“If you want it Magical, keep it clean”- Walt Disney

“When I started on Disneyland, my wife used to say, ‘But why do you want to build an amusement park? They’re so dirty.’ I told her that was just the point – mine wouldn’t be.” – Walt Disney

Walt Disney himself (everyone’s a custodian at Disneyland)

Today was our 3rd day of training and it was even more magical! We got more time on stage then in the class room, score!!

We started out learning how to sweep so we went down Main Street to clean pre-parade. When we were done we stayed behind stage until the parade went by and then followed it all the way to Small World. I even got some guest interaction just by sweeping believe it or not. 

After lunch we got to learn how to sweep the attraction lines (queues). So we went to Fantasy land to learn which was closed for the fire works so that was nice so we could learn without feeling awkward of embarrassed of not knowing exactly what to do. Usually you would sweep while people are in line (whether you follow the line or go against it).

Once we were done, we learned how to do post-fireworks clean up on main street. While waiting for them to end we got an awesome view of them right next to Pixie Hollow and we literately just stood there and watched them (unlike yesterday when we were walking and couldn’t even hear the music).

All in all, training keeps getting better and better. Honestly I’m sad that tomorrow is my last day of training! I hope to see my fellow DCP custodians around often (since we’ll be working by ourselves a lot). Even though my back hurts, my arms ache from sweeping, and my feet are blistery from new shoes, I wouldn’t trade it for any other job!

Nobody does it better

“I want to have a place that’s as clean as anything could ever be, and all the people in it are first-class citizens, and treated like guests.” -Walt Disney

Today was 2nd day of training! We learned even more then we did yesterday and I hope I retain all this information for when I start my first shift by my self of Sunday. After we read a couple chapters of training online, we took a test and went over it in the class room. We talked more about stuff in the classrooms but when that was over we finally got to do the fun stuff!

When we went on our lunch break we got there at prime parade viewing time (from backstage of course). I’m not going to lie, it didn’t necessarily ruin he magic for me, but it was a little disheartening when I saw the dancers just start walking away rather then dancing all the way to costuming haha. I still felt like a 5 year old watching the parade though and pointed out each character; it was really cool to see the characters get off the floats and get out of costume! I mean how many people can say they’ve seen that?

After lunch we finally got to do my favorite part of training, ON STAGE! So we got to tour all of back stage this time (unlike traditions and operations where we toured a little here and a little there). Well we obviously didn’t see other roles break locations and that kind of stuff but each land has a “locker” which is like a custodian closet so we got to see where they all were.

We even got to have a quick tour of Haunted Mansion (even though it’s closed right now to decorate for Nightmare Before Xmas). We got to go down stairs where HM attractions go and we learned about how we would walk in the attraction with the lights on if we had to go clean up a code v (vomit) or ashes of a loved one that someone scattered (which apparently happens like 2 times a month!!). Honestly, as gross as it is, it’s awesome to be able to have that privilege of being able to see each attraction with the lights on. We got to smell the chemicals we use to clean up code v’s or code u’s (urine) or code h’s (human/horse feces) and it smells like Fruit Loops! So at least the stuff you spray smells yummy and it kinda cancels out the bad smell haha!

We got to see the back stage of Indiana Jones (a huge building btw) and all of fantasy land, which was so cute since all the little attraction cars and boats are adorable. Oh and we got to watch the fire works while we were clocked-in, how awesome is that?!

We also learned today that depending on our location (land) we’ll get a diffrent break/lunch room every day! I love that I can be in all the lands all in one week! You’re so free; you’re never confined to a work location for the whole week!!

Custodial is seriously sounding better and better the more I learn about it. I can’t wait to have more on the job training! 

“Keep the place as clean as you can keep it. Keep it friendly, you know. Make it a real fun place to be. I think they’re convinced and I think they’ll hang on after… as you say… well… after Disney.” -Walt Disney

Custodial 101

Today was our first day of on the job training! It was not really glamorous and we didn’t walk around the park as much as the last 2 days of work, but we had fun!

As soon as we all got there we met our trainers, learned how to clock in, got our (free) shoes, got lockers, got our costumes, and got a quick tour of our custodial building back stage. After all of that, we were in our classroom for most of the shift just learning basic custodial things. We didn’t learn how to clean anything but it kind of felt more like custodial 101. Today was our guest interaction training 🙂 (my favorite part about my role).

We learned that there are day time custodians (me) and night time custodians (when the park is closed). Day custodians “maintain the magic” and night custodians “restore the magic.” I just love that they say that because it really is true! It’s amazing how awesome this role is, and yet it is so over looked! My trainer was right today when she said that this is a really humbling role for that reason!

 
They had these Custodial Mickeys all over the place in my building, it was so cute! I love it because it really is an important job and that’s one thing Walt wanted the most for his theme park; to keep it clean! I’m glad I can maintain the cleanliness and help make it magical for the guests!

Custodians use to be referred to as “Ninjas” as they would clean quickly and then disappear (go backstage)! Obviously this isn’t true anymore since you see custodians in white (to stick out to guests, but also blend in with any land). Custodians also have the most guest interaction in the park so we don’t want to be known as ninjas. We need to make sure we’re available to our guests as their go-to information booth. It also amazed me to hear that there are 400 custodians in the park! I had no idea there would be that much!

After our class room training we got to actually take the things that we learned and apply them out in the park on Main Street. Before we went out though we got our “goodies” for our satchel haha. We got some gloves, scrapers, paper towels, a water spray bottle, a flash light, maps, and buttons. We also got to put a lanyard around our neck for pin trading and we carried a claw pick-up tool around with us for trash. As if we don’t stand out enough with white on, there were about 15 of us so we walked onto main street right by the train station as we got a lot of stares (wondering what we were doing as a group). One man spotted us right away, a dedicated pin trader, and was ecstatic from the “jack pot” he found hahah! After we had a quick talk from our trainer we got to do our first pin trading with him and afterwards he said we “made is night no matter what happens” so he asked for a group picture which made me feel good (even though he didn’t want any pins from my lanyard lol).

We started walking some more and stopped right in front of City Hall where tons of pin traders bombarded us with pin trading. It was so much fun and I was so happy to actually practice guest interaction. I even played with a baby a little bit and told people to have a “magical night”. I FINALLY got to use the things I’ve been learning about the last couple days and it was wonderful. Once we started walking down to the end of Main Street I started picking up some trash and right before we went backstage I got to interact with a little girl by getting down on knee level to ask if she saw Snow White today (she was dressed as Snow White).

I forgot to put this in my last post, but I just found out that since California is in a drought, custodians wouldn’t be able to perform water art until May (after I’m gone), so that made me sad.

Although we were only on stage for about a half hour, tonight was definitely a magical night and a fun beginning to my new dream. I was really happy with how today turned out and it was exciting to meet all my DCP DLR custodian family! There were more then I thought! I know this will be an awesome role and I’m looking to some more training tomorrow (even though I’m exhausted). I can’t wait to see not only what else this role has to offer, but what else I’m capable of! I can’t wait to make those magical memories and experiences!

 
My custodial costume!