After my bath-of-fire, learn quick or die, endurance-testing beginning on the train, my employers have given me a very restful week of recovery. One might even say too restful, but I’m not sure I’m prepared to go that far.
I had last Tuesday and Wednesday off. I took that time to relax and recuperate, and run some necessary errands. I bought myself a bike to make the morning commutes and getting around Anchorage easier and more efficient. I got myself a library card. The Anchorage public library has very quickly become my best friend out here. I visit it almost every day off I have. It makes for a nice little outing, there’s free internet, and now, when I feel like it I can start taking advantage of all the books and movies and CDs. They also have a lovely little lawn with a beautiful fountain/sculpture, and it seems to be an auspicious place for young children and families to congregate and play. I’m lying in the grass there now.
My big brother Adam and his girlfriend Jess had been thinking about coming up to visit this coming week. I went into the rail office on my first day off to talk to one of the bosses about when and how I could get them rides on the train, and if there were any other employee benefits we/they could take advantage of. Unfortunately, I didn’t really know where to start or what questions to ask, and he seemed rather preoccupied and wasn’t very helpful, so we decided to postpone the visit until later in the summer or perhaps another time. I would have loved to see them and explore with them a bit, but I’m so new to this job, it was a bit overwhelming to try to coordinate. Hopefully it will work out that they can come later…
I went back to work Thurs-Fri last week. Apparently the universe really wanted to ease me back into this whole “labor” thing, because my car wasn’t part of the train “consist” on the way up to Fairbanks. It was waiting there, which meant I didn’t have to do any work for the first day. I spent most of the day sleeping, looking at scenery, reading Faulkner, working on my poetry and daydreaming, meanwhile earning an hourly wage for the first 8 hours and time and a half for the other 7. Not a bad deal, as far as I’m concerned. My assigned roommate in Fairbanks wanted to spend time with another friend, so I once again had a room to myself. I hung out and drank a little wine and did a little yoga with my buddies Sarah and Thomas, and also talked religion and spirituality with a server named Tania.
Friday I also had a dead leg for breakfast. By this point, I was so well-rested I couldn’t sleep much more, but I was amused and delighted when I was standing on the open-air platform, looking out at the world and hundreds of butterflies passing by, and both my on-board managers suggested I take a nap. I’m definitely starting to love this job.
Had Saturday and Sunday off as well. Hindsight being what it is, I wish I had arranged my weekend differently. Weather-wise, Saturday was an ideal go-outside-and-bike-and-have-adventures kind of day, and Sunday would have been good for staying in, reading, writing and getting chores done. But I did the opposite. Oh well. I did all my laundry and made myself some food and did other stuff on Saturday, and Sunday I went to the tourist info office, got myself a map of Anchorage to help with navigating my way around and was pointed toward the weekend market. I don’t know if they call it a farmer’s market or not, but that isn’t quite what it is. There were all kinds of vendors selling their wares. There were a couple honey booths, a fudge booth, a woman selling pearls, various Native craftspeople, some food, fried and otherwise, and there was a stage where someone was singing. It was pretty small-scale, but neat. Then I explored some of the many bike paths in town, even though it was rather cold and grey. My first priority was the coastal trail, being the sea-starved ocean-lover that I am.
I had another run Monday-Tuesday. On this one I was joined once again by Hope, Nicole and Caitlin. And I was in for another surprise. Most of the workers and cars were only needed for the first 2/3 of the first day, so we were getting dropped off in a tiny place/depot called Healy, about half an hour past where we drop passengers at Denali National Park, and then being bussed back to Anchorage the next day instead of working on the train. After so many days of relative idleness, this seemed less than ideal. I’m starting to feel pretty lazy and unproductive, and I know I need to start working and earning more. On the other hand, I’m a very go-with-the-flow kind of person, and I love that I never have any idea what’s going to happen to me when I show up for work in the morning. I like the variety and element of surprise to it all. It keeps it from getting boring, predictable or mundane.
