When I first encountered Garcia, less than an hour after Patrick Vieira's final game in charge of City's young guns a couple of weeks before Christmas, the Spaniard strode over to me and two colleagues and shook our hands.
This was a lad of just 17, yet to have any real interaction with the strange men of the press, showing incredible assuredness, confidence and, basically, excellent manners. He not only answered our questions in perfect English but hung around to translate for compatriot Brahim Diaz - not that he needed much help at all. The two then took farewell pictures of Vieira and his staff at the side of the pitch.
So I already had a good idea of what to expect of the young playmaker, now 18, when I met him at the Etihad Campus this week. But news that he is about to embark on a three-year online degree in sports science still came as a pleasant surprise.
"I’m the only one that is doing it I think. I wanted to do something because since I came from Spain I’ve been doing stuff, but not as much as I wanted. So this year, hopefully I can do the things I really want to do."
Bear in mind that this was a lad who left his family behind in Oviedo at the age of 15, and has since established himself as one of the jewels of City's burgeoning academy, one that attracts talented footballers from all over the world. He would surely be forgiven for focusing on his football.
Indeed, Garcia, who names Xavi and Andres Iniesta as his idols, appears a true student of the game. Sometimes players are earmarked as future coaches before they hang up their boots; but very rarely can they be identified after 20 minutes of senior action. Yet the feeling is that this guy can achieve whatever he wants.
He's certainly in the right place; having spent his first two years in England with a foster family and doing his GCSEs, he has been living at City's world-class training ground for the last six months.
"It’s good. If you’re here you’re always concentrated on football, it’s a bit boring sometimes but with all the team-mates it’s good."
Conducting this interview shortly after one of his educational classes, it's clear he's keeping the boredom at bay: "I have some work to do, I’m trying to get my driving licence now, I’m into the theory test, I’m doing some tests and stuff. And if not then I’m with team-mates, playing PS4 or whatever.
And regular users of Manchester's Metrolink should keep their eyes peeled for Garcia and his team-mates heading into the city centre in their spare time. "Yeah the tram is just here so it’s just five minutes."
Does he get recognised? "No not really, some people might look at you and you think it’s because of that, but not really." That will likely change very soon.
Before departing for New York, Vieira reflected on his five years at City which included a spell as coach of the next generation of stars. "My favourite and proudest moment at this club was seeing Manu Garcia play with the first team against Crystal Palace and to score a goal," the former midfielder said.
"Incredible!" Garcia beams upon hearing the comments. "Patrick’s been here a lot of years, he’s won trophies with the club, and to say that it is his proudest moment is really big, it’s the proudest moment for me! It’s unbelievable."
After a 16-minute League Cup run out at Sunderland in September Garcia needed just six minutes in the next round to open his City account and make Vieira really sit up and take notice.
Having been played through by Kelechi Iheanacho, probably the one City youngster more highly rated than the Spaniard right now, Garcia was faced with a goalkeeper in Wayne Hennessey who has made almost 250 appearances for club and country over the last decade. Plenty of seasoned pros, even strikers, can lose their head in front of goal when given time to weigh up the situation rather than being able to finish instinctively. Not Garcia.
"I think the worst thing was because I had a lot of time, because if you haven’t got time you just do whatever you feel in the first moment," he said. "I saw the ball coming across and I saw that nobody was there, I was just one-v-one with the keeper.
"The first touch I think was OK, and then I thought too much and the second touch went wrong. So first touch I was thinking if I was in the EDS I probably would have tried to chip the ball over, that’s the thing that I thought, but the second touch, because I was thinking too much, it went long, so I just tried to finish however I could."
The dink would have to wait; he rolled the ball into the net with his in-step, meaning the only damage done by that rogue second touch was that he did not even see his first City goal cross the line.
"I didn’t see the ball going in, I just heard the people. I was on the floor so I didn’t see it properly, it took me two seconds to realise I scored. I couldn’t believe it when it happened."
The Twitter account of Antonio Garcia, Manu's father, is a shrine to the exploits of his very special son, and the sheer joy and pride of the whole family was inescapable the night of the Palace goal.
"I called him after the game and they were happier than me," Manu added, "because for them obviously it’s been hard, I was 15, 16 when I came, so it was hard for them. So to see me come on, first game at home, and score, it was incredible."
There is frustration among fans, however, that he has not been given any further senior action since that night. There was a golden opportunity against Hull City in the fifth round of the League Cup to bring him on once again but, even as City went 3-0 up late on, Martin Demichelis came on in midfield instead.
But the pressure - as well as the benefits - that comes with being part of City's drive to produce the best young players in the country means he is always on his toes.
"We’ve got a really good academy overall, the U16s now have won a lot of tournaments and all the competitions in England. Everyone is pushing a lot, that’s good for everybody, not just for the young ones but for the older ones as well, because we know there are people coming and we have to push."
Considering Garcia's maturity, it is easy to forget he is so young. After all, the first World Cup he remembers was the 2006 edition in Germany: "Because I had the stickers with the players! I think that was the first one. I know older ones because I look at videos and stuff, but the one I really remember is that one."
Analysing former players is yet more evidence to backs up his status as a very young student of the game.
"For example five months ago I didn’t know about Dennis Bergkamp," he reveals. "I saw videos of him and I’ve fallen in love with him, because he’s unbelievable. I didn’t know about him probably because he had some problems travelling, he didn’t fly, so it probably was because of that."
Whether he's studying old matches, sports science or learning to drive, it's a wonder Manu Garcia has time to do anything else. That he is on the cusp of breaking into the Manchester City first team goes to show that this is no ordinary young man.
Whatever happens in his surely bright future, he is a credit not just to City but to football as a whole.
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