I have just realised that I have now passed the 6 month mark…as in, LESS than 6 months before I am leaving the country in the pursuit of the Disney Dream! Even though my flight is booked and I’ve got my tickets, it still doesn’t feel real.
I’ve been making plans for the end of my contract and what I am going to do with the 30 days I have got to roam the country before having to come back to Old Blighty. I don’t have to leave the States until 2nd January 2012 so I might spend Christmas and New Year in New York. I can’t believe that I am actually going to get the opportunity to do all the things I said I would – Spend a Christmas abroad, see New York, live in America…saving the money is going to be difficult, but not impossible and totally worth it.
And so the wait, the countdown, the adventure begins here.
Each time something of note happens, it will be documented on here, as well as the occasional post about everything and nothing in between.
The applications for the programme re-open in just a few short weeks, and I am trying to help everyone who is thinking of applying the best I can by sharing the inside knowledge. I am trying to convince my friend Danielle to apply; in fact, I have practically filled out an application for her. Don’t get me wrong, I am looking forward to making a hundred new friends but it would be nice to share the experience with someone who really knows me.
I’m still trying to figure out what this is going to mean for my relationship; I couldn’t possibly expect him to wait a year. But I’ve asked him to consider me as an option when I come back, and he’s said he will, which is good enough for me. No one knows what’s going to happen in the next 18 months; in fact we could split before I even start packing. He’s already told me in one of many long discussions about it that once I’m gone that will be the end, which makes me a bit sad really. My timing really sucks. I’m not having second thoughts about going, although I’m sure other people are convinced I haven’t got the bottle to do it. That’s why I booked my flight so early on; to prove to other people (as well as my self, if I’m being really honest) that I have got the guts to do something this big, this life-changing. There’s one thing I have learned, and that’s whenever you have a dream, there will always be someone out there ready to rain on it.
But that’s ok. I have an umbrella :)
Thursday 10 June 2010
Wednesday 9 June 2010
Disney: The Dream is Born
My Disney dream began on a bit of a whim if I’m totally honest.
There I was, after a bit of a messy break up, willing for a way out of the country when I came across the Yummy Jobs Website.
A job with Disney? In Florida? For a YEAR!? Surely not!
I meticulously typed, retyped, check and rechecked my Cultural Representative application, then with butterflies in my tummy and hope in my heart, I hit the send button.
I’d almost (but not quite) forgotten all about it when I got an email about four weeks later inviting me to participate in a telephone interview. I couldn’t believe it! I’d made it past applications and into the next round. Having auditioned for a character role at Disneyland Paris and been turned down, I knew that this was a step closer than I’d ever gotten before.
The day of my phone call came in August 2009, and I answered all of the questions without thinking, honestly and straight from the heart. I was actually out shopping with a friend at the time and I sat in her car for my phone interview. I didn’t plan it or over think it and deep down I didn’t really believe I’d have a snow ball’s chance in Hell anyway. Luckily, when it comes to rubbish facts, I am an expert, so when I was asked about my hometown I was full of useless information that made the recruiter laugh. I was told I would hear the result of my interview in four weeks and be informed whether or not I had made it to face to face interviews in London.
I checked my email every single day when that fourth week came, and was completely awestruck when I received an email inviting me to meet the Disney Recruiters in London for an interview three weeks later.
A week before the interview, I woke up with a really sore throat and a headache. Then came the fever, then the vomiting, and I was diagnosed with the H1N1 Virus – or Swine Flu as it was more commonly known. I stayed in bed, hoping and praying that I would be well again in time for my interview, but when I was still unable to get up the day before, I knew it was time to kiss my Disney dream goodbye and email the Yummy Jobs team to say that I couldn’t make it to London. I cried when I wrote that email. More than once.
I got on with things and tried to focus on other things, and had pushed Disney to the back of my mind when I was clearing out my email inbox 6 months later, in January 2010. I’d been a bit lazy and neglectful of my email storage space and was having a major deleting session when I came across my email from Yummy Jobs from the September 2009 applications.