The cool thing about ending up in Healy is that theoretically one can get a shuttle into Denali and take advantage of some of our crazy employee benefits, which include being able to do any kind of tour for next to nothing. There are helicopter and plane rides over the big mountain or to the tops of glaciers, there are four-wheeler tours of the park, covered wagon and bus tours, white-water rafting trips. Basically anything you can think of, it’s there and we can approach the lodges or vendors, tell them we work for the train, and generally, if there’s free space, we can tag along and just tip the trip leaders nicely and we’re golden. Nicole was gung-ho about trying to do one of these activities, and I was ready to join her. As it turned out, the only thing that worked with our schedule and was available that night was going to the Denali lodge dinner theatre musical. So we did that. It was hokey and cheesy and silly, but the food was pretty good, and it was fun to get out and do something, and I always like being in the vicinity of theatre, even when it’s not brilliant or moving. I’m not expecting much of that from my summer in Alaska anyway. And it was awesome to see the park a little closer up than from the dome of the train (which, as bartender, I am basically never able to leave.) It’s gorgeous.
The next day we learned once again to expect the unexpected. A couple hours into our 5-hour bus ride home, one of our tires blew out. Our driver pulled over to the side of the road. We were in the middle of nowhere, and didn’t have much in the way of cell phone signals. So an hour or more elapsed before we were rescued by another HAP bus that was passing through without passengers. We train folks kept our cool and used the time to sing songs in a circle around one of the crew who had brought a guitar along. This was one of the moments when I began to feel like I had secretly signed up for summer camp rather than a job. I also read my friends a couple pages of my thesis, since I had it with me, and we had time. :)
Tuesday afternoon-Wednesday night was one extended social solstice celebratory extravaganza. Hope, Nicole and Caitlin were hosting a party at their house in Wasilla. I went back around 4 with Caitlin and she and I chatted and drank tea and decompressed for a few hours. Then we went grocery shopping and began to prepare for the party. We were inexplicably sleepy, but we managed to shower and concoct a 2-pound pasta salad, a delicious lemon zest pound cake, and sparkling sangria before the rest of the small party crowd rolled in, around 10:30. The party was low-key, which is generally my favorite kind. I got a chance to get to know some of the train people a bit better, and to catch up with my older friends. We had a fire pit outside. We stayed up to watch the sky darken, in the 12-1:30 am vicinity, and by 2 it was getting lighter again. I went to sleep close to 4. We all had a massive sleepover, taking up couches and beds throughout the house.
The next morning we gradually roused, drank coffee, and watched the creative photo-video project of one of the returning rail guides, named Lane. His video was really cool, he had some amazing footage from hikes and kayak and ice-climbing trips he’s taken in past summers. Definitely got my blood stirring for some more Alaskan expeditions of my own. We hung out in the house playing a group game for a few hours, played outside on Nicole’s new slack-line for a bit, and then finally, around 5:30 pm a few of us decided to go out for a hike. This is one of the great advantages of the thousand-hour days out here. It’s never too late to start your day.
The hike was a wonderful experience and served as the culmination of me catching on to why all the people here are in love with/obsessed with Alaska, which has gradually been happening over the past few days. We went to a place called Hatcher’s Pass. The mountains were huge and impressive and easy to climb because they were covered in tundra moss. So we made a b-line straight up to the top, and then slid on our butts most of the way down, to go scope out the glacial lake that was awaiting us there. On the way up and at the peak, Nicole and I taught our companions a couple of sea shanties. It was an incredible feeling, being way up there, towering above the world, singing and yodeling, clearly audible to those below me. Alaska is like one giant playground, full of wilderness, animals, dangerous and awesome challenges to scale, and barely anyone else getting in your way. It seems we are perfect for each other. It’s just a matter of finding ways to get out and see and do more of it.
