A day at the office

Our students working at the hotel, continued working at the reception and house-keeping. They rotated their positions and shifts, but other than that nothing changed. They feel more comfortable each day, especially working at the reception, where they can talk to people. They realised that receptionists talk to the guests a lot more than in Slovenia, and that the guests are more open and talkative. The guests are a lot more relaxed and because of that they start talking about their experience and adventures to the staff, without them asking. They feel a lot better at the hotel, and then they thank the staff a lot and express approval, admiration and gratitude. The staff at the hotel said that one of our students reminded them of Luka Dončić, because he's quite tall. What surprised us most is how much paper they still use. They have everyting in solid form, so that if the power runs out, they can still operate. House keeping is not a physically or intellectually demanding work, but it is easy to forget or mess something up as its very repetitive. We didn't clean rooms, we only made sure they were fully cleaned. It felt like we were snitching on the housekeepers, it felt weird saying: "You missed a spot here, it's dusty." The students working at Intercruises experienced our first day working in the office. Our mentor, Carla, showed us the programs and what information you need to organise the arrival of a cruise ship. We didn't really do much at the office, because we saw the programs for the first time. Carla said that if we had been working there for a bit longer, she would've given us an arrival of a cruise ship to organise by ourselves. We spent the rest of the day removing tape from old signs for the buses. Honorable mention: one of our students got some words of advice: "Don't be a German army-sergeant with guests, be friendly and smile."

Tudi profesorji se lahko naučijo kaj novega

Takoj po sončnem vzhodu sta profesorici prispeli do šole, ki smo jo obiskovali v prejšnjem tednu. Prisotni sta bili pri pouku nemščine v 1. in 2. letniku. Glede na število dijakov pouk poteka drugače kot pri nas (minimalno število). Profesorica se lahko posveti vsakemu dijaku posebej. Zaradi bolezni in orkanskega vetra je bilo veliko dijakov odosotnih tako, da so v 2. letniku bili prisotni samo trije. Kljub temu, da se nam zdi, da so Kanarski otoki zelo sončni, se zelo pogosto zgodi, da zaradi slabih vremenskih razmer dijaki manjkajo pri pouku. Tako je bilo tudi danes, ko zaradi orkanskega vetra tudi letala niso mogla pristajati in vzletati. Profesorici sta izmenjali izkušnje, spoznali nove načine poučevanja in predali kolegom iz Španije svoje izkušnje. Tudi onidve mislita, da je tak način sodelovanja dobra izkušnja, ne samo za dijake, temveč tudi za profesorje. Dijaki, ki smo v Intercruises, smo danes imeli prost dan, saj smo delali v soboto. Imeli smo dan za "hišna opravila" in smo imeli dovolj časa, da za ostale v miru pripravimo kosilo. V hotelu je vse ostalo enako, razen tega da sta sošolki zamenjali položaje (house-keeping in recepcija). Tudi v hotelu se je videla posledica vetrov, saj je veliko gostov preklicalo svoje rezervacije.

First day at the hotel from another perspective

I woke up at 9, had tuna for breakfast, went to lay on the couch and had cereal for lunch. It was a depressing Vormittag. As I was not able to stop thinking about the fact that I still had 8 hours of work ahead of me. So for the next day I told myself: ˝I've got to have fun, I can't just lay on the couch.˝ When I made it to work at 2 o'clock, two of my friends were already there, eagerly awaiting the end of their shift, which was at 4 o'clock One of them greated me at the reception, as she was working there for the day, just like I would be for the following 8 hours. Even though I was already wearing a shirt and black pants, the hotel had their own uniforms. They gave me a shirt and a CORBATA, and for the ladies a fabulous green top. The first hours from 2-4 o'clock went by really fast as I had company of one of my classmates, that also showed me a lot of what to do and... gave me a quick tour of the hotel lobby. I also had an encounter with a Brittish lad. He was searching for his hat, but we unfortunately didn't have it in the lost and found. The other 6 hours were not as entertaining. I cut paper for 2 hours, took a 15 minute break and the did the same thing for another hour. After I finished it was time for CENA (dinner). I ate a lot of it, as it was to be expected. It was honestly one of the highlight of my day, as it was practically an all-you-can-eat buffet, with, you guessed it CHICKEN. There were also some really tasty carrots, with which I made a delicious salad with. The only bad things about my 2 rounds of dinner were, no sauces and the fries being soggy, besides that, *mwah* chefs kiss. After dinner I cut some more paper until it was finally over. My COMPANIEROS were already waiting for me outside the hotel when my shift ended and we walked back to our appartments together.

A new week of work.

