“GET UP!! GET UP!! THERE’S A FIRE!”
At first I thought the frenzied yelling from upstairs were some drunk people acting ridiculous, but after hearing my teammates Sean and Isaac pound on our door shouting to wake us up I knew this was no joke. They came in and we could smell the smoke. It kicked into high gear after that. I threw on my shoes, my teammates Chelsea and Karen grabbed their daypacks, and I did a quick mental check of what to grab. Thankfully we all had packed before bed prepping to travel to Romania that morning, and I knew all I could take was my daypack. I was not about to leave my bible, journal, and iPad with all of my memories and notes from the past 8 months behind. The rest could be replaced.
As we made our way to the stairs, I noticed the power was out and large flecks of ceiling paint were falling from the upper floors all over the stairwell. This was no microwave or sparking outlet fire. Carefully we went down the three flights from our room as more debris fell and people filed out of their rooms. Once outside we realized two more of our teammates were still inside on the second floor. The guys went in to wake them up as the three of us found a safe place to put our packs and wait. Finally they came out dazed like the rest of us. We took a moment to check ourselves over. During the rush most of us managed to bring our daypacks, but the guys didn’t have shoes or shirts. All of us left our big packs, and a few, myself included, realized I had forgot my wallet with all my money and passport. Within a few minutes the first fire truck arrived, and now began the anxious spectacle of watching the flames begin to breach the attic and engulf the roof.
There was no way of going back to get our stuff now, and no way of knowing how bad it could get. The time was roughly 3:30am, and we knew it’d be a long morning. As we tried piecing together what was happening, the guys told us they heard shouting, and like us thought it was drunk people. When Sean sat up he saw their room was filled with smoke and woke Isaac. When Isaac opened the door he said the heat was unreal and flames poked out from a room adjacent to theirs. They had to get by it to go down the stairs to us. Is this really happening right now?
We gathered in a circle and began to pray. We prayed our stuff would be ok, we prayed the fireman fighting would be safe, we prayed the fire wouldn’t spread, and we prayed no one would be injured. As the adrenaline wore off we did our best to make ourselves comfortable on the curb with our stuff. It was cold. We were tired, and we felt helpless. Sharing my airplane blanket with Chelsea we tried resting, and on occasion spoke with the other travelers who made it out. The hostel owner came over to us making sure we were ok. Seeing the worried expression on Mario’s face made my heart sink. This hostel was his livelihood and he spent a good bit making renovations and it was definitely one of the nicest we have stayed in. He even cut some of the cost when he knew what we were doing. After about two hours they managed to put the fire out and get everything contained. At this point we anticipated not being able to get our stuff for at least another day and our original plan to leave with the squad to Romania went up in smoke (couldn’t help it). The roof was just a frame with a few terra-cotta shingles left.
No one on our team complained. In fact we were cracking stupid fire jokes and made peace with the prospect of our stuff being gone. It was a hard pill to swallow, but we knew we’d manage. Racers have lost all their stuff before, but I think a fire would’ve been a first. As dawn began to break we learned we were allowed to retrieve our items so long as fireman accompanied us. One at a time each person went back to their room to gather things and come back. The guy’s packs were soaked through and had smoke damage since they were on the 4th floor where the fire was. Mine got fairly wet and smokey, and amazingly all of our stuff was basically fine. Mario was making sure we had everything we needed and called taxis to take us to another hostel where some of our other teams had stayed. Finally we asked if we could pray for him and he was eager to accept. We had no other offering to give except that and some encouraging words. I told him that from this he was blessed and God was going to help him rebuild even better. It sounded cliché, but he looked at me and forced a smile and said “I know. You will not be my last guests.”
Shortly before the taxis came a news crew arrived and interviewed Karen and I. The thought of this being on Bulgarian news was kinda comical because we looked super disheveled. What amazed us though is through all that mess not a single person was hurt. Not even so much as a stubbed toe. The fireman were fine. The fire didn’t spread, and we got all our stuff to travel on. Scarier still is that there were no smoke detectors or fire escape. We truly could have died, and I’m not being dramatic. Smoke inhalation while we were sleeping would’ve knocked us out before the flames did, and even then there’s no telling what could’ve happened. You may not believe me when I say this, but I wasn’t afraid. Just like my car accident before launch I remember thinking “I don’t have time for this sh*t. I have things God wants me to do.” It felt the same here. The rest of the squad would have to leave without us, but one simple lesson I have learned on the Race is we will get to where we need to go eventually.
We’ve spent the remainder of our day sorting through our things, resting, and relaying the incident to our families. I’m telling all of you this now to show you we aren’t slowing down despite how little time we have left in the field. God is still helping us push on to finish well, and clearly satan did not want us to go to Romania so I am all the more determined to get there and see what God will be doing. I could turn this into a great teaching on God’s goodness and mercy from this incident, but me adding words isn’t going to make it any more impressive. The results speak for themselves. We are seeing this through till the end and that’s all there is to it.