So I’m out in a big playground, hoping to do some camping, hiking, biking, kayaking and swimming, surrounded by people around my age who also want to do those things, when they aren’t singing around campfires, or doing their various crafts. Some of them make paper cranes, others knit, or do photography. The job itself is also a good place for picking up new skills—public speaking, mixing drinks, cutting fruit for garnishes, plus cooking for absolute beginners on off-hours. Not to mention all the romantic intrigue that goes on between this contained group slapped together for the duration of the short season. If I had gone to more summer camps as a kid, I could swear I’d just found a way to extend that experience into my post-college life. It’s very silly, and I’m excited to see where things go from here. I suspect that if I want to walk away from the summer with any substantial kind of profit, I’m going to need to start picking up more extra shifts. Because for the past week or so it seems like I’ve barely worked at all. For now, I’m just taking each day as it comes and trying to enjoy it.
Also, today was the first day EVER that me and my three roommates were all in our house at the same time. I’ve decided to call it a solstice miracle.
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Why I came to Alaska-- To prove I can do anything
Last night I returned from a surprise 6-day non-stop session of working 15+ hour days on the train.
I don't know quite how to drive home what an insane situation this was. I arrived in Alaska the evening of May 31st. The following two days I had a truncated version of training, along with about 13 other people who had come up late. Most people who started this year had a full week of training in mid/early May.
I had a day off after training. Then I was signed up to go on a "training run" the weekend of June 4 and 5. At that point, I was not on the next week's schedule. When I finished my run, one of the managers asked when I was working again and I told him I didn't know. He said I should be on the schedule, and they would call and let me know if they found runs for me to do. I wasn't terribly concerned. I was supposed to do CPR training Wednesday, which would have meant having Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday to get set up and settled in to my new apartment and living situation in Anchorage. A little break didn't seem like such a bad thing, especially after having basically zero transition time between leaving Brown and getting here.
However, it was not to be. Tuesday morning I got a call saying I'd be doing another mini-training run on Wednesday (instead of going to CPR training). I'd be doing a "meet-and-back," which is just what it sounds like. The North and South- bound trains meet at some point towards the middle every day, and sometimes you can hop from one to the other and not have to spend the whole two days working. This was so I could see what a “ship day” is like, because days where we pick people up from their cruise ships are run very differently than the normal Anchorage-Fairbanks and back days. The call also informed me I would be working a Friday-Saturday run, in addition to the Sunday-Monday one I was on the schedule for the following week.
Here’s the catch. When I got to work on Wednesday (at 4:45 in the morning, the greatest challenge of ship days, in my opinion) I found out that they were short on bartenders, so instead of training and getting back that night, I’d be going all the way to Fairbanks, staying over, and coming back working the next day. Which made 6 days of work in a row. It also meant that I had to improvise on toothbrush and pajamas that night. I ended up rooming with Sarah, the bartender I’d trained with a few days earlier, and she was helpful on both counts. She and I also did a bit of yoga with a server who was staying in a room nearby, a boy with a long red pony tail and sweet demeanor, named Tomas.
Funny tidbit: Sarah kept describing me as “shy” and “timid.” I’m always amused when that is someone’s first impression of me, though it has stopped shocking me. I tend to be rather quiet and introverted for the first few days or weeks that I am in a brand new social landscape. I like to take it in and get the lay of the land before I decide how much of myself to share, and which aspects. But oh the cognitive dissonance. Quiet, shy Shana. :D
At this point, those 6 days have turned into something of a blur. The first run I was paired with a rail guide named Debbie. She’s about my parents’ age, and from New Jersey, and had the accent to go with it. We got along well. Most of that run was devoted to trying to figure out where everything is on the train, what sorts of duties I’m supposed to do and in what order, and just sort of figuring things out. Wednesday was a really long day, but went all right. Thursday was absolutely out of control. I had passengers for the first two legs (each leg is around 4 hours, and includes one meal). I am fairly certain I wouldn’t have made it if I’d had passengers for all 3. I was serving drinks constantly, without breaks. We had some impatient and whiney drinkers, and some who were good-natured, but still thirsty and rowdy. By 4pm, I had missed employee lunch completely, had been on my feet, running around for 8 hours, was hot and hungry and exhausted, had been hit on by an obnoxious dirty old man from Massachusetts, who wanted to get his wife drunk because she wasn’t having enough sex with him, and felt like I was nearly going to faint. I spent the next few hours trying to make sense of my cash register and cleaning up. That was also the day my cash ended up short, so on top of all the other challenges of the day (including cutting myself while trying to produce more lime garnishes) I had to take $16 out of my tips to fix that. Needless to say, I was not thrilled by the prospect of needing to get up at 5 the next morning, walk back to the railyard and do it all again. Four more times.
