Dana

It’s been another fun week here at Disney World for me. I’ve been keeping busy with work and everything. I really enjoy working for entertainment! There is so much that changes and I’ve discovered that it’s very important to be flexible in this job. Some days I’ll come into work thinking I’ll be playing one character, only to learn that I’ll be playing another. It’s a lot of fun though, I’ve become “friends” with so many characters.

Disney has four parks in Orlando, and all the parks have their own entertainment system. So even though I went through a five-day training I really had to learn a lot more while on the job because I’ve been scheduled at a different park each day. And with that I play a different character each day. Each character is very different and requires learning several things about the costume, mannerisms, and signature. It’s like having a first day of work over and over again. But I really feel like I’m finally getting the hang of it. In fact, today I worked with a girl who was having her first day at Hollywood Studios and I was able to tell her what she needed to gather for her costume and everything. I was finally feeling like a regular.

A few days ago I was able to meet my good friend Alice at Epcot. Here are a few photos of her and the Mad Hatter and I. It was great seeing both of them!

Posted by Dana at 09:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi everyone!

Yesterday I had the opportunity to fall down a rabbit hole and I ended up in Wonderland! It was amazing! What a magical world filled with odd creatures and bizarre events. It was so much fun! And Alice was quite charming; she looked like she was having a lot of fun. She met many guests and asked them if they had found the white rabbit. She also talked to many flowers and sang "A Very Merry Unbirthday". It's very sweet to hear her sing in her British accent.

I had such a fun time yesterday. In fact, I don't think I've had a bad day here yet. I've been making so many friends and keeping very busy. But this is such a wonderful place to work. I get to make magic and memories for guests all day. There is truly no other job like it.

Alice is looking for the White Rabbit

Posted by Dana at 08:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I had the last two days off and had another chance to play in the parks. On Monday Ryan and I had a blast from the past. Our camp friends Penske and Denim (camp names) were in town and met up with us at the Magic Kingdom. Although Ryan was only able to stay with us for a few hours, I had a long chance to catch up with those two. It was so much fun spending the day at “the happiest place on earth” with two of my favorite camp people! I think we rode practically everything.

Toward the end of the evening the three of us decided to venture over to Toontown and take a peek at Mickey and Minnie’s homes. While we were looking around a character attendant ran up to us and said, “Alright, if you hurry I’ll let you meet them.” We didn’t know exactly what he meant but we followed him into another room. Once we walked in we were blown away to see Mickey and Minnie waiting there to meet us! It was so great! Penske and Denim’s mouths were on the floor. We had a personal meet and greet with the big cheese and his first lady! It was a lovely ending to a wonderful day. I hope to see Penske and Denim again soon in the near future.

Yesterday Ryan and I both had the day off from work, so we took full advantage of it. Neither of us had visited Animal Kingdom yet, so we boarded a bus over there to check it out. It was such an amazing theme park! I had no idea how environmentally conscious the park was. I was very impressed, and I know my fellow Greeners would have been too. We spent the day watching some amazing shows and riding the biggest roller coaster on Disney property: Expedition Everest! One of our highlights was riding the Kilimanjaro Safari ride, which was a jeep tour across the plains to see live African animals! It was truly amazing.

In the evening Ryan and I went to Downtown Disney and had some excellent pizza at a fancy Italian restaurant. It was a nice ending to our date day. Downtown Disney is always happening, and although we had a long wait to be seated for dinner, I was glad we had some time before dinner to do some shopping. It was great having day for just the two of us. I can’t wait for another date day!

Posted by Dana at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think it is so neat that I have the opportunity to gain college credit for my internship at Disney World. Contracts are such a neat component to Evergreen, and I hope everyone who attends Evergreen takes advantage of them at one point. I'm not sure I would be here in Florida right now if Evergreen didn't have their contract system.

So in case anyone is wondering, my contract here at Disney World is an internship contract through Evergreen. In an internship contract you must have one faculty sponsor from the school and one field supervisor from the internship in order to qualify for internship credits. My faculty sponsor contacts me once a week and we discuss what I am learning and doing here in Florida. My field supervisor overseas that I am staying on task, and at the end of the quarter they will write up a narrative evaluation on my performance.

