I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival

- C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

The Disney College Program is a really great place to make friends. Everyone on the program is in a new place and wants to meet new people. I have come to appreciate this, since being home. Here in the real world, people are so busy with life and already have too many friends who they've grown up with or go to school with etc. You can have a good conversation with a person and never see them again. At Disney, being alone in a new place meant that whenever we clicked with someone even briefly on the bus or at work or even around housing, we would always want to get to know that person better and gain a new friend.

There was always something exciting to do with new friends around Disney World - like riding rollercoasters, eating delicious theme park foods and visiting the fancy resorts. Having fun and making incredible memories was easy. The mindset of everyone on the College Program was to be friendly and make friends. I think the busyness and familiarity of our normal lives (or at least, my life) at home, means that we don't often pursue friendships in the same way. I think in that sense, we are missing out.

The first friends I made were the people in my training group. We spent a week together in boot camp! This was us on one of the first days together. There are five Aussies and six Americans and we made so many memories in those first few days that I will always remember!

After our training ended and we were scheduled different shifts in different areas of Walt Disney World, my  friends and I still caught up regularly over dinner and shared stories and recipes.

Remember when:

• Maxime, the French cast member got lost on his first day of work and ended up getting off at DAK Wardrobe with us - so all the girls decided that we should invite him into our van and drop him off at Animal Kingdom. Then we asked Connor to speak French to him.
• Jordan didn't know there was a kid standing next to him and freaked out when he finally realised
• Max ran into a palm tree in front of all the guests who were lining up to see him
• We played charades and Sharleen didn't know how to act out "Hannah Montana"
• When we were video'd dancing to the Cha Cha Slide and the Australians didn't know it was an instructional dance song, so we were doing crazy, inappropriate dance moves for most of the song. And then the moment of awkwardness when we realised that EVERYONE ELSE was doing the proper dance moves. (We'd never heard of the Cha Cha Slide)
• We had to introduce ourselves and name our favourite vegetable. We all went round in a circle and when Courtney said "avocado" we all tried to change our answers to avocado.
• We all realised that Courtney looks like Kate Winslet - and Devon would call her Kate.
• At the end of each training day, we had to go around in a circle and describe how we were feeling in one word and the trainers would write it down. WHY?
• Jordan forgot people's names and referred to Crystal as "Nice Hair."
• Jordan was dead sick during training and was breathing really heavily
• Jordan was talking about smoking "fags" (cigarettes) on the bus and he didn't know it was a rude word, and Connor wanted to die of embarrassment
• Connor wanted to die of embarrassment every time we used really Australian sayings
• Devon and Eeyore sang and danced to "Sexy And I Know It" 
• Chip told everyone that he took his girlfriend to McDonalds
• The Americans mentioned "strip malls" and the Australians thought it was an adult shopping centre
• Jordan cried when the Princesses waved at him in the cafeteria
• We got confused when Jordan said he wanted to marry Mulan and Pocahontas
• We had character dinners!
• Courtney made vomit dip and Jordan kept eating over the bowl like it was his own personal bowl and all his crumbs fell into the dip, yuck.
• We would end a night sipping on Crystal's Texas-sized hot chocolate
• Sharleen would always bring chocolate muffins to dinner, no matter what the theme was
• Crystal showed us pictures of her guns
• Connor made bread and Jordan kept saying that Connor thought he was too cool for normal bread (but it was delicious)
• Jordan did some weird wet willy thing to Connor after a dinner party and I have it on video
• Crystal kept talking about "Bisquits and Gravy" and we were all grossed out because a biscuit is a cookie. But then she made it for us and I liked it, but Jordan and Sharleen didn't want to finish theirs.
• The Americans tasted Vegemite and hated it
• Jordan was pimpin when the girls rode with him to Publix to buy 2 for 1 Ben and Jerry's
• Crystal hosted dinner and called it "Crystal Palace" and dressed up in a Crystal Palace uniform
• We did the Kitchen Sink and Jordan wanted coffee ice cream but forgot that Courtney is a Mormon doesn't consume coffee, and so he told the waitress that he "forgot he was allergic to coffee"
• We were always doing impressions of the old man at Epcot who loves leading warm-ups... and "5, 4, 3, 2, 1..."
• We watched Wishes together on our last night and lost Jordan after the Fireworks. He had followed two random short people back to Main St thinking it was me and Sharleen. The plan was to ride Big Thunder Mountain Railroad together because it had just opened. We waited for him in Frontierland and told him we would ride Splash Mountain while we were waiting. We got off Splash Mountain and we still couldn't see him. Then I get a text message saying "Wow Splash Mountain isn't very fun on your own." !!! Instead of meeting us outside, he had lined up for Splash Mountain and ridden it by himself! We lined up for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad without him because it was going to close and when we got to the front, we held up the line so that Jordan could catch up. It was pretty funny. We finally rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad together yelling "BOOM!" at every turn and it was the best ride :)

We devoured the Kitchen Sink together at Beaches and Cream:
8 scoops of ice cream: vanilla, choc, strawberry, mint choc and coffee
Hot fudge, peanut butter, butterscotch saucePineapple topping, Strawberry topping, a whole sliced banana, chunks of brownie, angel food cake, bundt cake, candy bar, Oreos, real chocolate syrup, sprinkles, nuts, a bunch of maraschino cherries
And a can of whipped cream

Courtney hates Vegemite at our Brinner Party