Jambo From Harambe

One morning after one of my beautiful and enthralling training classes I clocked in at Asia and it told me to pick up KSR Cart 1….what is that? I know the names of all my carts because we only have three…that’s not one of them. I frantically searched for a manager and discovered that I had been transferred over to Africa for the day because they were so shorthanded. So me and my fun Asian costume headed over to Africa. It was pretty much like picking up an extra hours shift, but in the wrong costume. They had a lot of different merchandise that I had to get acquainted with not to mention just finding everything in the store, because there store is huge! It was a good experience though, I met some awesome people that work in Africa regularly and if it wasn’t for their AWFUL costume, I would definitely pick up an actual extra hours shift in Africa! 

Final Days of Disney Heritage and Disney Marketing

My classes, like my job, were sort of becoming just part of the humdrum of it all. Luckily, I have one of the best teachers out there who knows what he’s doing and he’s good at teaching his classes. Disney Heritage has been especially exciting the past two classes as one took place in Magic Kingdom and the other took place in Hollywood Studios. Both were great because we got to get out of the two-hour classroom environment. Two hours goes by a lot differently when you’re in the classroom vs. the parks. 
At Magic Kingdom we really got to learn some fun trivia about Disney. I mean that’s really all Disney Heritage is anyway, lots and lots of fun facts about the company and our wonderful creator, Walt Disney. At Hollywood Studios, we broke into teams of 4-6 and competed in a scavenger hunt! Everybody has fun at some friendly competition and my group was no exception. We found out who the top three teams were via the EDU website and you’ll be happy to know that my bad-a team was one of the top three. Now we’ll just have to see what the rankings are. If you ain’t first your last people (Ricky Bobby reference).

Marketing has been nothing but guest speakers. Lots and lots of guest speakers and lots and lots of videos. This class really has done a great job showing how my field of study could be translated into this company. It highlighted all the areas of the Marketing department and I was able to discover what I know I don’t want to do and things that really strike my interest.

All in all, I definitely recommend taking classes, I don’t think my college program experience would have been the same without them. Woah……it’s crazy that I can talk in hindsight now, my program is almost over people! Just remember that time flies!

Training Classes

By the time you get pretty settled into your job and you don’t feel like the “new kid” anymore (we all know how that feels), Disney decides that you’re ready to learn some new VERY IMPORTANT information. This is where training classes come in. Thus far I have had the extreme joy of attending two of these beautiful classes (I hope you can smell the sarcasm through the screen). 

If you’ve been following my blog, you have heard me mention the Four Keys Basics. These are the four….things?….that Disney employees work by. They are: Safety, Courtesy, Show, and Efficiency. These are nailed into your head from the day you get to Disney over and over and over and over……………..and over. They are four principles that keep our company going and I believe they’re important don’t get me wrong, but how much more can your learn about these four things? Apparently Disney believes about three more hours worth. Three more hours worth starting at 7:45AM. You can believe my excitement. My other class was Safety in Motion, or SIM for short, where you learn how to lift and move things properly, again another nail biter this one was. 

Both classes were early in the morning and both classes were three hours long. The plus side? You’re getting paid….alright I can deal with that. You’re with about 15-20 other people from around your park. And I’ll give it to the teachers, they try their hardest to make it interesting bless their souls. But if I never have to take another one of these classes again…….I wouldn’t hate the idea.

Cliche "I'm Alive" Post

Where have I been? Back when I was reading through blogs, checking the days on my count down, and trying not to already pack up everything in my room, there were many blogs I had to quit following simply because the writers stopped writing. I’d shake my fist at the screen…how dare they? But you gotta look realistically at the typical experiences of a DCP blogger. It kind of goes in phases: I just applied, let me tell you everything about that. Then the phone interview. Now I’m waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. OH MY GOSH I GOT ACCEPTED. Now I’m waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. Oh, I packed up all my stuff. Check-in! Now Traditions. Work. Work. Work. Work. Work. Work. Work?………………….Work?…………………..I’m alive………………………………Cricket chirping. 

I’m not writing to tell you that you can all kiss me goodbye, I know those of you who are almost here for Fall Advantage and then later for Fall (by the way, what’s your countdown people?) are feverishly reading blogs and watching vlogs because you want to know it all! I’m actually more here to apologize that I haven’t been the quick blogger that I was in the beginning. In my defense, there really isn’t too much exciting-ness going on…but sit tight because I’ve got an aggressive amount of blogs comin’ at ya!

