Travel Day

Every Monday is travel day!

So being on tour is a little like being on the ship as far as weekly-disorientation goes. AKA: I lose track of what day it is and base my schedule on if it's a day off, opening, closing, or travel day. Our schedules are also organized Monday-Sunday so that's confusing to look at.

But basically our busiest part of the week is Sunday/Monday. Sunday we can have 1-3 shows and then load out. Load out is pretty self-explanatory. All of the sets, props, costumes, lights, equipment, etc. have to be packed up into our trucks so they can be driven to our next city. It's a team effort for everyone in the cast and crew. As cast members, it's our responsibility to pack up our costumes and clear out the dressing room spaces. Oh, and it all has to be done as fast as possible because the show ends around 9 and we have to travel early the next morning...Since yesterday(now two days ago because it's 1:00am) was load out and I was out sick, I still have yet to experience this.

Side note: in case you were wondering, I am 4 hours ahead of California.

Anyway, Sundays are long nights and Mondays are long days. Fortunately (almost said luckily, Jill, but I refrained!) we haven't traveled any crazy long distances yet so the days haven't been too exhausting. Travel days usually pan out like this:

1. Wake up around 8:00 or 9:00 depending when our bus call is so we can catch breakfast at the hotel before checking out. 
2. Check out of our rooms and pay off all of the room service/mini bar food we ordered.
3. Load all of our luggage onto a bus.
4. At least a 20 minute bus ride to the airport. (Today my buddy Lloyd and I watched the Season 3 premiere of Once Upon A Time!!!!)
5. Arrive at the airport and unload all of the luggage.
6. Walk as a very large group of mostly Americans to whatever airline check-in desks our business manager leads us to.
7. Check our bags and receive our boarding passes.
8. Go through the insanely painless and quick security. Can't even call it a line because there never is one.
9. Find the gate and finish watching said episode of Once Upon A Time/eat a snack/fill out Argentina visa paperwork/get a massage-chair massage/(my personal favorite from Belo Horizonte) have a creepy old Brazilian man repeatedly speak to you in Portuguese and offer everyone in earshot a swig of his questionable flask liquid and card with business information...no thank you.
10. Board. Fly for an hour or two next to an adorable little girl who you wish you could communicate with but, alas, Portuguese is still NOT Spanish so a creepy smile every now and then will have to do.
11. Realize you're landing and your laptop is still open, tray table down, seat reclined and no one seemed to mind. Oh, and Brazilians don't like to wait; as soon as the plane lands, they stand up and start getting their bags out of the overhead compartment. Ha! Still makes me chuckle a little.
12. Eventually get off the plane, find our bags, load our bus, make it to our hotel, get our room keys, find our rooms and drop our bags.
13. CHECK TO SEE IF THE WIFI WORKS OR NOT.
14. Facebook message other people in the cast to make dinner plans if it does work.
15. Food.
16. Internet.
17. Think about what you might do on your day off tomorrow.
18. Sleep.

It's hectic, but it's fun. And sometimes funny things happen and they make great stories.

I think tomorrow I might make a list of the Portuguese I've actually learned. Warning: it's not much.

Also, Porto Alegre is in Southern Brazil and according to one of our crew members (who used to be friends with Goofy with Disney on Ice - which is another branch of Feld Entertainment - so cool!) who is a resident of this area, says it's similar to The South in America and they like to eat a lot. So tonight I had a half portion of Spaghetti which will last me the next two days. Catching up for all of the emptiness my stomach has been suffering from the past couple of days!

Ciao!

So...I'm in South America!

It all happened so fast: one minute I'm on my way to a doctor's appointment, the next, I am taking down pages of information about an immediate replacement offer with Disney LIVE!'s "Mickey's Music Festival" in South America! Within a matter of weeks I had a Brazilian visa and a plane ticket to Belo Horizonte, Brazil and I was on my way to join my new cast!

