Hilton Head

Ok wow, so much to catch up on! Sorry, my family has been in town all week so I've been spending all my spare time with them!! It's so amazing to have them here, I really missed them a lot. I'm very close to my family, so it's hard for me not see them all the time. We've been having a lot of fun doing the tourist thing. We're staying at Old Key West Resort and it's AMAZING. I couldn't have booked at better resort. The rooms are massive, and we're right on the river so we sit on the patio and watch the boats go by, so relaxing. I think they didn't really know what to expect coming here and this trip may have blown their minds. It was really neat to be a resort guest and not a cast member for a few days. It's amazing how every resort has it's own special array of activities. I may have mentioned that we have movie nights at DAKL where we project Disney movies onto a screen outside by the pool? Well it's not just us, they do it all over! My sister and I enjoyed Alice In Wonderland one evening. They roast s'mores by the fire some nights. There's always something fun to do! More on that later

So last I wrote I was about to have an interview for Hilton Head. It went REALLY well. The interviewer and I had a delightful time, it was fabulous. She wanted to send a rep from the resort out here to interview me. However, they would have wanted me to move and start over there either the middle or end of may. Which is SO SOON. So I had to go talk to international programs and see if that was even possible. It's possible but I would have to self-terminate from this position and then I wouldn't finish my program. Which would mean I wouldn't graduate. Which is not what I want to do. So, I had to politely remove myself from the interview process. So that's too bad, because Hilton Head would have been a fabulous experience and it sounds like I would have loved it. However, I still have so much to learn here. In conjunction with this news, I also found out that UCR is not authorized to extend my visa because our program is a pilot program. So that means I can't extend my program, or take any internship position that might be offered to me. So I'm coming home in august. I'm a little sad about this, I would have loved to stay here longer, but I do miss home and I have some classes to finish at Camosun, so it'll all work out. It just means my original 3 year plan is still on track. I can always come back once I'm finished school. I need to go to casting sometime soon to find out what the process is to get Disney to sponsor a regular work visa. Then that's what I'll do!

Oh, I've started writing emails to myself, especially this week because I've been so busy with my family so if I have something I know I want to put in here, I email myself to remind me. So here's an email I wrote sometime this week:

I was working the closing shift tonight and there was a guest in the lobby doing some work on her laptop. i didn't really pay too much attention to her, she sat quietly working and her child was napping and she was there for about an hour and a half while i checked in guests and did my thing. at 1am, she got up, woke up her son and proceeded to head back to her room. as she went by the front desk she stopped and I smiled at her and said hello and she said, "you know, you are really good at your job. You really seem to care about everyone and you have a lot of fun while you're working. It's actually been a pleasure to listen to you for the last hour or so." I thanked her very much and felt all warm and fuzzy inside. There's always someone watching apparently. It's so nice to hear things like that, very flattering. Warm fuzzies for EVERYONE!!


And one more, this one re-iterates what I was just talking about regarding my work visa but I'm still going to include it, because it seems like a fun idea, and it would be a waste of something I thought was important at the time:

So in my quest to stay here forever, i have reached a roadblock. I have been keeping in contact with  UCR and hoping that I will be able to get a visa extension or even a whole new visa. However, I just heard back and unfortunately, because our program is a pilot program, the school is not authorized to extend my visa or give me a new one. So that means I must go back to Canada. Which is a bittersweet thing. Obviously, I love it here and I want to stay forever but I do still have unfinished business at home. So I've paid my fall deposit for Camosun and I will be registering for a few classes and finishing off my program, which is necessary. So then I have a few options. I want to head off to La Trobe to get my business degree so maybe between classes and more classes I will look for a job on the Disney Cruise Line for 6 months. That would be a really fun opportunity. Then when I'm done school in Australia I could apply for a regular work visa and come back here. I really love the company and want to work for them again in the future. And while I'm in Australia, ideally I would work for the Four Seasons. So that's the new game plan. So I will officially be coming home in August. 

 So that's what I have to say at this point. I'm sure all kinds of things will come up that I'll need to talk about, and of course I'll post some photos that I've got from various things. OH, I also got to work up on the concierge lounge the other day! So much fun!! I go back to Disney University this week for concierge training!! No DAKL for me all week long. Sad panda. But DU is always a good time so I'll have fun over there!!