Since the Disney College Program is world wide I have met a ton of people from other colleges. Most of the interns here are not getting college credit for this experience. This is just another reason why I think Evergreen is so unique. They welcome people's interests and are happy to award they appropriate credit for their passions.

Posted by Dana at 05:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello everyone!

Guess what? Today I had the pleasure of meeting Wendy Moira Angela Darling, one of Peter Pan’s closest friends. She had a lovely time roaming the park with Peter and meeting all of the guests this afternoon in Epcot. Her and Peter went on an adventure looking for Tinkerbell, who was playing a rousing game of "hide and seek". 

I wish you all could have been at Epcot and had a chance to meet my good friend. She looked lovely! But now she is off to Neverland with Peter Pan.



See, my friends, all you need is faith and trust, and a little bit of pixie dust and I know you can do great things!

What a wonderful day! 


Posted by Dana at 03:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello!

It’s been so long! I can’t believe how fast time has flown by! I am now down in Orlando, FL working at Walt Disney World. I am so excited to participate in this college internship Disney has to offer. And I am so thankful that Evergreen has a contract system so that I can take part in internships in college to help build my resume and work experience.

I am working in Entertainment here at Disney World, and I have just finished my five days of training. So far I have really enjoyed the experience. But I have to say, this has been an overwhelming week for me. There is so much to learn, it’s crazy. I have to remember a lot of things, and since Disney World has four theme parks I have to memorize everything in each park. It’s insane! But it still has been a lot of fun.

Here is a picture of one of my favorite pals here at Disney World. I had the pleasure of meeting him a few days ago at EPCOT. He was wonderful.

I will be posting more about all the unique events and opportunities I will encounter on my Disney Adventure over the next quarter, so stay in touch!

Posted by Dana at 03:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ah.

This is really my first official day off. I have been on the go from the minute I stepped off that airplane almost 2 weeks ago. It felt so great to be able to sleep in today and not have to get up early in the morning to race off to training/work. So now that I have a little more time on my hands I will catch you all up on what I have been doing.

Last week I had 5 days of training to be a character performer. This was a lot of fun, but I found that there was a lot of information to remember in a short amount of time. I also had to learn all the different backstage areas of the parks because I will be working at multiples ones a week. Then of course, there is the training with the costumes, which was fun and a bit of a challenge. I wish I could go into detail about the costumes and my work in that aspect but I must keep it a secret to maintain the character integrity.

I love the fact that I can get into the Disney World parks for free! Trust me, I've been using that to my advantage lately. Just today I went to Disney's Hollywood Studios with a couple of friends just to watch the new parade "Block Party" and ride a few rides.

In case anyone is wondering, Disney owns four theme parks in Orlando:
Magic Kingdom: This one I'm sure you are all familiar with. It is similar to Disneyland, and has the castle and all those favorite rides as Disneyland does.

Hollywood Studios: This is a theme park designed to look like the back lot of a major movie set. Most everything is themed for the 20s-40s time period, when movies began to make a big impression on society. This park has a lot of fun thrill rides like the Tower of Terror and Aerosmith's Rockin' Roller Coaster.

EPCOT: EPCOT stands for "Experimental Protoype Community of Tomorrow", and it was a design Walt had before he passed away. He wanted to create a land where people could live in the future with new innovations. Well, it didn't quite turn out to that, but it did become a pretty amazing theme park. Half of the park is dedicated to the future and technology, and the other half is know as World Showcase, which ahs several mini pavilions for various countries.

Animal Kingdom: This theme park is pretty self-explanatory. It's based on animals! Don't call it a zoo though, there is much more to it. They just built a new thrill roller coaster called "Expedition Everest" and it's a very popular one.

My friend Josh and I found Wendy and Peter Pan! Alright, that's all from me right now.

Posted by Dana at 03:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)