I phoned them straight away to see if there was any way I could reapply. I was told that I’d just missed January applications but that I could reapply in June 2010. Deflated, I explained what had happened and how I’d gotten so ill that I missed the chance to go to the Interview in September. Luckily, I was thrown a lifeline when the Yummy Recruiter told me he could squeeze me onto the phone interview list, but that it was most likely I would be propelled straight back to the Face to Face stage. Unable to believe my luck, I prepared myself for the phone interview. This time, I knew what to expect and when asked “Which Disney Character are you most like?” I had the perfect answer.
“I’m most like Cinderella. Not because I had a wicked Stepmother and Ugly Stepsisters, but because even through times of heartbreak and disappointment, Cinderella holds on to her dreams in the hope that one day, her kindness and inner beauty will be rewarded and that her wishes will come true. It’s not that she’s ungrateful for what she’s got; she just dreams of a better life.”
Silence.
I wondered if I’d been cut off when I heard, “Wow. That is the best answer I’ve ever had to that question!”
I could relate so well to what I’d said; heartbreak followed by disappointment where recurring themes in my application process.
A month later, and two days after my 22nd birthday, I was on a train to London to meet the Disney recruiters at a face to face interview. Short of death, nothing was stopping me from going this time.
I’d found an online forum for applicants at www.wdwip.com where we chatted and made friends and decided to meet up at Waterloo station so we could give each other a bit of Moral support. There were a few of us meeting, but Lucie, Lucy, Kat, Jenny and Emma where the people I’d spoken to the most. We went in to the pre-interview presentation and all sat together, watching avidly and bubbling over with excitement. We were introduced to Jill and Michael, the Disney Recruiters who would be interviewing us. When Jill struck up a conversation with me about my outfit, and how much she liked what I was wearing, I desperately hoped it would be her interviewing me. We were given our interview times to come back and then headed off into London as a group to do a little bit of sightseeing.
After a few hours, it was time for some of us to head back to the interview location. I was waiting outside the interview room when I was told it would be Jill interviewing me. I thought I was in luck when they changed my interview at the last minute and that it would be Michael interviewing me after all. To say I was disappointed would be an understatement; Jill and I had a little chat and I’d been able to get a little piece of my personality across to her. We were interviewed in pairs and I went in with a guy. We were both asked questions by Michael and the whole time all I could think was how his answers were a million times better than mine and that I was shrinking next to him. I kept my answers honest and from the heart, but the guy I was interviewed with dominated the conversation massively and had loads of hospitality experience, and I knew there was no way I was going to walk away with a job offer.
Dejected, I brushed aside my plans to do some more sightseeing with the others and got on a train home.
We waited a long week to hear the results of our interviews, and I watched on the forum as more and more posts started appearing about job offers. First came the posts about rejection, then the posts about the waitlist, and then the posts about Job offers. About an hour after everyone reported getting their emails, I summonded up the courage to read mine, too.
My heart sank as I read the first few lines; the people who had gotten job offers had seen the word ‘CONGRATULATIONS’. Mine didn’t.
Dear Natalie,
Many thanks for attending the recent interviews for the Walt Disney World International Programs! The Disney Recruiters and the Yummy Jobs Team were very excited to meet you, and had a great time getting to know you and your reasons for wishing to work at Walt Disney World.
Disney was very pleased with the amount of interest we received from applicants across the country wanting to participate in Disney’s Cultural Representative Program. Your qualifications, along with those of other applicants, made their decision a challenging one. Participant selections were made after much evaluation and deliberation.
The standards were extremely high and at this time the Disney Recruiters are not able to offer you a position on the Cultural Representative Program.
I knew a rejection email when I saw one. Then I read on.
However! The Disney Recruiters did feel you were a GREAT applicant and would like to keep your file for our Opportunity List! This list is put together to enable great applicants, such as yourself, the opportunity to go to Walt Disney World when additional positions arise, and the best news is that Disney is now looking to fill positions starting all the way into to February 2011 allowing the possibility of even more available roles!
Your application is currently being considered for a program start date between October 2010 and February 2011 and we will be keeping your details on file until the end of October 2010 by which time we WILL have contacted you and all available positions will be filled. If Disney is not able to find a suitable role for you, we will also notify you by the end of October 2010.
Once again, we would like to take this opportunity to thank you for all your efforts so far and we will be in touch over the coming months!
