Recap: Week 1

I am going to try my best to recap everything that has happened in the past 5 weeks.

Week 1: On the Saturday before check-in on Monday the 23rd of May, I went to all 4 parks with my Mom and Aunt. We started our day off in Disney's Hollywood Studios with my brother and his friend. This was the first weekend of Star Wars Weekends (aka....SUPER busy). We basically walked onto Star Tours, first thing in the morning. It. Was. Awesome. My Mom rode Tower of Terror for the very first time (and I think she liked it!). After Studios, we went to Epcot, MK and DAK (I forget the exact order). In each park, we only did the attractions that my Mom wanted to do. My Aunt has a season pass (so she can come to the parks as often as she likes) and my Mom won't have the chance to see anything again until December.

On Sunday, my Grandma took the train down to Orlando, so we picked her up from the Train Station. That day, we went to Costco and Target to get everything that I needed. Later that night was the pre check-in dinner at Earl of Sandwich. It was a lot of fun! Definitely a success.

MONDAY!! I woke up at 4:30 AM to meet my roomies at Starbuck at 5:30 AM. We all got our coffee and made our way over to Vista Way. We waited in line for a little under 2 1/2 hours (we were let in at 8 AM). A Cast Member (or Price Management Employee, I don't remember) came over to the line in a Segway. The line was INSANELY long at this point. Thankfully we were only about 20 people from the front of the line). She made her way down the line, explaining to everyone that we were NOT GOING TO RUN. She was going to escort us in an orderly fashion back to the check-in area. Everything with the check-in process was very efficient and everything was great! We got a 2 bedroom Chatham (first floor), which is just what we wanted! We got on the 8:30 bus to Casting (even though it was about 8:45) and then we went through the Casting process. This took about 2 hours. There were SO many different stations that we had to go through. I got my work location and part of my training schedule.
After that was over, we made our way over to Chatham and started to move in! We had a housing meeting at 3 PM, but other than that, the rest of the day was a free day.

Tuesday was the real free day. We could basically do whatever we wanted for the entire day. I finished unpacking and then I went out to lunch with my family at Outback Steakhouse before they had to fly home.

Wednesday was TRADITIONS! I don't think I can say too much about Traditions...just the fact that the first 30 minutes was (as Marion would say) WOMP WOMP and then the rest was AMAZING! I got my ID to get into the parks and I got my name tag from a super special guest! Here's a hint...he's the BOSS! :) Since Amanda, Jess and I had the 2 pm traditions, we didn't get back to our apartment until around 7 PM. MK closed at 9 PM that night, so we decided to go to Studios instead. They didn't close until 10 PM. We went on Tower of Terror, Rock N Roller Coaster and we saw Fantasmic. (Hmmmmm....oddly enough, the first 3 attractions that I rode/saw as a Cast Member ended up being my work locations! Funny how things work out!)

Thursday was my Merchandise Tier 1 training. Basically an intro to my locations, Merchandise in general, and an introduction to some of my managers.

Friday was On With The Show. This is the park orientation for Disney's Hollywood Studios. It was very interesting and informative. Lots of walking...

I was off on Saturday and Sunday and then on Monday, I had Merchantainment at Disney University. This was just a day of POS (Point of Sale) training, and learning how to use the registers. Pretty easy day.



Look for my recap on Weeks 2-5 soon!!


EQ

I am going to start blogging again!

Well...I am living in DISNEY WORLD now! My mom told me that I should keep a blog, and since I have a neglected blog, I think I am going to start updating today.

I have to head to work in about an hour, so I need to get ready now. But expect many more blogs in the future!
OH! I work in Hollywood Studios Merch, and my area is Hollywood Hills. This includes:
-Rock Around The Shop (the gift shop of Rock N Roller Coaster)
-Tower Hotel Gifts (the gift shop of Tower of Terror)
-Fantasmic (I sell stuff right before the show in the theatre, up and down the walkway into the theatre, and from carts all around the park)

Well, off to get ready for work!

EQ


EDIT: Just killed two cockroaches during the time that it took me to put up this blog post.

Lesson: BRING RAID WITH YOU TO FLORIDA.