Yupa's New Kitchen (The Whole Story)

Yupa and her Pampered Chef Chopper

 It's all big and bright and clean.  Just like you would want any kitchen to be.  But there's something of a deeper good and a truer shine on this new addition to the house of Suradet and Yupa on the Hot Springs campus.  Because it quite literally rose up out of the ashes.

Before this.

It's important to know something of the living situation of not just our gathered children, but of their parents as well.  We are situated on property that is the extension of the Korean Methodist Church  Suradet and Yupa planted some 20 years ago.  It's a larger-sized property, and can host small conferences and large meetings, youth retreats and, well us.  

In this living situation, Suradet and Yupa have been given one of the structures to live in, and while it wasn't originally laid out to be a family home, they have innovated and adjusted and made a good place for their own family, with an office space now included.  

And before this, the kitchen was, let's say rustic.

Don't get me wrong, some of the best Thai food on the planet came out of the kitchen, proof of Yupa's excellent culinary skills and gift of hospitality.  But the "room" that we called the kitchen was more outdoors than in; more camp-style than cuisine.  It made use of what was once a porch, some corrugated fiberglass roofing, crazy Thai-style electric wiring, and copious black netting to keep out the animals.  It was cramped and crowded and dark, and accessed down a rather steep step and via a rather narrow walkway.

To be clear, this was not the kitchen where the main food prep for our children took place.  Some did.  And a fair bit of food storage was in there.  So there's that.  But still.

Yupa was not at home when the fire happened.  She was staying with her Mom in their shared time of grief at the loss of her father.  Trauma happens that way sometimes, layer on layer like that.  Bell was the first to notice the smoke and the alarm.  She woke up her Dad.  And by the time they and the older boys were on it, things were almost, almost beyond saving the entire house.  Almost.  And aren't we glad we made sure we have smoke detectors and the fire extinguishers, because the fire department never would have made it out here on time.

And it was a mess.

I received the video of the still-smoking remains within minutes of the danger being past.  And Suradet's strained but relieved voice, saying first the words you absolutely must say first if you ever have to send a video of what used to be your kitchen but now is just a charred and hissing mess. 

 "Everybody okay!"

I admit, this was perhaps one of the hardest points of the full-throes of the pandemic for me.  We were already contending with the pandemic itself.  Online learning for the kids.  Concern for everyone's health and safety.  Then Yupa's father's diagnosis leading to his death.  Now this.  Really?  A fire?  And the next little bits of this illusion of security and control we fool ourselves with break off and shatter on the smudged ceramic tiles. And I am all these cursed miles away, completely unable to do what everything in my being screamed to do.  Just be there.

An important pause inserted here, because it was awful.

But after this.

This.

It's beautiful.  Big and bright and clean.  And it happened because so many responded in the moment.  Because it just so happened that Yupa's nephew who is a skilled tradesman was available.  Because folks half way around the world felt the "oh no!" of it and wanted to help.  Because insurance is a real thing and was part of our start up plan four years ago.  A new kitchen was not in the budget but it happened anyway and today we are all shiny with gratitude.

The Pampered Chef Chopper was a cherry on the top of one of the fundraisers we did.  Thank you to everyone who participated in that.  Thai food, as you well may know, requires lots of chopping, and it will be put to very good use, believe me.

And now I am tempted to simplify it all and say that good things come out of bad.   They do.  But in all my conversations I'm having this week about all the things that happened while we were away from one another, we are trying to make sure not to be glib.

This was hard.

So many levels of hard.

And we are grateful, 

largely because of how much we've lost, 

and how much we've lived, 

and how much is true in dark chapters of the story.