FIRE!!

FIRE! The events of the past 4 hours here in Taraz, Kazakhstan, has caused Carolina and I to realize that “FIRE!” is a word we definitely need to learn in Russian. Definitely.

So, I was Skyping with my mother (seriously, if you see her today, she probably needs a hug after the heart attack I nearly gave her) and my roommate, who is usually WAY calm and laid back, starts calling my name in a semi-panicked voice. So, I tell my mom to hang on, and I leave my bedroom only to find flames burning 3 feet above our stove! I yelled at Carolina to get our neighbor, since we had no idea how to warn anyone else in our building (due to our lacking language abilities. I cannot say “fire!” I can, however, say “frog” and “fresh.”) and I rushed into the kitchen to see what I could do about getting rid of the fire. It reached above my head as I filled a glass of water and threw it on the flames.

BAD IDEA.

I didn’t know that Carolina was heating oil to fry something, and when I threw the water on the stove, it exploded into a ball of flame that I thought for sure would leave me bald and/or eyebrowless. The fire hit the ceiling—thank G-d for these old soviet buildings made only of cement walls and nothing flammable—and dissipated. I went screaming out of the kitchen backwards, feeling for the hair I feared I now lacked, and toward the other kitchen entrance. I turned off the gas. By now, miraculously, the flames has disappeared completely and all that was left was thick black smoke, which covered our ENTIRE apartment.

Damage? Less white kitchen, less pink lungs. And one HECK of a November sunburn. All in all, not too bad.

I returned my terrified self to my computer to tell my terrified mother, who had been listening to screaming and slamming and exploding, that all was well again. So seriously, she probably needs a hug.

Carolina and I have decided this: “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”

We’re feeling PRETTY strong right now. We know that really bad things should have happened, since we both at one time this evening occupied a small enclosed room with a fireball that could have eaten us alive. But HE is watching over us. HE is protecting us. HE’s got us here for a reason, and HE’s not letting anything get in the way of that. How good is HE?!

(This cup was IN the cupboard, on the other side of the kitchen from the fire...)