Yorba Linda Temple Tour: My Experience
So this past Saturday, I went to the Yorba Linda Temple's Tour (family reasons, and bc my gf is an architecture major and wanted to check it out) and here's what I got from it:
There's a load of stained glass. Like all over the place. It's actually really pretty, but interesting that in some of there "super-secret rooms" they have windows to the outside, for example, the celestial room and their sealing rooms. There's also gold all over the place. In the chandeliers (there are so many), inlaid in some of the walls, sconces, and even the candelabras, it was quite over-the-top.
There's practically no steeple. With the debate going on in Fairview, I thought it was interesting that the "steeple" is practically just a slightly raised point on the roof. The missions around California are a lot more "temple" then this one, and I'm wondering if they were aiming for that.
Child labor (not really but kind of). You have to wear these booties to "keep the temple pristine" and they have youth at the entrance and exit stationed to put them and take them off your feet. I felt bad for them, forced (or maybe not who knows) to spend their weekend volunteering at the temple, all day.
Propaganda! They take you room by room, with members waiting to give you a literal scripted explanation as to what each room is, and why it's so amazing and peaceful. Every speech however, was specifically angled in a way that it was always "only members of the church of....", really emphasizing that you have to be part of the special church to even maybe go here.
Peaceful...kind of. This is just a funny thing I noticed, but in certain areas they had everyone sit quietly (because the group ahead of us was really slow) and encouraged us to "feel the peace of the temple", which would be nice in normally, except for the fact that there was an incessant backrooms-esque buzzing from the fluorescent lights.
HORRIBLY DECORATED BRIDES ROOM. I cannot emphasize this enough, the brides room is horrendous. It looks like Umbridge from Harry Potter herself designed it, all frills, lace, and pink everywhere. The tour guide literally said "this is our most feminine room, to remind all brides that they are daughters of god". It was horribly decorated, my own sister whispered to me "i'd rather die than be married or prepare here".
Missionaries all over the place. My gf and I were the only ones in our group dressed in normal clothes, so as soon as we were out of the temple tour, we were instantly singled out and the missionaries tried to get us to "have a chat sometime!" It's to be expected but really annoying to have to explain every 5 minutes "nope i don't believe i'm just here to check it out".
That's all I've got off the top of my head, if you guys got any questions, I'd be happy to answer them!