It was during one of those many bike rides — the kind that clears the mind just enough to let the big questions in — that it all began to crystallize. Something had to move forward.  The passport renewal was done, a major burden off my back.  The trading system was humming along, holding steady through the usual market chaos. But now, the question loomed louder than ever: what happens next?

There were so many moving parts it was almost dizzying.

HR from the school in a certain Gulf country (which shall remain unnamed) had begun pestering me for updates. They wanted the new passport scanned, plus my university degrees, transcripts, certificates — the whole bureaucratic parade. None of it was unreasonable per se, but it was a pain trying to coordinate from Thailand.

I chipped away at it in stages, making incremental progress — one verification here, one scanned doc there — but it always felt like two steps forward, one bureaucratic side-step back.

And then came the insurance cheque debacle — the one I’d flagged earlier. That situation alone could write its own chapter of frustrations. But the worst thought of all crept in: I might have to go back to Canada. Just thinking it sent a shiver down my spine. Not because of any one thing, but because of everything — the climate, the systems, the lifelessness I once knew so well. Surely there had to be another way.

As you can guess, I ran all the moving parts through AI.  It was like having a second brain to map out the logistics, and while it helped keep things organized, it also highlighted just how absurdly complex this whole thing had all become.

Anyone can do a midnight run.  Escaping the metaphorical (or literal) prison is the flashy part. But sustaining the run — that’s what separates the men from the boys.

While I chipped away at the requirements from the Gulf school bit by bit, the most pressing issue became the visa run.  Several routes opened up, each with its pros and cons, but I kept circling back to one key priority: consume as few passport pages as possible while maximizing time.

Vietnam started to rise to the top.

Why?  For one, my longtime friend Jen who had been behind the scenes helping orchestrate this entire midnight run since January, she was now holed up in Danang with her boyfriend. She was longing to return to Thailand but couldn’t, so perhaps I could bring Thailand to her.

And then there was Hanoi, where another brother of mine was based. A chance to reconnect.

This wasn’t just a visa run anymore — it was becoming a branching path:

→ If I truly had to return to Canada, this would be part of the stretch home.  → If Thailand welcomed me back for another two-month stretch, I’d set my sights on Pai as there were some good communities over there.

At least now the fog was somewhat lifting. The plan wasn’t perfect, but it was clearer than last month’s chaos.  For now, that was enough.

But there was still that conversation looming — the one I had been dodging for months.  At some point, I would have to tell my wife:  I found a job in the Gulf.  And when I did, she would lose her marbles.

She was still clinging to the hope that I’d return to China  That somehow this midnight run was all temporary.  That this was just one more spin around the drama wheel before everything returned to “normal.”

And to be honest, deep down… part of me understood that pull.  There was something nostalgic about the idea of slipping back into that old rhythm. Familiar cities. Familiar haunts. Familiar routines. But it was just that — nostalgia.  The China I knew, and the China she was hoping for didn’t exist anymore.

The Gulf was unthinkable to her. She was not exactly a fan of Arabs unfortunately.  Even casual conversations made her squirm.  It's all the same thing, "So what now, you want to have four wives?"  So to tell her that I’d taken a job there? That it might become home? No way she could process that.

But then again, let’s be real: what was left in China?  I had torched all bridges with my last employer.  My passport had been renewed, meaning the old one — with the precious China visa — was now invalidated. Even getting back in would be a bureaucratic nightmare.  And if I somehow pulled it off, the jobs were drying up, the pay was collapsing, and the entire country was on a slow, quiet decline that only those outside the bubble could clearly see.

Rob and I watched the anti-CCP videos daily.  Each video painted a bleaker picture than the last. And every conversation we had ended with the same quiet conclusion: China wasn’t coming back.

But she wouldn’t see that. Or worse, she refused to.

To make matters worse, due to the need for references and the fact that word of my midnight run had spread more widely than I anticipated, I found myself quietly locked out of most future job opportunities in China.  Or even Taiwan too unfortunately.  The fruitless search during my time over there had made that painfully clear.  Plus there were the geopolitical risks as we've gone over before.  

So when a position opened up in the Gulf, where nobody really knew me and I could start again fresh, I had little choice but to seriously consider it and take it.  It wouldn’t be easy.  A three-month probation period loomed ahead, and obviously, any ideas of pulling future midnight runs were now completely off the table.  

Midnight runs were not a pattern I wanted to normalize.  But given how extreme things had become in China, it had been a necessary escape. And while my trading system had matured into a self-sustaining engine that handled volatility with impressive resilience, it still wasn’t bulletproof.  It hadn't been tested to work against deep bear markets or systemic shocks because since 2023 we haven't really had one.  The March-April tariffs crisis came close but even that wasn't as bad as what could happen.    For now, I needed a full-time income to hedge this all. Until I crossed that threshold of a million dollars or more - something that was beginning to look more and more achievable at least — I’d need one foot firmly planted in the world of work.

And that’s what made the coming conversation so heavy — not just because of what I’d say, but because of what she wouldn’t be willing to hear.

So naturally, I said nothing.

There was no good way to bring it up — not yet. No timing that would make the news easier to swallow. But it was also becoming increasingly obvious that I couldn’t stay silent forever. At some point, the conversation would come. It had to.

And that’s when Vietnam started looking more and more like the right place to face it.

Not just because Jen was there — the one who helped steer the entire midnight run from back as far as January — but because it offered a kind of emotional buffer zone.  A liminal space between past and future. Not quite the Gulf, not quite China.  Just… neutral in a way that Thailand couldn't be for now.

Danang was calling in its own way. There, maybe I could get grounded again, figure out how to say what needed to be said — and maybe even say it. From a distance, with perspective. Not from the storm center of Samui, and definitely not from the collapsing weight of Bangkok.

Vietnam offered space.

And that, more than anything, was what I needed before stepping into that next, inevitable confrontation.

So then the plan, at least for now, was pretty simple: take the White Tern onto the ferry bound for Koh Phangan and catch three nights of partying in a row, all building up to the legendary full moon party.

It felt like the right kind of chaos.

Not the draining, cold kind of chaos from Bangkok, but the wild, sweaty, uninhibited kind that only Phangan could offer. It would be one last pulse of madness before heading north — a sendoff, a reset, maybe even a small celebration of having gotten through everything up to this point.

After that?  Bike to Chumphon via the next stage: the Thailand night rides.

This would be a whole new concept. Riding under the moonlight, dodging traffic and heat, powered by solitude and momentum. There was something meditative in that. The wheels were turning again — literally and metaphorically — and for the first time in a while, the horizon didn’t feel suffocating. It felt open.

The next chapter was taking shape. And it would be written one silent mile at a time.

But first, Rob and his family had a better idea.

His wife suggested, “Why don’t we throw a pool party here at the villa before you go?”  It was perfect.  A soft launch into the next arc.  I volunteered to bring the cocktails. Rob smirked — he knew I wasn’t the mixologist type, but I figured we’d keep it simple: rum, lime, soda, ice. Thailand’s heat did the rest.

That night the villa lit up, not with loudness or spectacle, but with presence. The sound of splashing water, reggae beats in the background, soft clinking of glasses, and conversations that wandered from trading systems to travels to nothing at all. It was just what I needed: no goodbyes, no drama — just the kind of moment you remember without needing photos.

By the time the stars took over the sky and the pool lights cast soft blue halos on the surface, I knew — this was the real party before the party. A proper sendoff, not just from a place, but from a chapter. And soon, it would be time to board that ferry, carry the Tern onto new shores, and let the next phase begin.