Tuesday, February 15, 2011

When life gives you dilemmas....

This morning, I woke up, hopped on the 6:25am bus, and made the long trek to work.
Little did I know what awaited me once I got there!
So today, I was scheduled as a "spare". This means that I had no specific spot or character to attend unless an attendant called in sick. So until the park opened at 9, I was able to hang out in the break room and color with my lovely friend Lauren. It was a wonderful morning and I was crossing my fingers that no attendants would call in and I could sit and color all day long!!
No such luck. Mary Poppins' attendant called in, and I was assigned to roam Fantasy Land with her. This was exciting for me, since it was a brand new character and a brand new location!

So, we go out into the park for our first meet & greet and another attendant pulls me to the side:
"There's been a bit of a problem...the only ride in the park that is operating is the carousel"

Since I don't know how much I am allowed to expose on the blog, I'll just say this: the magic exploded, and therefore no rides would be in working order, and who knew how long it'd take to get things up and running again?! So today I learned a valuable lesson: When an amusement parks rides are down...there's only one other thing that will make those guests happy: meeting characters.

I was kind of apprehensive to even bring Mary Poppins out for her next meet and greet for fear that she would be mobbed, but as my favorite mediocre sitcom dad Danny Tanner says: "When life gives you dilemmas, make dilemmanade!" And that's exactly what Disney did. It was time to make some memories, and Disney was more than ready to take on the challenge!

After our meet & greet, Mary & I made our way backstage for a spot of tea, and it was the craziest, yet most organized chaos I have ever witnessed. Just a few moments after we found out there would be no rides, characters were everywhere, ready and waiting to meet their fans. I mean, these characters were all over and all kinds of random!! Instead of just Pooh, we had Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, even Rabbit! Marie from the Aristocats came over from Epcot to spend the day with us, and even Miss Poppins had two penguin friends!!! All the while we were accompanied by Peter Pan, the Evil Step-family and of course the Fairy Godmother.
today really proved that attitude makes a huge difference!
Instead of panicking and making the guests upset, our managers and entertainment department did everything they could to make the morning extra special!! If we could approach every single instance in such a positive manner the world would be such a happier place!!

All is well now at the Magic Kingdom, & rides were restored one by one during the day
But I will never forget the morning that Disney World had no rides...
at least my job's never dull!!

3 comments:

  1. I worked in Fantasyland on my CP. I worked on Pooh, Snow White, and tecaups. Pooh went down all the time. But no rides working? Even Philharmagic? That's scary. But when I went to the parks, all I wanted to do was meet characters. If I had been a guest that day, I would've been in heaven. I'm impressed that you handled the situation so well. Was it nanny Mary or Supercalifragilistic Mary?

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  2. it was nanny Mary...and EVERYTHING was out...slowly but surely we got things up and running again. but honestly, if it wasnt for like, everyones composure we would've fallen apart!! We had so much to attract guests with they didn't even get mad or impatient. it just goes to show what a crazy awesome company Disney is...they really have it together!!

    Thanks for reading, God bless!!

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