This is where I live! Yay!
Check-In Day
I arrived about an hour before I really had to because I was anticipating this day to be very long and drawn-out, mostly standing in a line and stressing about whether I had all my paperwork right or not. I was actually able to go sit in Starbucks for about an hour, and then stand in the first check-in line in front of the building for about 10 minutes. The first thing that struck me was how friendly everyone was during the check-in process. I'm used to logistics-type people being mean, scary, joy-sucking paperwork machines who look at you like you're a huge imposition on their time simply by breathing near them. Not so at Disney. They had people come out into the line and chat with every little nervous person in line and give them a smile and a name tag. Seriously, every person (and there were a lot of them) who took every little piece of paperwork was really nice and patient, pointing me where to go next and what to make sure to have ready when I got there. It was all so smooth and made me feel loads better, and the whole thing was done within about 30 minutes!
After that, it was time for the very long process of schlepping all my stuff up from my car to the fourth floor of the building. I had already made about 3 trips up the stairs with heavy loads before I realized there were freight elevators and dollies you could use...But! Once I did, it made hauling everything a whole lot easier :P At first, the hauling process was a little awkward - you show up in this room carrying lots of heavy things, put them down in a pile in front of your new roommates and their family/friends helping them move in, and you're just like, "Hey! Here's my stuff, person-I'm-going-to-be-living-with-for-the-next-five-months-but-have-never-met-in-person! I'm going right back down to get more stuff! And more! And MORE!" And then you all have to stake your claims to shelves and drawers and figure out where the heck five people's stuff is going to live in your 2-bedroom apartment. Luckily, I have really, really awesome roommates and we have things pretty well figured out now.
Also on check-in day was a little welcome/apartment orientation rules-y kind of thing. After that was more settling in, and then my roommates and I (minus one, who was spending the evening with her family and fiancee) went to Downtown Disney for dinner and roomie bonding! Yay!
Orientation
There were basically 4 days of orientation. The first day was very basic, welcome-to-Disney type stuff, then more settling in the rest of that day. The next day was called Traditions. This was a rather long day of learning all about Disney history and heritage, touring the park and backstage, and eventually getting our beautiful name tags and ID cards - delivered by Mickey Mouse himself, which made me ridiculously happy and oddly emotional.
My first pair of ears!!! (Also prettymuch the only photo we were allowed to take backstage)
My gloriously beautiful and magical name tag :D
The following day, we had Our California Story, which is basically like Traditions, but for Disney's California Adventure park (DCA). Now, since it is very similar to Traditions, I really should have guessed that there would be a lot of walking (actually, there was even more walking than the day before), but I was dumb, and decided to wear heels that day. Not wedges, not thick heels that support your weight evenly - spike heels. My feet were not thrilled with me that day. However, in spite of the pain, the tour was pretty amazing since I'd never been to California Adventure before, and it was great to get all the history and inside knowledge that you probably wouldn't get if you were just visiting the park as a guest.
That night, even though my feet were almost completely dead, two of my roomies and I went to the parks, and it was utterly fantastic even though we didn't really do that much because we were all really tired. The first ride we went on was Soarin' Over California in DCA. If you're ever in that park, go on that ride. It was incredible. The cinematography was gorgeous, the music was exciting, and you get to smell pine and orange trees. On this ride, it really hit me that all this was really happening - "Dude. I live here. California. I work at Disneyland. OMG GUYS I WORK AT DISNEYLAND AHHHHH!!!!" I seriously had to try really hard to keep it together and not just start blubbering like an idiot. Also, side note, when they showed the part with hot air balloons, I recognized a few of them from Fiesta :P Yay, New Mexico! We also went on the Little Mermaid ride and ate very tasty food at Flo's V8 Diner in Cars Land, and the chef came out and talked to me personally about my food options! Super courtesy points! After that, we hung out in Disneyland, which was only the second time in my life I'd ever been there, the first time being when I was 7. It was mega rad.
DCA Gift Shop selfie with ears that now have my name embroidered on the back ^_^
Paradise Pier
DISNEYLAND!!!
My roommate and I really love ducks. Like, a lot. She told Donald that he was her favorite. Donald freaked out - literally fell to the ground. Unfortunately, my camera is stupid and was too slow to capture the ground moment. But trust me, it was fantastic.
"So these are summer weekend crowds..."
Haunted Mansion! Which I had never been on before because I was too scared as a 7-year-old. It was neat, but I think my favorite part was the wrought ironwork on the outside of the house. It was so pretty!!! Also, the puns on the headstones in the pet graveyard were pretty great.
The next day was Welcome to Operations. This day was basically a lot of sitting and watching presentations. Lots and lots of stuff about safety, including more scenario-specific safety, and a whole section on lifting and moving things without hurting yourself, complete with fun little interactive demo with Andy the Trainer! :P After lunch was Entertainment-specific. I'm Cast Costuming, so that's under the umbrella of Entertainment, along with Photopass and all the characters and parade performers. We got to do a really reeeeeeeeeally cool backstage tour for this one, which got me crazy stoked to start working in costuming, but mostly made gave me a giant, burning longing to be in the parades...so, we'll see what happens... :D
After that, I had two days off, in which I did a lot of errands, and won some groceries that I can't eat in grocery bingo at our building! I got to go to the park with all my roomies on Tuesday night, and they surprised me with a birthday button, which made me extremely happy, and we watched the fireworks that night, which was spectacularly magical.
So, that's basically what happened the first week! Yay! I'll be posting soon about my training and first few days on the job, but for now, just know I love you all, miss all my New Mexico and non-California friends like crazy, and wish you all a very magical day!