Kindest regards,
The Yummy Jobs Team
I was absolutely gobsmacked. I thought I’d done terribly at the interviews, but I was waitlisted! Along with a couple of other people who I’d met at the London interviews who were also waitlisted, we all chatted on the forum and passed the time, wondering how long it would be before we got off that list.
On April 1st, myself and a handful of other people received an email about our availability. Since not everyone got one, I took this as a sign that we would soon be off the list with solid job offers.
After that, we started hearing rumours of people being offered positions but we hadn’t actually had a solid confirmation. Then, on April 19th, people started to get job offers. A few people got off the list, and I checked my emails every five minutes like a mad woman. Then, I accidentally deleted everything in my junk mail. I felt sick to the stomach, being SURE than I saw an email from Disney. Instead of phoning Yummy and potentially making a fool of myself, I sent a subtle email about the waitlist and how long people were usually on it for. I got a response sure enough, but it didn’t mention anything about me having a job offer.
I was happy for everyone, really I was; but gutted for myself and the other still waiting. I kept my fingers crossed than I would hear something in the next round of job offers to the waitlistees.
It was April 29th when my phone started ringing with a familiar number on the screen. It was Yummy Jobs, asking me if I’d gotten an email from them a few weeks earlier. I explained that I had received one about availability, but nothing else. It was then that I was told I had been sent a job offer and that I was being offered a position in UK Merchandise, starting December 7th, 2010. I literally screamed and jumped up and down so much that everyone in the office gathered around to hear my phone call as I frantically scribbled ‘DISNEY 7TH DECEMBER!!’ on my pad and held it up to the my colleagues. Then, I phoned my Mum, shrieking down the phone to her whilst she promised we’d have an early Christmas so that I wouldn’t miss it with the family. Pandemonium ensued, as I started to tell everyone the good news, but it took a little longer for me to break the news to Gary; a guy I had been seeing since January. He’d known about the interviews and was really happy for me, but when I told him people had gotten off the waitlist and I wasn’t one of them, we’d pretty much assumed that I wouldn’t be getting a job offer for this year and started making other plans.
It took ages for me to tell him and he said he was really happy for me, but we both knew that things would change. I told him I wanted to keep things as normal as possible, so that's what we agreed to do; cross the bridge when we get to it.
I booked my flight after my Disney Welcome pack arrived, and started talking to other people with the same start date as me. I exchanged details with a girl called Sabrina, who booked the same flight as me so that we can both go a few days early and have a chance to explore and beat the jet lag. Even though I never got to meet Sabrina at the interviews, we've become good friends and I am glad I have someone else to share the excitement with.
So now we are up to date, I am going on holiday in a few days so I will be able to concentrate properly on Disney when I get back.
To say I don't have mixed emotions about the experience would be a lie; I am happy and excited and sad to leave my friends and family behind all at once. But at the end of the day, I have worked so hard and waited so long that I can't let this opportunity pass me by. It's a year out of my life that will have a massive impact of the person I am and the person I've yet to become- I am not willing to sacrifice that.
I know that the people who love me are supporting me, but I will probably always have concerns. In the meantime, I am going to let whatever will happen, happen, and concentrate on enjoying this experience.
Until next time..
Dream it. Wish it. Do it.
There I was, after a bit of a messy break up, willing for a way out of the country when I came across the Yummy Jobs Website.
A job with Disney? In Florida? For a YEAR!? Surely not!
I meticulously typed, retyped, check and rechecked my Cultural Representative application, then with butterflies in my tummy and hope in my heart, I hit the send button.
I’d almost (but not quite) forgotten all about it when I got an email about four weeks later inviting me to participate in a telephone interview. I couldn’t believe it! I’d made it past applications and into the next round. Having auditioned for a character role at Disneyland Paris and been turned down, I knew that this was a step closer than I’d ever gotten before.
The day of my phone call came in August 2009, and I answered all of the questions without thinking, honestly and straight from the heart. I was actually out shopping with a friend at the time and I sat in her car for my phone interview. I didn’t plan it or over think it and deep down I didn’t really believe I’d have a snow ball’s chance in Hell anyway. Luckily, when it comes to rubbish facts, I am an expert, so when I was asked about my hometown I was full of useless information that made the recruiter laugh. I was told I would hear the result of my interview in four weeks and be informed whether or not I had made it to face to face interviews in London.
