Two months ago I stormed out of a board meeting and booked the first flight to Bali.

It’s not just that I’d grown tired of the corporate world. I was also fed up with the company’s latest obsession: cell-culture technologies. A few board members had heard about the Nexa Forge — a cutting-edge bioprinter — and were hellbent on buying the company that created this dangerous tech.

I was the only one who saw the potential pitfalls of this new technology. The company had conducted trials with promising results, but the tech was still in its infancy. Something about the acquisition unsettled me. So I did some digging and discovered that Nexa Forge once operated under the name CelluSynth Tech, the same company that provided the lung for my father’s transplant nearly a decade ago.

After my father’s car accident, which left him with one lung lost and the other damaged, we were hopeful when a company offered a trial for artificial organ transplants. Despite the daunting risks outlined in a lengthy consent form, we enrolled my dad.

The transplant initially appeared to be successful and my father returned to his former self. He even completed another marathon. Then, one by one, the trial participants fell ill. My dad was the last one in the group to die, 62 days post-surgery.

I explained all this to my colleagues and our investors, but they were only concerned with the hefty price an artificial organ would fetch. Everyone laughed at me. They said I couldn’t have picked a worse time to grow a conscience.

The board outvoted me in the end.

In another life I would have been on their side, but watching my own father waste away changed my perspective. Maybe Vuyo was right. Perhaps I am getting too soft for these boardroom battles.

So I did the most logical thing — grabbed my passport and a single suitcase, and jumped on the plane still wearing my perfectly steamed suit. It was the most reckless thing I’d ever done.

Now I’m here, on this beautiful island, hiding away from the people I don’t have the courage to face.

My little bungalow off the coast of Bali was the first thing I bought when I became the CEO of Robert & Ross Tech seven years ago. People don’t know who I am here, so no one’s rolling out the red carpet for me, and it’s nice to be an ordinary man again, to have a moment of peace. But today, I’m heading to one of the offshore islands. A flyer ended up on my doorstep this week advertising a free-diving school that I’d love to join.

The boat ride over is pleasant. I enjoy peering over the side and staring at the multi-coloured fish as they weave through the crystalline waters; somehow the ocean here sparkles brighter than any glass table in my Cape Town or New York offices.

I hate how thoughts of work still creep into my mind.

Today I must change that. To distract myself, I try eavesdropping on the couple beside me. I soon give up on this because my Balinese vocabulary comprises about a dozen words.

The mainland is beautiful, but so many people are trying to sell me shit. My shorts and backpack give me away. I look like too much of a tourist, and the street vendors are having a field day.

The water’s too rough for free-diving so I decide to go sightseeing instead.

After wandering around the market for a few hours, I’ve spent all of my money on things I’ll probably never use.

I take the glass globe from the plastic bag at my feet, shake it, then watch it snow on the miniature island inside. It’s winter in New York right now. How did they manage to sell snow to a man trying to escape it? There are some damn good salespeople down in Bali; perhaps I should recruit some of them?

“Shit…” I sigh.

I shake my head, put the globe back, and wonder if I’m ever going to stop thinking about work.

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