The Vagina Monologues

As you may or may not know, the Vagina Monologues and its campaign V-Day is an organized response against violence toward women. There is the night of monologues, but there is also a whole month of activities like seminars, workshops, arts events and more geared around ending rape, incest, battery, genital mutilation, and sexual slavery. Its also a lot of fun in celebrating wOmeN!

so, i thought to myself, i'm into that. i believe in ending violence against women and also i knew the group of girls that were getting involved and i secretly really wanted to get to better know this amazingly strong and beautiful group of ladies. i used to like theater, why not audition?

then i got the audition monologues... you want me to say wHaT? ok, i am not a super shy girl, but some of those monologues were pretty intense. i didnt feel completely comfortable with those about rape. but.... i jumped out of my comfort zone and auditioned. to my temporary dismay, i got a part. to my further dismay it was the monologue called "cunt."

ok, so i LoVed the book about women's issues called "cunt" when i read it some time ago, but what in the world was this all about? i understood that the character was trying to reclaim the word. make it positive. make it sexy. make it hers.... But.... it didnt even make sense to me. it was all about the sounds actually. not a story. anyhoooowwww--- i almost backed out, but didnt want to look like a coward and also did i mention how cool the other girls were that were involved? so cool. such amazing women.

in the end, i had no idea it was going to be even half as powerful and wonderful as the whole experience was. we had wonderful seminars, including one put on by some of the boys at the school "male monologues' talking about what it meant for them to grow up male, facing those stereotypes and sometimes twisted roles, from a latin american speaking about machismo to a guy from Jordan speaking about women's roles, a kenyan and also fillipino. it was beautiful and fresh since they all wrote what they were saying.

the spotlight this year was on violence against women in the democratic republic of congo where the war has left over 200,000 women raped. most of the proceeds from our show went to aid the cause there and the rest went to the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq. if you are not informed on this subject i highly recommend checking out this link: http://www.vday.org/drcongo

i expected it to be neat, but it was so... important. the whole campaign. just by rehearsing these monologues we would end up having conversations about life, love, sex, abuse all that stuff that rarely comes up on the norm. some stuff that is taboo to speak of, but feels so good once you have. the monologues were only part of it, but man we really did so well with that. we had the audience laughing and crying with us the whole way. performers who had been in tears because they were nervous just an hour before the show ended up blowing EVERYONE away. afterwards, so many women came to us and thanked us from their hearts. the monologues lead to some women speaking out about violence that had happened in their past in a way that they had never done before. they appreciated our frankness and courage to go on stage and perform whether it was funny, empowering, devastating, tragic... it was important.