In February 2022, upon arriving at Princeton, I was anonymously nominated by someone to be considered for the inaugural Asia cohort of the International Strategy Forum at Schmidt Futures. Upon giving consent to be considered, I was selected and participated in the launching conference for the Asia Cohort (’22) by Schmidt Futures at the Capella Hotel in Sentosa Island, Singapore from April 25-28, 2022.

It was the longest trip as a return to Singapore after my postdoctoral years at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore (2015-2017). Before the pandemic, I had been back to Singapore briefly for the Shangri-La Dialogue in May-June 2019 and also for the IMF Asia-Pacific region recruitment interview at the Monetary Authority of Singapore in November 2018, but had not had a chance to go back since the pandemic broke out.

The fellows comprise of next generation talents across academia, industry, government and military, from whom I learned so much through events, panels and endless discussions.

(Upon returning from the event, I applied for the individual impact grant at Schmidt Futures for my book project, ‘Digital Trade Wars & Currency Conflict: China, South Korea and Japan’s Responses to U.S. Pressures since COVID-19’ in June 2022, and the grant was approved. I will be wrestling with the manuscript in the 2022-2023 academic year.)