Yes.
I admit that.
It was probably the only deliberately petty thing I did.
And I don’t regret it.
Sometimes people deserve clarity in the exact shape they gave it to you.
The flight was long.
Tokyo first.
Then Singapore.
I landed at Changi Airport early the following morning local time.
Everything felt strangely clean.
Bright.
Efficient.
Signs everywhere.
Orchids.
Glass.
People moving with purpose.
I stood in the arrivals hall with my suitcases and took another photo.
This one I didn’t send to Petra.
I sent it to Theo.
Made it.
He replied immediately.
Try not to reorganize their economy on day one.
I laughed for the first time in several days.
Meridian had arranged a temporary serviced apartment in Tanjong Pagar.
My driver took the expressway toward downtown.
I remember looking out the window at a city that felt nothing like Seattle.
Tropical vegetation.
High-rise housing blocks.
Dense roads.
Then sudden views of towers.
Marina Bay.
Ships offshore.
Heat fogging the window when the car stopped.
Seattle had gray softness.
Singapore had brightness.
Intensity.
It felt awake in a different way.
My first week was brutal.
Jet lag.
Meetings.
New systems.
New people.
I woke at three in the morning and fell asleep at seven in the evening.
Suki Tan, who had been with Meridian’s Singapore office for four years, refused to let me pretend I was fine.
“You look terrible.”
“Good morning.”
“No. You look actually terrible.”
“Thank you.”
“Did you sleep?”
“Some.”
“That means no.”
Suki was thirty-five, Singaporean, and one of the sharpest analysts I had ever met.
She had no patience for corporate ego.
“Go outside at lunch.”
“Why?”
“Sunlight.”
“I know what sunlight is.”
“Apparently not. You’re from Seattle.”
Fair.
By day four, I felt semi-human.
By the end of the second week, something else happened.
Silence.
Not literal silence.
Singapore was not quiet.
Traffic.
MRT announcements.
Construction.
Restaurants.
People.
But the background tension in my own mind had stopped.
I no longer wondered what Petra was doing Saturday.
No longer checked the time to see when she might come home.
No longer rehearsed arguments.
No longer translated my own discomfort into language that would sound sufficiently reasonable.
My brain had room again.
Work filled some of it.
The job was exactly as demanding as Ford had promised.
Hiring.
Research process.
Regional exposure models.
Singapore equities.
Japanese markets.
Korean technology.
Australian commodities.
Currency risk.
Political developments.
Institutional clients who expected immediate answers about economies I was still learning.
I loved it.
Not every minute.
But the challenge felt alive.
My permanent apartment was also in Tanjong Pagar.
Small by Seattle standards.
Expensive by rational standards.
But mine.
One bedroom.
High floor.