Fire is SCARY.

God I never knew fire could be this scary, perhaps because I've never been a victim of arson, but today's experience has changed my view of fire.

I mean common sense, everyone knows not to play with fire because it is obviously dangerous; however, no one ever really thinks about it until they have been affected by it.

It was 8:10 pm in Korea and I had just finished cleaning out my fridge. I notice the three round potatoes just sitting inside my fridge for almost a week now. I thought to myself, French fries sound good right about now. Thus I reached in grab the three potatoes and started to chop them up in long rectangular pieces. I placed the pan filled with used oil from the previous night on the stove and turned the fire on. As the fire is flaring its heat underneath the pan, I took out the pasta that I had made from the previous night, went to my futon and enjoyably stuffed my face. Lost in the essence of delicious food, I forgot for a minute that I am still cooking. As I lift my head up, I notice smoke profusely spilling out from underneath the lid of the pan. I ran to the stove; turned on the vent to my kitchen hood and backed away. Smoke continues to overflow the surface of the pan thus I reached in, placed my hand over the lid and picked it up. Fire immediately flared out from inside the pan igniting itself from the oil. I panicked. What am I suppose to do? Where the hell is the fire extinguisher? Oh god what the hell should I do, I thought to myself.

It took my brain a good 30 seconds to process the situation. I thought to myself, it'll take me too long to look for a fire extinguisher and by that time the fire may grow. I need help. I picked up the pan ran outside to my next-door neighbors and started pounding away on their door.

Is anyone in there? I yelled, I need help out here! Forgetting that I am in Korea and English is not a language that EVERYONE in Korea speaks, I continued to pound away anyways. A lady opens the door with her 3 kids, looks at me with a dumbfounded glare and says *&&*^%$$. I have no idea what she had said, but I'm damn sure she knows what situation I have involved her in.

The fire continues to find its way to other things, by that time I realize that I am no longer able to uphold this pan, I quickly dropped it to the floor splattering the oil everywhere. Now the fire is really burning. I thought to myself, oh god, am I really encountering a fire? Am I really going to be a victim of fire? What am I suppose to do? By this time, a substantial amount of smoke has made its way throughout the corridor and the fire alarm to the entire building is ringing uncontrollably. Should I run for it or should I take the next step in this horrific situation and warn others, but this fire has yet to reach anyone else so would I be impulsively overreacting if I do warn others? Okay I'll just wait a little longer, I said to myself.

In 5 seconds, if this lady doesn't come back out with a fire extinguisher, I'm going to do what I have to do. Okay counting in my head, one......two......three......four......lady where are you, I don't want to die in Korea, not here and definitely not now.......five. As I prepare myself for this next procedure, the rescuer of the day came rushing out with her mini fire extinguisher. Thank you lord! I stepped aside assuming she would do the rest. She looked at the fire and immediately handed the fire extinguisher to me. I'm thinking, oh god how do I use this? No time to learn now, just improvise and use your common sense. In just a short time, I found the safety release, and started to spray away. It felt good. The fire is gone, hence I look down at the floor and there I see, a big black round brunt shape imprinted right in the middle of the corridor's floor. Yikes! I wonder if they're going to make me pay for this damage?

The lady smiled, nodded her head, snatched her fire extinguisher away from me, and slammed the door in my face. Gosh lady, I'm sorry to disturb you, but I didn't want anyone to die because of me.

I was relieved.

I went back into my apartment, sat down on my futon, stroke my fingers through my hair, and thought to myself, wow that was a rush, but I think I did extremely well. Then I realize the fire had burnt part of my hair and the flaming oil pierced through the thin surface of my skin leaving my fingers with small brown spots. I guess that's my evidence of this little disaster and a little something to remember.

Lesson of the day: Always know where your fire extinguisher is. And when you are cooking, REMEMBER that you ARE cooking.

Now I'm starving, but I'm afraid to cook again, at least for tonight. Guess I'll just munch on my junk food for now. What a day.