Earning my ears!

The last three days have been so busy with training, I can't even begin to explain it... This seems to be how I start just about every blog lately, but it is all good and will be a great thing in the end. Our group had the longest and most intensive training schedule of all the different positions at Disney; we had 3 full 8-hour days of job specific training before we had our assessment day today, not to mention the other two full days of training we had. Then today we had finally made it to our assessment day where we were required to take a 55 question multiple choice test, be assessed while doing about an hour of working at the turnstile in the busy part of the morning, and get an assessment from one of the managers. It didn't really take very long at all for us, because we are all intelligent and have become fairly proficient at this the last few days. Since we passed our assessment, we had finished "Earning our Ears" which just means that we are no longer training for the job. We will probably get our little "Earning my Ears" ribbon back when we doing training for PAC this next week, but we got to enjoy it for part of one day.  After finishing up a few online training things, we started actually working our job as Park Greeters at Walt Disney World - Magic Kingdom! I can't even count the amount of times that I said either "insert your ticket right there" (with the Disney Point aka 2 fingers), "please place your finger on top there for me," "have a nice day," and "have a magical day" while I was helping people with their tickets getting into the park. I really do enjoy it, particularly when the little kids are just so happy and can't contain their smile any longer when I ask if they want a Mickey sticker and sheepishly say "Yes..."
I also got assigned a lot of random tasks later in the afternoon when the lines were not very long like taking pictures for people, handing out celebration buttons, and cleaning off the bio-devices that are used to take a picture of the persons finger. The last task that I got assigned was doing exits for the park; this is one of the more enjoyable parts for me because I get to help guest with strollers and wheelchairs get out the gates, answer questions that guests have, and mess with the guests a little bit. I also get to wave a big mickey hand stick and tell the guest good-bye. The most frequently asked question by far is, "Do we need a stamp to get back into the park later today?" or some variant of this. This is my favorite question to mess with the people a little; I always tell them, "No, you just need your ticket and your finger" and "Don't forget your finger." Every person's reaction to this is a little bit different, so it is really entertaining! Haha!
It is also entertaining to mess with the dads every once in a while when they are wearing their favorite sports team shirt. My favorite today was when a man with an Iowa hat asked me what they needed to have to get back into the park, and I said I didn't know if they would with the Iowa hat on and then informed him that I was from Nebraska. He said we would see them the day after Thanksgiving, but I am sure that we will end up on the good side of that one. I was able to go to last years game, and with how we handled them, I say good luck to them.
It should be a good time doing this and PAC for the summer, and I am excited to start getting to know my coworkers and being able to poor into them with the love of God. This summer is just starting to get into the swing of things, so I am excited to see all the God will do through us here in the next two months!
I am so thankful that I finally will have some time off from work now. We have Wednesday off every week just to devote to project stuff, so we have that day off. Then my group also has Thursday, Friday, and Saturday off! I am plenty tired and will be really grateful for some rest and recovery the next few days.

I'm out. #keepingitclassy #disneypoint #noticketynomickey #WDWSP12