Today some of us went to the Marina again, where we just switched the excursions, except with German tourists. The trip to the north was a bit different, because they added a distillery of Rum to the program. Our job was to observe and learn how to guide, our mentors told us a few tips about etiquette, how we have to smile if a guest is staring at us etc. The other half started their internships at the hotel. When we came to the hotel we were surprised, because it was so beautiful😍. Inside it looks like a tropical forest with live fish in the water. Persona uno: The first day of my internship was very interesting and a little bit exhausting. I was working at the reception where I learned how to make a check-in and check-out. They also showed me the hotel and they were very nice and polite. I was pleasantly surprised that, even though they know English, they still talked to me in Spanish, to help me learn. By doing that, I learned a lot of new spanish words. It was a very good and amazing experience to work in a different country and to use different languages. Prsona dos: Today was the first day of work at the hotel, where I was assigned to be in house-keeping. They told me basic information and then I went to check the rooms if they were perfectly cleaned. The rooms were pleasantly surprising, as they were very beautiful and the view over the sea is incredible. It was a bit difficult to communicate because the colleagues only spoke Spanish, but I was surprised by my knowledge.

Dela prost dan

Današnji dan je bil dokaj sproščujoč. Vstali smo okoli 10ih in se pripravili za na plažo. Nekateri so se kopali, nekateri smo pridobivali vitamin D. Po sproščanju na plaži smo se preoblekli in se odpravili na kosilo. Jedli smo v L'Osteria del Geco. Ko smo se okrepčali, smo se odpravili nazaj v apartmaje. Proti večeru, smo hiteli s pisanjem bloga, saj smo lovili avtobus do mesta (nismo ga ujeli in smo morali čakati še dodatno uro ˙_˙). V mestu nas je presenetilo, da je vse bilo ˝mrtvo˝, saj pravijo, da so Španci nočne ptice. Po mestu smo iskali trgovinice s spominki, ampak, ker je bilo vse zaprto, smo se na koncu ustavili v enem izmed odprtih lokalov, kjer si je vsak naročil sladoled in plastenko vode :). Čez nekaj časa, smo ugotovili, da smo zaman šli v mesto, ker nismo dobili tega kar smo želeli. Naš dan se je zaključil ob enajstih zvečer, ko smo vsi ˝popadali˝ v postelje.

First day of work.

It was the first day of work for some of us, and we had to be at the La Palma marina at 9 in the morning. We had some struggles with finding the correct building, but we ended up arriving before our mentor. First she told us what will be going on that day and then ger colleague made us passes for the marina. We made our way to the cruise ship, where we saw A LOT of people disembark the ship. Each of us was put in a different bus for a tour and each of us went to a different location. The first bus went to the north to San Bartolo where the view was beautiful and beaches like no other and of course there is no pretty view with no wind. The tour was in Spanish and Italian, so it was hard to understand, but some words were familiar and you were able to connect the words to understand the context. We also went to the National park, but we only saw trees and maybe 200 meters of the path. The second bus went to the volcano. Our path began from the docks through Santa Cruz, then we headed to the very south of the island. We took the "scenic route" through the mountains. We drove through clouds, pictoruesque villages and the remains of lava flow. At the very south of the island we took a 10 minute photo break. At the Faro de Fuencaliente, a beautiful lighthouse. Then they went back on the road to the San Antonio volcano. Sadly because of the fog the caldera was not visible, so we watched a short film about the volcano in the museum next to the volcano. Then we took a short drive to the local wine refinery where the guests had wine tasting. We returned by a less scenic road. We diesmbarked in the port of Santa Cruz. The last bus left half an hour late, and was behind schedule the whole day. The trip was to the national park Caldera de Taburiente, where we took a short hike around the forest. Unfortunately because of the delay, the walk was cut short and we had to return to the bus. We stopped at a view point above Santa Cruz, and saw it from a different perspective. At the end we were able to catch the bus and were not late to our own trip, which was organised by the school's professors. The trip was to the observatory and the drive was very squiggly. There was a lot of fog, so the view was not as beautiful as it could've been, though we got many pretty pictures of the sunset.

Petek je!!!!!!!!!

Še zadnjič so nas avtobusi "okradli" za 6€. Pouk smo začeli s predstavitvami, ki smo jih odlično opravili. Predstavitve so bile veliko bolj sproščene kot pri nas. Profesorju je pa bilo seveda bolj pomembno, da smo mi in njegovi učenci vadili angleščino, ter, da smo se med sestavljanjem predstavitev med seboj spoznali. Za spomin smo z učenci in profesorjem naredili nekaj fotografij. Po odmoru za malico je sledila nemščina, pri kateri smo z učenci vadili kako nekomu dati navodila za ogled mesta. Profesorica angleščine nas je prijetno presenetila z lepim britanskim naglasom. Zadnjo uro smo imeli angleščino, kjer so nam povedali več o otoku in kulturi. Uro smo končali s kvizom o Veliki Britaniji. V mestu smo se okrepčali v lokalnem McDonaldsu. Opazili smo, da imajo nekaj drugačnih jedi na jedilniku kot v Sloveniji, ter da so cene malo višje. S polnim želodcem smo si odšli ogledati mesto. Med ogledom prikupnih ulic smo se ustavili v trgovinah s spominki, kjer smo kupili nekaj magnetkov in modnih dodatkov. Po tem smo se še ustavili v trgovini za oblačila, zaradi last-minute potrebe po srajci za uniformo. Po hitrem spancu smo igrali družabne igre in si ogledali film, tako se je zaključil tudi naš šolski teden.