I checked my email every single day when that fourth week came, and was completely awestruck when I received an email inviting me to meet the Disney Recruiters in London for an interview three weeks later.
A week before the interview, I woke up with a really sore throat and a headache. Then came the fever, then the vomiting, and I was diagnosed with the H1N1 Virus – or Swine Flu as it was more commonly known. I stayed in bed, hoping and praying that I would be well again in time for my interview, but when I was still unable to get up the day before, I knew it was time to kiss my Disney dream goodbye and email the Yummy Jobs team to say that I couldn’t make it to London. I cried when I wrote that email. More than once.
I got on with things and tried to focus on other things, and had pushed Disney to the back of my mind when I was clearing out my email inbox 6 months later, in January 2010. I’d been a bit lazy and neglectful of my email storage space and was having a major deleting session when I came across my email from Yummy Jobs from the September 2009 applications.
I phoned them straight away to see if there was any way I could reapply. I was told that I’d just missed January applications but that I could reapply in June 2010. Deflated, I explained what had happened and how I’d gotten so ill that I missed the chance to go to the Interview in September. Luckily, I was thrown a lifeline when the Yummy Recruiter told me he could squeeze me onto the phone interview list, but that it was most likely I would be propelled straight back to the Face to Face stage. Unable to believe my luck, I prepared myself for the phone interview. This time, I knew what to expect and when asked “Which Disney Character are you most like?” I had the perfect answer.
“I’m most like Cinderella. Not because I had a wicked Stepmother and Ugly Stepsisters, but because even through times of heartbreak and disappointment, Cinderella holds on to her dreams in the hope that one day, her kindness and inner beauty will be rewarded and that her wishes will come true. It’s not that she’s ungrateful for what she’s got; she just dreams of a better life.”
Silence.
I wondered if I’d been cut off when I heard, “Wow. That is the best answer I’ve ever had to that question!”
I could relate so well to what I’d said; heartbreak followed by disappointment where recurring themes in my application process.
A month later, and two days after my 22nd birthday, I was on a train to London to meet the Disney recruiters at a face to face interview. Short of death, nothing was stopping me from going this time.
I’d found an online forum for applicants at www.wdwip.com where we chatted and made friends and decided to meet up at Waterloo station so we could give each other a bit of Moral support. There were a few of us meeting, but Lucie, Lucy, Kat, Jenny and Emma where the people I’d spoken to the most. We went in to the pre-interview presentation and all sat together, watching avidly and bubbling over with excitement. We were introduced to Jill and Michael, the Disney Recruiters who would be interviewing us. When Jill struck up a conversation with me about my outfit, and how much she liked what I was wearing, I desperately hoped it would be her interviewing me. We were given our interview times to come back and then headed off into London as a group to do a little bit of sightseeing.
After a few hours, it was time for some of us to head back to the interview location. I was waiting outside the interview room when I was told it would be Jill interviewing me. I thought I was in luck when they changed my interview at the last minute and that it would be Michael interviewing me after all. To say I was disappointed would be an understatement; Jill and I had a little chat and I’d been able to get a little piece of my personality across to her. We were interviewed in pairs and I went in with a guy. We were both asked questions by Michael and the whole time all I could think was how his answers were a million times better than mine and that I was shrinking next to him. I kept my answers honest and from the heart, but the guy I was interviewed with dominated the conversation massively and had loads of hospitality experience, and I knew there was no way I was going to walk away with a job offer.
Dejected, I brushed aside my plans to do some more sightseeing with the others and got on a train home.
We waited a long week to hear the results of our interviews, and I watched on the forum as more and more posts started appearing about job offers. First came the posts about rejection, then the posts about the waitlist, and then the posts about Job offers. About an hour after everyone reported getting their emails, I summonded up the courage to read mine, too.
My heart sank as I read the first few lines; the people who had gotten job offers had seen the word ‘CONGRATULATIONS’. Mine didn’t.
Dear Natalie,
Many thanks for attending the recent interviews for the Walt Disney World International Programs! The Disney Recruiters and the Yummy Jobs Team were very excited to meet you, and had a great time getting to know you and your reasons for wishing to work at Walt Disney World.
