Princess Jasmine and I were hanging out back in Morocco in Epcot’s World Showcase one day: she was meeting her fans, and I was there to to keep order. Not a bad gig–the Princess seldom needed much help (except when the occasional gentleman behaved in a wholly inappropriate manner, but those are stories for another time.) She usually drew quite a crowd, though, so I was vigilant.
As I kept an eye on things, there was a woman standing off to the side, by herself, just scrutinizing the whole situation. After a few minutes, she tenuously approached me. “Excuse me?” She asked, clearly embarrassed and trying to keep her voice down. “Who is that?”
“That’s Princess Jasmine,” I responded. The woman stared at me blankly. The name clearly meant nothing to her. “…Aladdin’s wife?” I hazarded. Sometimes, the Disney-uninitiated wouldn’t know an individual character, but would recognize the movie’s title, at least.
It didn’t work. The woman’s cheeks colored–she was still clearly confused. “What is she doing?” The woman asked carefully.
“Just meeting with her fans. Taking pictures, signing autographs, giving hugs–that kind of thing.”
“Ah.” She stared pensively at the Princess and her line of guests. “…Does she do this often?”
“A few times every day.”
I’d been keeping my answers pleasant and non-judgmental, so the woman was clearly starting to get over her embarrassment at not recognizing the character. She flooded me with questions: Does she do this all day? She gets a break now and then, right? How long is she out here at a time? Typical questions from adults who are usually mystified by our Disney friends’ ability to meet a seemingly impossible number of guests.
I answered honestly–these were straightforward questions. Sometimes grown-ups tend to get a little too into the weeds about how our characters manage to seemingly be in multiple places at once, and it’s my job to reassure them, and all the little ears that might happen to be listening: there is only one Princess Jasmine, and she is it. She’s not a fictional character. She’s as real as you and me.
Her next question indicated that the conversation was not heading in the direction I anticipated. Having now received a minutely detailed description of what Jasmine was doing, and for how long, the woman then chose to ask: “…Does she live here?”
Wait, what?
For the life of me, I could not follow this woman’s mental process. By ‘here’, did she mean Orlando, or Epcot itself? Either way… what exactly was her impression of the situation, that it would lead her to ask that question?
It was my job to answer in a way that reinforced that Princess Jasmine was real, and this was her. I sensed that what I was about to say would be taking that directive a bit too far. Still…experience had taught me that sometimes a little pointed tongue-in-cheek was the best way to clue grown-ups in that I wouldn’t answer them any other way.
“Oh, sure,” I said. “The palace is right behind those trees. Actually, in a few minutes we’re going to jump on the flying carpet and head back there to give her pet tiger a bath.”
And her reply, ladies and gentlemen, is the reason I occasionally lose faith in all humanity.
She smiled, looked me right in the eye, and said fervently, “It is so great that Disney provides housing for these people.”
Laura Writes 
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