The second run also had plenty of challenges and frustrations. I felt more like I knew what I was doing, but I still made some mistakes that made my life more difficult. I also had to work with full cars all of both days, and I was tired to begin with. I got my own room at the BVI, and was excited about the privacy and chance to relax, but I was unable to get any sleep Friday night. So I was extremely cranky and concerned about facing my life the next day, with three days still to go. Saturday we also had completely full cars throughout the train for the last 8 hours, which meant there was no place for me to sit down at all. I served a LOT of coffee in the dome and wine for diners downstairs, neither of which I make any tips on. But I survived to serve another day. Or two.
Two different people on that trip asked me for milk. I was surprised by their request, though it turns out we do have milk on board, downstairs, and they were both surprised when I asked them to pay for it. Also, one Indian woman asked me-- mostly by waving it at me and looking sad, to microwave popcorn she had brought on board for her. It was the middle of dinner service, the kitchen was a place of bustling chaos, I didn’t even know where the microwave was, I strongly suspected her family wasn’t going to tip me, but against my better judgment, I did it. They did not tip. They did drink a lot of free coffee, though. And some milk.
Saturday night I was back in my apartment in Anchorage. It was empty when I got here. I was hungry, but too incoherently tired to do much of anything about it. I decided to heat up and eat a can of black beans. The problem is that we don’t really have a can opener. Blair has a Swiss Army knife he’d left on the counter, which has a camping opener, which I had never used before. I hacked at the can for a while, spilling bean juice on my uniform shirt which I was, for some reason, still wearing when I began making food for myself, and eventually got it open to the extent that I could get my beans out. Zack and Blair made fun of me about it yesterday though, saying it looked like Wolverine had attacked the can.
I collapsed into bed for a short while after the Bean Incident, but then I heard quiet chattering and giggling. Nicole, Hope, Caitlin and Blair had all returned from their day off, which they had spent at a music festival (lucky twerps), and were having a slumber party here, on Blair’s king-size mattress because they were all accompanying me at work the next morning. I hadn’t yet spent any time with any of them, because our schedules had been opposites, so I got up and joined them. I regaled them with some ridiculous tales from the past 4 days, hysterically and deliriously laugh-crying my way through them. We got about 4 hours of sleep, but I think the chance to talk and laugh about my experience, and get a little sympathy, and see some familiar friendly faces, was worth the trade-off of a slightly more insufficient night of sleep.
By my third run, I basically felt like I had gotten the hang of it. There is still certainly a great deal I can work on, improve and fine tune. But I think I understand the basic mechanics and procedures and schedule of the job now. I had a lot of nice passengers who were pleasant to chat with, but who did not order many drinks, and thus did not produce much profit for me. As far as I’m concerned, this is somewhat secondary. I did come out here hoping to make a great heap of money, so I could spend the rest of the year having guilt- and employment-free adventures and traveling. I don’t know yet how feasible this will be. However, I know I don’t like to be too hung up on money. I’d rather enjoy the experience, and genuinely connect with people, instead of calculating how much they might be worth to me.
My favorite part of my last run was meeting this family that belongs to a mechanic of Alaska Railroad (ARR for short, :D ). There was a little girl whose 7th birthday was yesterday, and her little brother Lyle, who was 4, and their mother. I made them all some smoothies, and brought them juice and coffee, and chatted with the kids a few times. Apparently the mom appreciated it, because she tipped me over 50% on their bill. I hope I see them again, riding the train to visit their dad who’s stationed in Fairbanks for the summer, not because of the tip (though that was nice), but because they were adorable, and I enjoyed talking to them.
