing on a bleak November afternoon in 2018 to begin my posting as a China correspondent, the city greeted me with a familiar indignity: a leaden sky, a feeble sun and air thick with smog.
It was hardly the welcome I had hoped for, but neither was it unexpected. Moving to China’s political heartland meant accepting that one of the world’s most fascinating cities came with a rather serious flaw. And winter, when air pollution typically worsens, was just beginning.