Time Flies

Hallo Guten Tag!

At the same time every day we have the Lufthansa German flight crew depart and, a mere few hours later, a whole new batch arrives from the airport. As this is an ongoing event I'm taking the time to learn a few words in German. The crew gets a kick from my broken attempts but it's a pretty good time.

I've not written nearly enough, I'm finding it impossible to find the time and the days are just flying by. I'm in week 6 of work already. Sometimes it feels like I started yesterday whereas other days, most days, it feels like I've been there the entire summer already.

Lately I've been finding that I'm not overly challenged at work and while the people I work with are amazing (as previously mentioned) today was the first day I was really challenged. With huge numbers arriving and departing AND two ships in I didn't get a chance to look at the clock until around 1:30 this afternoon. Even then it was just long enough to remember I'd had to go to the bathroom for about 3 hours and to get back to work until 5:00. In my last blog I mentioned that I was looking for another job but that's been put on hold temporarily as they've been good enough to keep me on until 5 during the busy days.

Initially I had been hoping that I would get the opportunity to job shadow or maybe do some cross-training in various departments but it appears that neither of these things are an option for me due to liability, etc. etc. I was starting to feel a little down on the slower days and then I remembered that the hotel offers online training for its employees for free! After a few conversations with the Human Capital Department I was all set up with a name and password and have started a series of online training in areas of study bizarrely similar to those in our program. I'm hoping this will lead to some kind of certification in the end but if not, at least it was something to do during the down times of the day.

So far the highlight of working at the Pan Pacific has been the opportunity to attend a number of industry events. I've had more free food and drinks and met more interesting people in the past month than I have the past year. The first was at the Chinese Gardens and it was a promotional event for Big Bus tours. I met a fellow who let me know that he could hook me up with after hours fudge (what?!?!?!)...one of many unique characters at these shindigs. The following week I attended two more events - the first was on the rooftop of Joe Fortes and the next night on the patio at the Boathouse down in English Bay. Both were a blast but, like most networking situations, our crew tended to stick together which actually provided a great opportunity to get to know the guys I work with on a more personal level. They're all am-az-ing!
The following week the group headed to the Hastings Race Track for horse racing and hot dogs! All these businesses trying to schmooze us so that when guests ask advice on what to do we send them their way...pretty powerful marketing tool, I'd say. Someone came round and taught us how to bet, about the odds and each horses history. I lost $2 that night...I only bet $2...but I lost $2. Proof that I should never gamble! I did, however, place bets on which jockey would win in a running race and took home a few dollars that way.

Last week I was feeling a lil homesick for Victoria so I headed back over to the island for my days off. It was fantastic catching up with my friends and visiting the restaurant (Pag's) but after just 2 days I felt I'd made the right choice moving to Vancouver. I believe I mentioned it in the last blog but truly honestly, the energy here is absolutely contagious.

Anywho, that's the latest from the Pan Pacific and my life here in Vancouver.

Hope everyone's doing well...miss you all!

xoxo

PS - check out Peter Chao..."guy that rubbed his crap on a building" and "Chinese guy eats sooo loud" on youtube.com - HEELARIOUS