My inner Disney princess--or should I say "queen"

Sunday we had a highly uneventful tour of Prague--but of course it was absolutely beautiful. We learned that the four of us live in the Jewish quarter, Josefov, and that we have the best location for the homestays because most of the tour was basically right in our neighborhood! After the tour, Iveta decided that we should go to Prague castle, which sits on a hill dominating the city. One of the sites on the tour was a church by the Charles Bridge that was founded by a Masonic order (I hope I am getting that right, because I can't remember the name of the church). This intrigued a few of us, including Iveta, who really could not stop talking about it. As we walked toward the castle, she told us that the Strahov monastery opposite the castle had underground tunnels that also had a Masonic past, and how when she and Betty tried to visit them, they were denied access. In all of this talk about secretiveness and the Masons, one of the other girls was prompted to voice her disgust with Masons because, as she said, besides being secretive, they were anti-Semitic, patriarchal, and only for wealthy white men. Saying this--not just what she said but the way she said it as well--really shocked and put another girl and I on the defensive, which we were totally unprepared for! I said that my understanding of the Masons were as a service and faith-based organization, which surprised many people in the group. My mom's family has a long history of being involved in the masons; her dad was a 32nd degree mason (the highest level of masonry), her mom in Eastern Star, her brothers in DeMolay (for boys), she and her sisters in Rainbow Girls (for girls, obviously!), and her parents led the Rainbow chapter for many years in the Elkhart area. Even though I was not raised in Rainbow or being active in masonry, I have very strong ties to it, particularly through my mom and grandmother, who tried to raise me with the supreme values of faith, hope, and charity. So when this girl (I do not want to use her name, because that would obviously disrespectful and wrong) attacked the Masons out of emotionally-driven and uninformed opinion, it did hurt me a bit, because that is a strong family tradition, a base for the values that I was brought up with, and a connection with my mom's family. I was not upset to the point of being completely crushed, but I did try to avoid the girl for the afternoon so I could get my emotions in order, because I haven't felt affronted like that in some time. As we were walking to the castle, Ashley and I started talking, and I found out that she too was trying to grapple with what had just been said. She has been active in the Rainbow and Masonic youth organizations nearly her entire life, and that is where many memories, values, and friends come from. We talked about our respective feelings and experiences; about the types of service and other activities she does in her organization, about my family's tradition, about how so many people have misconceptions of the Masons and what they do, particularly after the DaVinci Code, and how we are afraid we are seeing the decline in participation, particularly with people our age. I had never met someone my age who had been involved in Rainbow, and neither of us expected to come on the trip and meet another person who we could talk to about this. She got a kick out of the fact that my high school prom was at the former Masonic temple in Elkhart, and that my mom had as much fun (if not more) hearing me describe how it looked after the fire when I was six and after it had been turned into a dance club. In the end, the positive connections that came out of this outweighed the minor negative incident.

Can I say that one of my favorite things on trip thus far is Prague castle? Why did I even ask that? Prague castle is absolutely stunning. Again, Prague spreads out beneath you, and I could just sit for hours on one of the walls of the castle and take everything in! Prague castle is now the seat for the Czech government, and you can walk right under the Prime Minister's house without any snipers on the roof or gates meant to keep citizens--or non-citizens in this case--out, very opposite the White House. On the other side of the Prime Minister's house is St. Vitus Cathedral, a huge and spectacular Gothic cathedral, flying buttresses and gargoyles and all. I was a little disappointed, because I was totally expecting the gargoyles to come to life and start singing and dancing! I guess that only happens in Paris. Or in Disney movies. The castle is definitely something that I would take the good part of a day to explore. There are several museums and churches on the grounds. A must-see is Golden Lane, a very cute little street that reminds me of the Muppet Christmas Carol, and was where the castle's artisans and masons (the craft and guild kind) lived, as did Franz Kafka. The houses are the tiniest things I have ever seen! There is also a dungeon at the end of Golden Lane, and I kind of want to go in there, but I am not sure that they allow visitors, so I might just have to break in! And then the gardens--the labyrinth of gardens that winds through the castle are so magical! I found one small garden in particular that was walled in, had a line of pink rosebushes, ornate lamps, and a spiral staircase that led to a little turret, very a la "Romeo and Juliet" or "Beauty and the Beast." I am a hopeless romantic. It was the absolute most perfect place for me to get in touch with my inner Disney princess, particularly since I was wearing my pink swishy skirt, and for me to over come the many years I have spent in jealousy and rivalry with Belle from Beauty and the Beast, who lives in a castle in France that has an enormous library and in the end winds up with a cute guy who is also a fabulous dancer. Besides the fact that she started on this path as basically a sexual captive in the castle's dungeons. Now I had my own castle, my own garden with pink rosebushes, and my pink swishy shiny skirt--eat your heart out, Belle! The next step in the whole feminist princess process is to kick out the Czech government and all of the tourists from my castle! Then I would be queen, wouldn't I? I can do that!

I do not want to really go into what happened next. There were some group issues that had been boiling under the surface, and then boiled over while the group was at the castle. We had a long, emotional talk about class and privilege as the streetlights came on at the castle. I don't really want to discuss what was said, as this is not the place for specifics. I will say that it was enlightening to learn more about our group dynamics and the individual members of the group. I realized that although I can speak about "patriarchy" and "oppression" in an academic setting and apply it to other people and their situations, I have a much harder time positioning myself as being effected by these structures, although I know that I am. Everything that I have learned in the last two years in being involved with the Center for Women's Intercultural Leadership and in my outside activities and classes really helped me understand what happened.