I also stayed up past my bedtime on Sunday to watch the end of the Tony’s on TV at the BVI. I do so adore the Tony’s.
Thankfully, I got a couple of dead legs on this run—dinner going north, and breakfast coming south. I maximized the utility of both—by sleeping. And I survived this grueling test of endurance, and now I have a couple days off. And it looks like I’ll be on a more reasonable schedule for the next week or two. But now I know…I can do anything! I’m thinking about testing this theory further, by staying in Alaska for the winter as well. And swimming in some glacial rivers. We’ll see.
Disclaimer: In case this came across as an incessant bout of whining, I'd have it known that I'm pretty sure I like this job. I'd prefer not to work in such extreme bursts, and it would have been nice to ease into it a bit slower, but I think they like the trial-by-fire technique, and it seems to work well enough. Now I know I can withstand basically whatever they send at me. I'm excited about getting better at it, and I think I'll enjoy doing this more than most other things I could have spent my summer working at. I don't know yet if I'll come back for more next year, repeating experiences generally isn't my style, but I expect I'll be able to apply what I learn to other stuff I'll do in the future, like working more typical bartending gigs, or...you know, other things.
I don't know quite how to drive home what an insane situation this was. I arrived in Alaska the evening of May 31st. The following two days I had a truncated version of training, along with about 13 other people who had come up late. Most people who started this year had a full week of training in mid/early May.
I had a day off after training. Then I was signed up to go on a "training run" the weekend of June 4 and 5. At that point, I was not on the next week's schedule. When I finished my run, one of the managers asked when I was working again and I told him I didn't know. He said I should be on the schedule, and they would call and let me know if they found runs for me to do. I wasn't terribly concerned. I was supposed to do CPR training Wednesday, which would have meant having Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday to get set up and settled in to my new apartment and living situation in Anchorage. A little break didn't seem like such a bad thing, especially after having basically zero transition time between leaving Brown and getting here.
However, it was not to be. Tuesday morning I got a call saying I'd be doing another mini-training run on Wednesday (instead of going to CPR training). I'd be doing a "meet-and-back," which is just what it sounds like. The North and South- bound trains meet at some point towards the middle every day, and sometimes you can hop from one to the other and not have to spend the whole two days working. This was so I could see what a “ship day” is like, because days where we pick people up from their cruise ships are run very differently than the normal Anchorage-Fairbanks and back days. The call also informed me I would be working a Friday-Saturday run, in addition to the Sunday-Monday one I was on the schedule for the following week.
Here’s the catch. When I got to work on Wednesday (at 4:45 in the morning, the greatest challenge of ship days, in my opinion) I found out that they were short on bartenders, so instead of training and getting back that night, I’d be going all the way to Fairbanks, staying over, and coming back working the next day. Which made 6 days of work in a row. It also meant that I had to improvise on toothbrush and pajamas that night. I ended up rooming with Sarah, the bartender I’d trained with a few days earlier, and she was helpful on both counts. She and I also did a bit of yoga with a server who was staying in a room nearby, a boy with a long red pony tail and sweet demeanor, named Tomas.
