I haven’t heard from Rachel in a while and it makes me wonder what she’s doing. I have no concept of what life is like in Sudan so I thought I would just pop her in a fairy tale and see what happened. A ye olde sexist fairy tale to really test her patience (this is what happens when you neglect your friends Rari – enjoy)
As much as I love Rachel I don’t think we can immediately cast her in the princess role. Let’s meditate upon a typical princess. Long wavy luscious locks to start with - I don’t think they ever go through a ‘dreadlock’ or ‘mullet’ faze. Then we have the dresses. If Saris or flared pants were ‘in’ for Princesses Rachel would be a sure thing. Sadly her wardrobe has always been lacking in the frilly satiny ribbon covered trailing dress department.
So.
That leaves us with a peasant.
Rachel is hanging out at her peasant hut (I think I’ll make her a lonely orphan to spare her family from having to be involved) and doing ye olde things. What does peasant Rachel do? The last time I saw Rachel get in touch with nature she was trying to mow the lawn with gardening shears so I don’t think we can trust her with farming. I have also eaten her very interesting macaroni and cheese and it confirms that she won’t be in the kitchen either (sewing or weaving don’t even deserve consideration). Rachel has told me in the past that she appreciates ‘animals with purpose’ so let’s put her in the dairy milking a cow.
I’m not sure if Rachel is aware but dragons have a liking for milk maids in fairy tales and a big green scaly gold one descends from the sky to pluck her away from her cow and fly with her to his cave. Rachel absolutely loves to travel so I can’t imagine her struggling too much, and honestly she would probably be happy to be parted from her cow as she is more the dairy consuming rather than producing kind.
It’s never really clear why dragons take ladies to their caves, there are accusations of culinary plans but as they never seem to get around to it I’m sure that’s not the truth. Rachel happens to quite enjoy spending money (generally on travel) and dragons have a lot of jewels and etc (generally from travelling) so I’m sure that they actually wind up sitting down together on his mountain of doubloons and discussing how they should spend it all. As an ethically conscious peasant Rachel would no doubt recommend returning some of the stolen treasure, but for the cases where everyone in the village was burnt to death I’m sure she would reason that they should invest in food, wine, and possibly an island.
There is no doubt that in the midst of all this planning a prince would turn up to save Rachel and slay the dragon. Both Rachel and the dragon would not be impressed with this. Dragons happen to be against slaying of their fine selves and Rachel would be against any connotations of damsel in distress. I’m sure she would give the prince a stern lecture on sexism, unnecessary slaughter of endangered wildlife and the irrelevance of a monarchy in fairytale land. The dragon would back her up by toasting the prince’s ears a little every now and again.
The prince, now suitably reprimanded, would probably ask for a kiss which Rachel would not very grudgingly bestow. Suddenly -hey Presto! (This wouldn’t be a fairytale without some element of magic) The prince’s hair begins to lengthen and matt together, his velvet robes shrink and tighten on his chest and his pants flap out fisherman style. His hips start to move to a strange new beat and he wishes he could express it, but wait! He can! A bongo drum materialises in front of him and a guitar appears to grow from his back to hang from a sling. Rachel’s true prince has arrived.
She, the dragon and the prince buy their tropical island and live in total harmony lying around drinking coconuts and eating vegetarian delights (the dragon happens to be an excellent chef and very versatile in non human flesh cuisine). Every now and then they will fly to a village and restructure its economy, discuss social values, and even have a traditional dance party with moves specific to that region. In short - happily ever after.