Disney was very pleased with the amount of interest we received from applicants across the country wanting to participate in Disney’s Cultural Representative Program. Your qualifications, along with those of other applicants, made their decision a challenging one. Participant selections were made after much evaluation and deliberation.
The standards were extremely high and at this time the Disney Recruiters are not able to offer you a position on the Cultural Representative Program.
I knew a rejection email when I saw one. Then I read on.
However! The Disney Recruiters did feel you were a GREAT applicant and would like to keep your file for our Opportunity List! This list is put together to enable great applicants, such as yourself, the opportunity to go to Walt Disney World when additional positions arise, and the best news is that Disney is now looking to fill positions starting all the way into to February 2011 allowing the possibility of even more available roles!
Your application is currently being considered for a program start date between October 2010 and February 2011 and we will be keeping your details on file until the end of October 2010 by which time we WILL have contacted you and all available positions will be filled. If Disney is not able to find a suitable role for you, we will also notify you by the end of October 2010.
Once again, we would like to take this opportunity to thank you for all your efforts so far and we will be in touch over the coming months!
Kindest regards,
The Yummy Jobs Team
I was absolutely gobsmacked. I thought I’d done terribly at the interviews, but I was waitlisted! Along with a couple of other people who I’d met at the London interviews who were also waitlisted, we all chatted on the forum and passed the time, wondering how long it would be before we got off that list.
On April 1st, myself and a handful of other people received an email about our availability. Since not everyone got one, I took this as a sign that we would soon be off the list with solid job offers.
After that, we started hearing rumours of people being offered positions but we hadn’t actually had a solid confirmation. Then, on April 19th, people started to get job offers. A few people got off the list, and I checked my emails every five minutes like a mad woman. Then, I accidentally deleted everything in my junk mail. I felt sick to the stomach, being SURE than I saw an email from Disney. Instead of phoning Yummy and potentially making a fool of myself, I sent a subtle email about the waitlist and how long people were usually on it for. I got a response sure enough, but it didn’t mention anything about me having a job offer.
I was happy for everyone, really I was; but gutted for myself and the other still waiting. I kept my fingers crossed than I would hear something in the next round of job offers to the waitlistees.
It was April 29th when my phone started ringing with a familiar number on the screen. It was Yummy Jobs, asking me if I’d gotten an email from them a few weeks earlier. I explained that I had received one about availability, but nothing else. It was then that I was told I had been sent a job offer and that I was being offered a position in UK Merchandise, starting December 7th, 2010. I literally screamed and jumped up and down so much that everyone in the office gathered around to hear my phone call as I frantically scribbled ‘DISNEY 7TH DECEMBER!!’ on my pad and held it up to the my colleagues. Then, I phoned my Mum, shrieking down the phone to her whilst she promised we’d have an early Christmas so that I wouldn’t miss it with the family. Pandemonium ensued, as I started to tell everyone the good news, but it took a little longer for me to break the news to Gary; a guy I had been seeing since January. He’d known about the interviews and was really happy for me, but when I told him people had gotten off the waitlist and I wasn’t one of them, we’d pretty much assumed that I wouldn’t be getting a job offer for this year and started making other plans.
It took ages for me to tell him and he said he was really happy for me, but we both knew that things would change. I told him I wanted to keep things as normal as possible, so that's what we agreed to do; cross the bridge when we get to it.
I booked my flight after my Disney Welcome pack arrived, and started talking to other people with the same start date as me. I exchanged details with a girl called Sabrina, who booked the same flight as me so that we can both go a few days early and have a chance to explore and beat the jet lag. Even though I never got to meet Sabrina at the interviews, we've become good friends and I am glad I have someone else to share the excitement with.
So now we are up to date, I am going on holiday in a few days so I will be able to concentrate properly on Disney when I get back.
To say I don't have mixed emotions about the experience would be a lie; I am happy and excited and sad to leave my friends and family behind all at once. But at the end of the day, I have worked so hard and waited so long that I can't let this opportunity pass me by. It's a year out of my life that will have a massive impact of the person I am and the person I've yet to become- I am not willing to sacrifice that.
I know that the people who love me are supporting me, but I will probably always have concerns. In the meantime, I am going to let whatever will happen, happen, and concentrate on enjoying this experience.
Until next time..
Dream it. Wish it. Do it.
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