Funny tidbit: Sarah kept describing me as “shy” and “timid.” I’m always amused when that is someone’s first impression of me, though it has stopped shocking me. I tend to be rather quiet and introverted for the first few days or weeks that I am in a brand new social landscape. I like to take it in and get the lay of the land before I decide how much of myself to share, and which aspects. But oh the cognitive dissonance. Quiet, shy Shana. :D
At this point, those 6 days have turned into something of a blur. The first run I was paired with a rail guide named Debbie. She’s about my parents’ age, and from New Jersey, and had the accent to go with it. We got along well. Most of that run was devoted to trying to figure out where everything is on the train, what sorts of duties I’m supposed to do and in what order, and just sort of figuring things out. Wednesday was a really long day, but went all right. Thursday was absolutely out of control. I had passengers for the first two legs (each leg is around 4 hours, and includes one meal). I am fairly certain I wouldn’t have made it if I’d had passengers for all 3. I was serving drinks constantly, without breaks. We had some impatient and whiney drinkers, and some who were good-natured, but still thirsty and rowdy. By 4pm, I had missed employee lunch completely, had been on my feet, running around for 8 hours, was hot and hungry and exhausted, had been hit on by an obnoxious dirty old man from Massachusetts, who wanted to get his wife drunk because she wasn’t having enough sex with him, and felt like I was nearly going to faint. I spent the next few hours trying to make sense of my cash register and cleaning up. That was also the day my cash ended up short, so on top of all the other challenges of the day (including cutting myself while trying to produce more lime garnishes) I had to take $16 out of my tips to fix that. Needless to say, I was not thrilled by the prospect of needing to get up at 5 the next morning, walk back to the railyard and do it all again. Four more times.
The second run also had plenty of challenges and frustrations. I felt more like I knew what I was doing, but I still made some mistakes that made my life more difficult. I also had to work with full cars all of both days, and I was tired to begin with. I got my own room at the BVI, and was excited about the privacy and chance to relax, but I was unable to get any sleep Friday night. So I was extremely cranky and concerned about facing my life the next day, with three days still to go. Saturday we also had completely full cars throughout the train for the last 8 hours, which meant there was no place for me to sit down at all. I served a LOT of coffee in the dome and wine for diners downstairs, neither of which I make any tips on. But I survived to serve another day. Or two.
Two different people on that trip asked me for milk. I was surprised by their request, though it turns out we do have milk on board, downstairs, and they were both surprised when I asked them to pay for it. Also, one Indian woman asked me-- mostly by waving it at me and looking sad, to microwave popcorn she had brought on board for her. It was the middle of dinner service, the kitchen was a place of bustling chaos, I didn’t even know where the microwave was, I strongly suspected her family wasn’t going to tip me, but against my better judgment, I did it. They did not tip. They did drink a lot of free coffee, though. And some milk.
Saturday night I was back in my apartment in Anchorage. It was empty when I got here. I was hungry, but too incoherently tired to do much of anything about it. I decided to heat up and eat a can of black beans. The problem is that we don’t really have a can opener. Blair has a Swiss Army knife he’d left on the counter, which has a camping opener, which I had never used before. I hacked at the can for a while, spilling bean juice on my uniform shirt which I was, for some reason, still wearing when I began making food for myself, and eventually got it open to the extent that I could get my beans out. Zack and Blair made fun of me about it yesterday though, saying it looked like Wolverine had attacked the can.
I collapsed into bed for a short while after the Bean Incident, but then I heard quiet chattering and giggling. Nicole, Hope, Caitlin and Blair had all returned from their day off, which they had spent at a music festival (lucky twerps), and were having a slumber party here, on Blair’s king-size mattress because they were all accompanying me at work the next morning. I hadn’t yet spent any time with any of them, because our schedules had been opposites, so I got up and joined them. I regaled them with some ridiculous tales from the past 4 days, hysterically and deliriously laugh-crying my way through them. We got about 4 hours of sleep, but I think the chance to talk and laugh about my experience, and get a little sympathy, and see some familiar friendly faces, was worth the trade-off of a slightly more insufficient night of sleep.
By my third run, I basically felt like I had gotten the hang of it. There is still certainly a great deal I can work on, improve and fine tune. But I think I understand the basic mechanics and procedures and schedule of the job now. I had a lot of nice passengers who were pleasant to chat with, but who did not order many drinks, and thus did not produce much profit for me. As far as I’m concerned, this is somewhat secondary. I did come out here hoping to make a great heap of money, so I could spend the rest of the year having guilt- and employment-free adventures and traveling. I don’t know yet how feasible this will be. However, I know I don’t like to be too hung up on money. I’d rather enjoy the experience, and genuinely connect with people, instead of calculating how much they might be worth to me.