Finding Myself In The Eight Week Slump

I must admit that I have found myself in the eight week slump. There are only eight weeks left of my program and man has it flown by! I'm still enjoying my program, don't get my wrong, but I have now FULLY sunk into the humdrum of my full work schedule. I have about two weeks left until I find out about the status of my extension. I have been working on my days off so that I can take some days of later to visit home. Speaking of home I'm really missing my boyfriend, friends, and oddly enough, my home state, which I thought I would never miss, because it's Arizona. But sure enough, they are all missed dearly.

Needless to say, I've hit a plateau. But like my Disney teacher said on the first day of class, this is the point where you decide what you're going to make of your program. Guess only time will tell!

Emily Earns Her Ears: Update on My Book

Thus far, I have written the first draft for about eight chapters of my book, Emily Earns Her Ears. My book is a lot more "book-like" than my blog and it's been a lot of fun to write. I'm looking forward to getting the edits back from my editor. To make it all more official, I received my contract today in the mail...I'm writing a book people! Say whaaaat?! 

Today Jake and I did Hollywood Studios and we left no stone unturned, which was a blast because we did a lot of things that I hadn't done before! In the next coming days, I won't be able to give you a lot of work updates because homegirl has five days off (say hello to no paycheck!). But it will all be worth it for the memories I get to make with my boyfriend! 

I'd also like to take a moment to thank the people that have been commenting on my blogs and vlogs, it's comments like the ones I have been receiving that make me feel like what I'm doing here on my blog and YouTube channel isn't ENTIRELY dorky! So thanks for those of you who are following who aren't just family and friends! Hopefully you'll stick around and finish out the program with me, because as long as people are reading, I will gladly keep writing!

My Vlog Channel

I thought I'd take a moment to showcase my vlog channel since I might be making more vlog posts than blog posts from here on out. If you haven't checked out my latest vlog, I explained why, but basically it's because of my book. People aren't likely to buy my book if they can basically read the blog version of it online for free. So I'll be doing some light blogging and hopefully more vlogging as my program continues.

Check out my vlog channel here.

Here are some updates you have to look forward to:

• Training classes at work.
• Disney Heritage class.
• Shift in Africa at Disney's Animal Kingdom.
• Most recent Meet and Greet.
• My boyfriend visiting.

Program Update One

Exploring Disney Heritage: Week Four

I can't believe that this week is already the fourth week of class. Even crazier is there are only ten weeks left in my Spring program. WHAT?! This week in class we talked about the theme parks. Disney theme parks are, of course, my favorite part of this company and we focused mostly on my favorite park of them all: Disneyland. We got to watch a lot of neat videos of opening day and "re-opening" of the park, openings of attractions like the Matterhorn, the Monorail, and the Submarine Voyage. It was neat to see how far things have come but it was also neat to see how things were back then. Everything was just so different, from the way people talked, dressed, their mannerisms, it was all beautiful, in my opinion. This week's session was just another reminder of how special Walt was and how special the things he did were.

Next week will be very exciting because next week's class takes place IN Magic Kingdom. We don't have to dress in business casual (thank God), and I'm sure it will be a very fun class!

Q&A

In just my five weeks of being here, I've started to notice that I've gained a little bit of a following on this blog from people that aren't my friends and family back at home. This is probably because Fall Advantage applications and acceptances are rolling out right now. That being said, I would like to highlight one of the lovely features of this blog that sadly never gets used: the Q&A button on the bar above.

Maybe you haven't seen it, maybe you're ignoring it on purpose, I don't know. But I figured I would point it out so that if anyone had any specific questions about ANYTHING, then I would be able to answer them. Because frankly I rather have some interaction on here than thinking I'm writing in bed at night to no one.

So I extend the Q&A button to you to use as you may or even refer to. Just a thought, let's see how it goes.

Character Performer Auditions and Other News

Okay, I HATE long vlogs, but there was just so much to tell you guys that I PROMISE it's worth watching the whole thing because I went to character performer auditions to extend through August and I have lots of news. Please watch, well worth it I promise!