Where in the world has Mariah been?

Hey everyone, sorry I've gone missing for a few days. It got crazy around here quickly and it just came out of the blue! But I'm back and I have a weeks worth of information to tell you!

 Last Monday was my first day off since starting my training at DAK and I took full advantage of my time off! My roommate Amanda and I spent the morning and early afternoon at Disney's Blizzard Beach, a water park with a winter theme. Sadly, there are no pictures from this adventure because I didn't want to risk the chance of something happening to my camera. But Amanda and I both decided that the next time we go to a water park we should get a water proof camera from Walmart and then have all our pictures put on a CD! So, hopefully we remember for next time. Anyways, the decorations we just darling, little snowman families and heavy piles of "snow" on the buildings and slides.  I also loved the fact that there was Christmas music piped through the park... it really set the mood of the park! We went on the lazy river, up the ski lift to a family tubing ride down a twisty slide, on a tobogganing slide on purple rafts and a racing water tube ride down a steep slide. It was a lot of fun! On our way out, we stopped at a gift shop and saw the cutest beach towel. It was mint green and it had the seagulls from "Finding Nemo" on it, along with "MINE, MINE!!" I think I'm going to have to buy it before I go home, I just loved it!!! Still on my to do list is Typhoon Lagoon, where you can swim with sharks! Awesome, right?! I can't wait to do this, I love Sharks! I think they are so fascinating! But more about them in another post!

After the water park it was home to our second roommate dinner! Amanda (who loves to cook and bake) made chicken and potato's, Christine made a wonderful salad and I finished off the meal by making fruit smoothies like my dad does at home! It was such a fun evening, everyone was home and we just laughed and talked and relaxed. It was great to catch up with everyone, since we all work different schedules, it can be hard to keep up to date with everything we are all doing at work and on our days off!

On Tuesday, I had my second day off for the week and my roommate Hannah and I used it to do laundry and run around Epcot! We got our picture taken in front of the Epcot Ball, went on Mission Space, tried pop from around the world for free at the Cool Cafe, bought a Mexican Donald and French Minnie in the gift shop (our first purchases of Disney merchandise as Cast Members), walked around the world, stopping to ride the boat rides in Norway and Mexico. Also while in Mexico, we got a picture with Mexican Donald! We also had to look at the little gift shops in all the countries, deciding that we would be back to buy at least one thing from every country while we were here! In Morocco, we watched a man hand-carve these beautiful wood animals. he put so much detail into his work! In China we saw an amazing show put on by young Chinese acrobats. They were so talented! Once we made it all around the world, we finished off the day by off by riding "Test Track", "Finding Nemo" and "Soarin'". We packed so much into the day, but there was still so much that we missed seeing!! Since we both had to work the next morning, we decided not to stay for the fireworks, but we made plans to get back there soon to see them! They are set off over the waters and from what I remember as a kid from the last time I was at Disney, they were breath-taking! I can't wait to see them again! And just so you know, in the 5 hours we were at the park, I took over 400 pictures!

On Wednesday, I went back to work. i was trained on the expo line. We are responsible for getting the order when it prints and putting all the right orders on the tray as quickly as possible. During our training, I managed to burn myself twice, once on each arm. The one on my right arm was caused when I was reaching to get a veggie sub and i touched the hot metal (I was wearing my burn resistant sleeve on my left arm) and the one on my left arm happened while we were cleaning out the expo cart at the end of the night. I didn't realise it was still hot and I bumped the metal again while scrubbing out the inside. (Thank goodness I only have a thin scar on my right arm above my elbow that I hope will fade over time.)

Thursday was my last day of training! It was kind of nerve-racking because we were on cashier for the first time. But we got to start of the morning as greeters, so that was nice! basically all we had to do was welcome everyone who came in, make them feel special and noticed. If we saw Celebration buttons (i.e. birthday, just married, 1st time visitor) we got to make a big deal and be all excited! (I loved this part). We also got to talk to the guests and direct them to which line they should go to place their order. After an hour or so of this it was our turn to tackle the cash handling. I didn't do too terrible. I was able to place the order quickly and make the right change quickly. However, my downfall was counting the change back to the guest the Disney way. The reason I found this challenging was simple, I kept looking at the wrong line on the receipt for what their total was so I could count up from that to the dollar amount they gave me. I kept looking at the amount of change I was to hand back and tried to count their change back to them starting with that amount! It sounds confusing, I know!  But I got it all figured out and i think it will go smoother for me next time. We also got a chance to close the topping bar on the Plaster side of the restaurant (when you walk in the door as a guest, it would be to your left). This wasn't hard, it included cleaning the drinks station, restocking everything and spoiling the toppings that were not used by the guests and then recording the amounts. The last 15 minutes my shift was my assessment. basically, manager Eric asked us questions about Food & Beverage basics that we learned in class and during our e-learning courses, about different things in the restaurant, where to find things a guest might be looking for (i.e. restrooms, smoking sections, ATM) and other basic questions. It was terrible, I had worked myself up during the day for nothing! I knew I had passed when he told me to remove the "Earning My Ears' ribbon from my name tag. So when I left work, I was scared out of my mine because I knew when I went into work on Friday it would be my first time "flying solo". But I was also so excited to have completed my training and also because it means I'm no longer the newest new person there as I noticed the next group of CPs have started training this week!

Then Thursday night there was another welcome pool party at Patterson Court (where I live). The theme was Monster's Inc. It was crazy, I didn't know you could cram that many people into our pool area! But I guess that's what happens when you tell poor college students they can get free food and drinks, take pictures with the characters and dance. I am not kidding, I even saw people in the pool dancing to the Cha Cha slide! it was the funniest thing I have ever seen! So, Hannah, Amanda and I all went over to get free food, pizza and a bag or chips, (which is the best tasting thing in the world) and then Amanda and I had our picture taken with Mike Wazowski. Then we decided to go to Target and JoAnn's so she could get supplies to decorate her cork board for her room. It turned out super cute, too! And to round the evening off, we watched Jersey Shore with Hannah.

So I think that covers just about everything from this week! I'm going to post about Friday in it's own post because I think it deserves it, lets just say that I couldn't have asked for a better first day on my own than what I had. But more about that later! Good night!