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I spent a fascinating day in the Foreign Office.

We were following David Miliband for the day to get an insight into his life as Foreign Secretary.

By the nature of what he does, there were only brief bursts of activity interspersed with long periods where we couldn't film for reasons of confidentiality.

But we still got a decent flavour of life there.

We saw him meet the South African Foreign Minister, then eavesdropped on a small part of a briefing he was getting ahead of his appearance at the Iraq inquiry next week.

I also became a tourist attraction at one point while walking down Whitehall with Mr Miliband towards the Commons for Foreign Office questions.

A gaggle of tourists, who were presumably there to snatch a look at 10 Downing Street next door rather than see me, spotted the camera, surmised there was something significant in the offing and started snapping.

It's possible I may soon adorn the odd photo album in Yokohama or Stockholm.

But what really took my breath away was the surroundings Mr Miliband works in.

at the height of Britain's imperial might - and it shows.

The main staircase would overwhelm any visiting dignitary, and David Miliband's office was certainly not furnished by Ikea.

I can imagine working there would either leave you intimidated or power-crazed.

Which was Mr Miliband? Intimidated, he insisted, by the weight of history - his office includes a bust of Labour's longest-serving Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin.

It's clearly a job he loves.

But during his packed day, I also asked him just how much of the life of a Foreign Secretary could possibly be spent on the problems of his South Shields constituents.

Oh, and the leadership question also came up!

You'll have to wait a couple of weeks for the answers as I still have to film the other part of his life in his constituency for the .

I'll also be talking to some of his opponents in the contest for South Shields.

And at least I met some Foreign Office staff who confirmed that the Diplomatic Service exam I failed aged 21, is very tough - so at least I don't feel quite such a failure.

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