After a 22 hour travel day I landed in Brazil, was picked up by a driver who only spoke Portuguese and taken to my hotel where I would eventually catch up on sleep and be cured of jetlag. I was lucky enough to have my own room for the 3 days I was in Belo, but I learned that things go wrong when I'm by myself. I plugged in my laptop and 3 minutes later all of the power in my room shut off. I used my new iOS7 flashlight app to make my way out of my bathroom to the front door and I looked to the peep hole to discover that the hallway was all black. I immediately thought I had short-circuited the floor or something along those lines. I strangely still had wifi so I posted on our cast's facebook wall that my power had gone out. They set me straight and let me know there was a room key slot that kept the electricity in the room on, and the hallways had motion-sensored lights. The next day I learned that my AC didn't work and made a loud clattering noise all night long (thank goodness for earplugs), you can't flush toilet paper in Brazil (a lesson I learned when I came home to a clogged toilet), and my TV didn't work/I couldn't be bothered to figure it out.

The next morning I went down to breakfast to meet whoever happened to be down there at the same time. As I finally matched voices and personalities to facebook profiles I became reassured that I was where I was supposed to be and that I had an amazing adventure ahead of me.

I still have a lot to learn but here are a few characteristics of what being on tour is like so far:

• Everyone wears the same 2-3 outfits over and over again throughout the week because we never know when the laundry machines will be available at our venue and you have to sign up for washing/drying machine slots. So basically, we stretch out our wardrobe for as long as possible.
• I'm never 100% sure if what I order at a restaurant is actually what I'm going to receive because when they ask me questions in Portuguese I have no idea what they are saying. Example: ordered a coke, received an orange juice!
• This cast has a mild obsession with Reese's Peanut Butter Cups because they are very rare to come by in Brazil.
• I already mentioned the plumbing problems in Brazil.
• Red lights mean "slow down" and lane lines are optional. Brazilians are crazy drivers.
• When you're hungry and you are sick of mall food, you order room service or eat the food from the mini bar.
• Ordering room service can be very challenging if nobody speaks English.
• Portuguese is NOT Spanish.
• When you see a movie in English with Portuguese subtitles and there are sections of the movie when the characters are speaking German or Italian, it's still translated in Portuguese.

• We use the word "ration" a lot when we talk about our American snacks, toiletries, laundry detergent, etc. because we never know if/when we're going to be able to replace them.  
• Airport security when traveling inside the same country is super lenient: don't take off your shoes, don't remove your laptop, don't even remove your liquids.

So those are just a handful of fun things I've experienced so far. More to come I'm sure...

Let's talk about the real reason I am here, the show. "Mickey's Music Festival" is a high-energy show with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, and other friends from "The Little Mermaid" (the best Disney movie), "Aladdin," and "Toy Story." It is an interactive show for kids and adults of all ages and even includes moments where the audience is asked to dance along or help Woody, Jessie, and Buzz, conquer a meteor shower! I get to dance alongside all of these famous Disney characters and I even hangout with Aladdin's Magic Carpet! It really is a wonderful show both to watch and perform!

I spent the beginning of the week learning my track and I opened with the cast last Friday! It was so exhilarating performing in front of the audience and with so many beloved people supporting me. I felt like a rockstar seeing all of the cheering kids with their glow sticks and flashing Minnie mouse headbands. Definitely had a moment of pure gratification to God for how much He has blessed me. I may or may not have shed a few tears of joy and relief after that first show!

The next day (yesterday) we had two more fantastic shows. After opening night, I finally felt secure with all of my choreography, costume changes, traffic patterns, and blocking. I wasn't perfect, but I wasn't thinking about anything but performing and having a good time!

So the first week with DL6 has been amazing up until last night when the bug that's been going around the cast and crew(including my roommate) bit me last night and rid me of everything I've eaten all week...Woke up feeling completely drained, frail, and weak and had to call out of our 3-show day. Hopefully resting all day and drinking lots of fluids will nurse me back to strength and tomorrow's travel day to Porto Alegre, Brazil (last stop before Argentina) won't be horrible. At least it gave me time to write this...

Thanks for tuning in to my first post about this incredible new adventure!!!

Blessings!