It's Grouse Mate!

So I had his dream one night: I was in this blissful slumber, all cuddled up in my brand new Ikea bedding and Ed Sheeran was singing Lego House to me.

It was a beautiful dream, mainly because it was real - minus the Ed Sheeran part.

Then suddenly, out of nowhere - BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG!!! ..."AMANDA! WAKE UP!"

Shit.




Now I was having a nightmare.

Sweet dreams you...

My peaceful dreamy sleep had been taken hostage by my hyperactive, filter-free flat mate Sophie, who had waaayyy too much Red Bull infused energy for my liking.

Sophie was up every morning at sparrow-fart, even after a cider drinking bender the night before. 
She visited the gym twice a day and was happier than a toddler, high on pink cupcake frosting. This little pocket rocket was forever on fast-forward.

I greeted her at my bedroom door with a sour face, Lorde's hair, and was wearing the sexiest set of baby pink, bunny print pyjamas, you have ever seen. I'm sure Ed Sheeran thought they were cute.

Which bitch woke me up?

"I knew you would still be asleep! Come on, get dressed, we leave in 30 minutes!"

It was 8am Monday morning; Sophie was already dressed in her gym gear, was on her second can of Diet Coke and was keen as beans take Kim and I hiking on the Grouse Grind - or otherwise known as 'Mother Nature’s Stairmaster', up the face of Grouse Mountain.

"Sophie, I just can’t do the hike today. After doing all those squats and lunges yesterday, my legs have as much movement in them as Barbie's limbs.

I can't even sit on the toilet; I basically need to pee standing up. Not today, maybe another time OK?"

Compassionate and Sympathetic:

Two adjective words you will never find in Sophie’s

Eharmony dating profile.

A casual 2.9 km vertical climb, 43 breaks and three hours later, I finished that gruelling hike. 
In return I now have Candace Swanepoe butt.

The Grouse Grind is hugely popular with tourist, locals and competitive hikers. 

Real fitness fanatics take on the trail weekly, attempting to beat their last personal best or competed to see their name on 
the Grind's fastest times list, which was displayed on the TV flat screen in chalet.

I can safely say I wasn’t in the running for fastest time on the Grouse Grind records, but I was definitely in for the chance of winning 'The Slowest Hiking Time, Of All Time' award.

I like to dream big.

Some guy named Sebastian Sale, who did it in 25 minutes, held the fastest Grouse Grind time.  I'm pretty certain Sebastian was a goat.

Grouse Grind

You wish you could pull this look off!

It had been nearly two weeks since settling into our new home and we're getting to know about local area. 

This is what we have learnt so far about North Vancouver:

-The local grocery store sold Tim Tams (yes!) for $5 and a small Vegemite jar for $10 (no!).

-Bus drivers didn’t like me.

-Wal-Mart has everything - I can buy my cream cheese, pop tarts, a bike, a dinning table set, fill my prescription, buy a Mcflurry and have professional glamour shots taken all in the same place.

- Pickles, cheese and jalapenos can be deep-fried

- I don’t hate root beer

- Drivers will always stop for you when you cross the road- and I'm not just talking at the crossing, I mean like any time, any road, no matter how busy it is, cars will literally stop traffic for you. “That could totally work in Australia”- said no one ever.

On Friday that week, Kim, Sophie, twenty other newbies and myself, started our first day of training at Grouse Mountain.

Not only was in my first day as a Grouse Mountain employee, but it was also time I had ever seen or touched snow. It's basically like sand, but it's white, freezing and made for great entertainment - watching the uncoordinated slip and fall spectacularly on their arse.

I thought I would have flipped out in delirious happiness about it, but to my surprise I was relatively calm about the situation.

I couldn’t say the same for my flat mate Kim.

Kimberly couldn’t stop smiling like a Miss Universe contestant and was on the verge of ugly tears as if the final two came down to her and Miss Kazakhstan. All she needed was to see a deer running through the snow, and Kim would have been as emotional as Miley Cyrus on a wrecking ball and as inconsolable as the 3 billion people who watched the film clip on YouTube. 

Counselling and hot chocolate would be needed immediately for all parties.

Friday:

We learnt about the history of Grouse Mountain, the great services and activities they have to offer to tourists, and how passionate Grouse staff members are about giving customers pickles.
I love pickles!

You may be thinking, "What do you mean pickles? Are they just walking around with giant pickle jars and handing them out to snowboarders? Is that hygienic? Are they using tongs at least?"

‘Give 'em the Pickle’ is a customer service training video we watched created by Bob Farell - a motivational speaker and entrepreneur in the customer service industry.

Grouse wants every one of their customers leaving happier then they first arrived, and experience the best service Grouse have to offer.

Give 'em the pickle = Give 'em 100% plus that extra bit to make the customer happy.

Saturday and Sunday:

We meet our rental supervisors: Alex, Laura and Guy. 

Approachable, encouraging, top humans.

This is where we learnt everything we needed to know about working in rentals. 

Basically our job is to fit customers with the correct size skis, snowboards, boots, helmets and clothing, according to their individual needs. (Shoe size, height, weight, age, and skiing/snowboarding level)

The whole thing was incredibly alien to me, I was in a whole new world, learning about products and sport I knew nothing about.
 I won’t lie, I was stressing out just a wee little bit. 
Ok, ok, I was quietly flipping out.

Time to get hands on! 
Sunday’s training was held at the rentals building, where we would be spending a good part, of the next 6 months in. We were clued up on all the ski and snowboarding gear and services we had to offer, practiced setting up a snowboard and a pair of skis, learnt how to book lessons and process transactions in cashiers department.

After that, it was all up to us. No pressure guys.

As daunting as it all may have seem, our supervisors advised us not to stress if we didn’t understand everything yet. During our shifts there would always be a supervisor or a senior staff member there to help whenever we needed it. 

I would be finding out for myself later that week when I had my first ever shift.

(I’ll let you know how I went in my next blog. My first days as a renty involve vomit, dancing and my Aussie slang getting lost in translation)

Until next time pickle lovers.

Amanda x

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