BRAZILIAN (BRASILIAN) SEASON, CHEERLEADER SEASON AND VARIOUS OTHER GROUPS

If you're at the parks and see a large mass of people dressed in neon orange, neon green or neon yellow shirts being led by someone carrying a TOURISMO flag, I suggest you just step back and let them pass because it's Brazilian season and you will get sucked onto their wave if you try to cross thier path. In fact in the mid to late nineties, Disney had special events called Brazilian nights where we'd have some of the shows in poutugese. This would encourage the tour groups to come later in the day and not be quite so over whelming to the non-brazilian guests. These groups are loud and haven't seemed to grasped the concept of waiting in line. In fact at Epic (Indiana Jones Stunt Show), a Brazilian group forged a trail through the landscaped que line and tried to come in the back of the theater, the operations people escorted them out of the theater. Management made them go to the back of the line.

While I was working at All Star, a Brazilian group gathered in the hotel lobby and were so loud I felt like I was working in a stadium. Then thier leader decided to use a whistle to get his group's attention. My managers quickly put a stop to that. The complaints from the regular guests about these groups ranged from, "Do they ever sleep?" and "they're running up and down the halls all night" to "My young child just saw two of them 'doing it' in the elevator". Extra security and a portugese speaking lobby greeters have helped to tame them some.

The darling Cheerleaders aren't much better. Except, instead of running up and down the halls at night, the Cheerleaders would have thier boom boxes blasting at the wee hours in the morning so they can get that last bit of practice in before thier competion. When management and the Varisity leaders made a rule that they had to 'X number of feet' from the rooms to practice, that calmed down those complaints a bit. What always amazed me was, for being an athletic minded group of people, they complained endlessly about how far thier room was or that they had to carry thier own lugggage if luggage service was being overwhelmed by other guests. I finally told a few people, "You're young and supposedly an athlete. Pick up your own suit case." She said, " It's too heavy." I responded, " Well, maybe you shouldn't have over packed." . . . Needless to say she wasn't happy with me, but I was just a nameless opeerator in a phones room at that time.

I was at All Star Movies one day and heard Phantom of the Opera music drifting across the resort, so of course i had to go check it out. In the Mighty ducks building the icons are three story tall duck shaped hockey masks. A high school show choir was using the acustics inside of the hockey masks to practice. I had to stop and listen. Then for the rest of the day I had Phantom music in my head.

I picked up a shift one morning at the studios thinking it was going to be for the Star Wars event. I was wrong. There was a jump rope competion in the Theater of the Stars. When they told me that, i said "Jump Rope Competition. You've got to be kidding." They weren't. It was a small group compaired to the Cheerleaders, but they put thier heart into it. On my way out for the day a group of four jump ropers were behind me talking. "Some one asked me if we were cheerleaders. I said DO WE LOOK LIKE CHEERLEADERS ? WE'RE JUMP ROPERS". I wanted so bad to turn to her and say, "Why, yes. Yes you do look like Cheerleaders." But I was sill in costume with my name tag on, so I behaved myself and just kept walking.

Pop Warner Football always manages to stir things up a bit at the resorts too. THe year before I started at All Star Resort there was a brawl in the food court between the teams. And the year after I moved on to another resort there was a brawl in the food court. You can always tell when there are sports teams on Disney property. Security is stationed at every corner.

The first weekend in June every year is Gay Days at Disney. It started as a group of guys chatting online and they all decided to meet up at Walt Disney World. Someone in the group decided they should all wear red shirts so they could find each other. And Presto-Chango a new special event was created. A side note: When this first made headlines, the pastor of my church, First Baptist of Orlando, was the president of the Southern Baptist convention. The Southern Baptists were offended by the concept of Gay Days at a family place and decided to call for a boycot of Disney. How ever, when my pastor returned to Orlando and realized that a very large population of his congeration worked for the so called Evil Mouse, he started back peddling pretty fast and quickly stopped the protests.

Let's not forget the convention side of the property. There was a resturant company who had a yearly convention at the Wilderness lodge. Not to mention specific names, but it was an Italian-style grill and steakhouse company. They checked into thier rooms with buckets of beer waiting for them. Not to say they drank like fish, but before the end of thier convention, security was fishing a few of them out of Bay Lake when they decided to go skinny dipping after thier night cap.

Speaking of a night cap, i think it's time for a little Jamacian Rum, then off to bed for myself. My goal is to do at least two blogs a month, so See you next time.