We sat at the dining table chatting. “I need a name for the hub I’m setting up.” There was a brief pause and what followed changed everything. “Why don’t you call it Space?” Space. Of course. That’s what I’d been looking for. Simple. Elegant. And full of meaning. What is the first thing you think of when you hear the word? For some, it’s “the near vacuum extending between the planets and stars, containing small amounts of gas and dust.” For others, it is “a continuous area or expanse that is free, available, or unoccupied.” For me, I am particularly grabbed by this one: “the freedom and scope to live, think, and develop in a way that suits one.” *
Space is simultaneously so many things. It is both physical and not, both external and internal, and at some point life takes us on journeys through it on each level. Our feet walk the paths of physical space in this world while our minds probe the ways of inner space. Only by engaging both is the experience of our journey full. We all need space. Space to live, space to learn, space to explore, space to reflect. While space already exists around and inside us, it can also be created, held, given, and denied. Having it can be exhilarating and liberating while not having it is ultimately debilitating. It is the ideal we strive for - that everyone has space. And so the credit for naming Space Bangkok goes to my good friend Jan Sunoo, who’s first thought was what I’d spent months searching for. And also to his wife, Brenda, to whom I will be forever grateful. You see, if she hadn’t been having so much fun with her good friend while Jan was away, she wouldn’t have told him to delay his return home and he would never have ended up sitting at my dining table, chatting about names, and creating space.
* definitions from the Oxford Dictionary