My first day!

Hi Y'all!

I am excited to share with you, my friends, all about yesterday! What happened yesterday you might ask? My first day of on-the-job training! Woohoo! I'm so glad that the day finally come. I have been waiting for this day to come for so long. Although, I was nervous to get started. I tried not to have expectations for the first day because I knew that it would benefit my experience in the end. Soooo I didn't have expectations. I did, however, have high hopes for friendships that could blossom with my coworkers. This, for sure, was met. My training shift began at 14:00 (we run on military time here at Disney so technically 2PM) and would get off at 22:30 (10:30PM). Working 8.5 hours on the first day was quite overwhelming but I knew I could get through it. I'm a trooper. In order to set a good first impression, I arrived 30 minutes prior to the time my shift began. When I first arrived, I was told to wait until 15 minutes before the shift to clock-in. During this extra time, I met a few of my coworkers and my trainer for the day, Nicole from Puerto Rico! I also realized that my friend from New Zealand, Razhaan (pronounced Ray-jaughn), was being trained with me. Razhaan and I get along wonderfully and have fun together and that added a certain level of comfort to my first day. On this first day, Nicole taught us where to find the goods for restocking and also how to bus tables (quite self-explanatory). After she had gone over most of the knowledge we needed, business seemed to sky-rocket in the food court. Our leader for the night, Ms. Jill, came over and requested our trainer take over a cash-register to keep business moving. Razhaan and I had to go through the dining area cleaning off tables and restocking. Talking about quick-learning! I would be lying if I said I wasn't completely overwhelmed at the speed we were thrown into the job. I did take it as a complement that our leader had enough confidence in us to get started so quickly, though! After about 3 hours of working the dining area, the day was over and it was time for us to ask any final questions about the knowledge we had learned for the day. I didn't have any but I did have plenty of highlights to share with her. 

My first story I wished to share was about one of my guest interactions. An elderly couple and a family of 4 were sitting at one of our round tables chatting. When I walked past to clean a neighboring table, the elderly man stopped me and began chatting away. We talked about how he and his wife met while working for Disney and were now retirees of the company. We talked about how they met the family sharing this meal with them. We even talked about me and what brought me to Disney. I can't necessarily say there was one thing in particular that struck me as special in this conversation. The conversation itself was simply heartwarming. I learned about their story, and their love for Disney, and it was memorable. After telling this story to Nicole and Razhaan, I began my next one.

I was wiping down high-chairs when a woman came up to me telling me her son spilt all of his chocolate milk on the floor. I assured her would I would right back with more napkins to clean up the mess. After cleaning it up, I went to my trainer who was at the cash-register at the time, and explained to her the situation. I asked if I could get the little boy another Nesquik milk and she said yes. So, I grabbed a chocolate milk and made my way back to their table. When I gave it to the little boy, he looked so ecstatic and as if he didn't even know what to say. It was sweet to see how just one little thing such as a new chocolate milk could brighten his day. That concluded this story.

And of course, I have another story to tell. I was once again cleaning a table when I looked up to see a woman and her daughter looking at me and smiling. I was so confused because I wasn't sure if something was disheveled on my costume or they were just being friendly. After I cleaned up that table, I figured why not go say hi. So thats exactly what I did. I walked over to the table and said "well, hello y'all! How's it goin'?" The mom smiled at me and said, "Wonderful thank you!" I could tell they looked pretty exhausted from a day so I struck up a conversation asking "Did y'all go to the parks today?" The mom said, "Yes we did! It was so great. Today is our first day here so it was a great start." "That's wonderful to hear!" I exclaimed. I then noticed the mom had a tiara on her head but the daughter didn't. I pointed it out saying, "My goodness, I love your tiara! And you little miss priss, how come you don't have one?" And the pre-teen girl said, "I just don't really care to have one." I replied, "Do you atleast have Mickey ears?" And the girl stated, "Yep." "Whew!" I exclaimed, "I will say that it would be heaven on earth if I could get my mom to wear a tiara!" The mom laughed and said, "I wear it because it adds to me and also embarrasses her in the parks." With this statement, I laughed so hard. It sounded so typical of a mom and daughter relationship. It reminded me of the relationship I have with my mom and the fun times we have had together at Disney. To finish up our brief, and humorous interaction, I told the duo, "Well since it is your first day here, I am certain I'll be seeing y'all around! I'm lookin' forward to hearing all about y'alls vacation!" Even this slight interaction made me smile. 

 My experiences didn't end here though. I just simply enjoyed saying "Hey y'all!" to the guests entering the restaurant, or "I hope y'all have a wonderful evening!" to the guests leaving. Some would look so surprised that someone would recognize them, but also so happy to be recognized. I'm grateful that I can do this for people. I can give them a reason to smile and just make the experience even more personalized to them. 

After wrapping up our good stories, I told Nicole and Razhaan about my one embarrassing moment. I was restocking the condiment bar when a preteen aged girl came up to it looking for something. I said, "Hi there! How ya doin' today? Ya lookin' for something particular?" I was very surprised with the girls response. She looked up at me looking confused and a little unnerved and then ran away from the stand. I was so shocked that she just ran away. I assumed it was because maybe I had scared her or her mom needed her for something so I just went on with my job. After I told this story, Razhaan told me she also had an interaction with a little girl and that she had to show her all of the condiment bar because she didn't know English. The girl only spoke Portuguese! I laughed for soooo long about how I didn't even think about how maybe she didn't even speak English! This made the experience all the more embarrassingly hilarious. 

After sharing stories, our shift ended and we left for the day. I would say that my first day was a successful one. It was exhausting, educational, and well-worth the energy you put into it. If there is anything I learned from today, it is that the guests are always what matter. That is why I wanted to work for Disney, for the guests. You can meet so many different people and learn so much about other cultures just by cleaning tables for one evening. I would also that I learned its all in perspective. Many people say working quick-service food and beverage is awful or gross, but I'd say its rewarding. This role gives you a well-rounded objective to working with guests in multiple ways. You make the guests happy physically by feeding them, emotionally by reaching out to them, and mentally by giving them a place to relax. And for all of these reasons, I'm grateful to be doing what I'm doing and to be where I am! Heres to a semester of food and guests interaction! :)