My favorite part of my last run was meeting this family that belongs to a mechanic of Alaska Railroad (ARR for short, :D ). There was a little girl whose 7th birthday was yesterday, and her little brother Lyle, who was 4, and their mother. I made them all some smoothies, and brought them juice and coffee, and chatted with the kids a few times. Apparently the mom appreciated it, because she tipped me over 50% on their bill. I hope I see them again, riding the train to visit their dad who’s stationed in Fairbanks for the summer, not because of the tip (though that was nice), but because they were adorable, and I enjoyed talking to them.
I also stayed up past my bedtime on Sunday to watch the end of the Tony’s on TV at the BVI. I do so adore the Tony’s.
Thankfully, I got a couple of dead legs on this run—dinner going north, and breakfast coming south. I maximized the utility of both—by sleeping. And I survived this grueling test of endurance, and now I have a couple days off. And it looks like I’ll be on a more reasonable schedule for the next week or two. But now I know…I can do anything! I’m thinking about testing this theory further, by staying in Alaska for the winter as well. And swimming in some glacial rivers. We’ll see.
Disclaimer: In case this came across as an incessant bout of whining, I'd have it known that I'm pretty sure I like this job. I'd prefer not to work in such extreme bursts, and it would have been nice to ease into it a bit slower, but I think they like the trial-by-fire technique, and it seems to work well enough. Now I know I can withstand basically whatever they send at me. I'm excited about getting better at it, and I think I'll enjoy doing this more than most other things I could have spent my summer working at. I don't know yet if I'll come back for more next year, repeating experiences generally isn't my style, but I expect I'll be able to apply what I learn to other stuff I'll do in the future, like working more typical bartending gigs, or...you know, other things.
Monday, June 6, 2011
A New Beginning - Welcome to Alaska!
Hello world! I'm back and ready for more adventures.
Last Sunday, May 29 2011 I graduated from Brown University with a Bachelor's degree in Literary Arts. I'm as surprised as anyone that I actually made it through to the end and got handed a diploma. I was pretty sure I'd find a less conventional way to finish, or not finish, but I got swept up in the moment and forgot to thumb my nose at the proceedings. I don't mind. I had a glorious and strange, tumultuous, complicated and beautiful four years, learned and changed a great deal, more outside the classroom than in, but both were involved, and Commencement was as good a way to cap it off as any. Better than most, I imagine.
I had a day or so to finish packing my room up and transition, and by Tuesday night (5/31) I had arrived in Anchorage and found my new home. I'll be living here until the end of September, working as a bartender for Holland America/Princess (HAP for short) Alaska Rail Services.
"What does this mean?" you may well ask. Let me explain. Two cruise lines that have a bunch of ships up here decided to join forces and allow passengers to extend their trips with various wilderness adventure and "land tour" options, including the chance to ride from Anchorage up to Denali National Park or farther up to Fairbanks (or back down south) on luxury glass-domed scenic tourist trains. I had the good fortune to score a gig working on the upper level of one of these trains for the duration of the season.
Two of my old friends from Portland, Hope and Nicole, worked on the train last summer as food servers, and told me about it. They are both back this year. They live with Hope's aunt about 40 minutes outside of Anchorage in a town called Wasilla. However, they set me up to room with a friend of theirs named Blair. Blair found a house for me and two other "train people," (Zack, who's awesome, and Debbie, whom I still haven't met) so all I had to do was show up, shell out tons of money for rent and food and getting situated, go through two quick days of training, and get started.
I went out for my first practice "run" this past weekend. I was assigned along with fellow trainee John to shadow a more experienced bartender named Alex. The way it worked:
Saturday, 4:45 am - Woke up, groggy and cranky. Got into the shower. After 5 minutes, the water stopped coming out of the shower head. I've found out since, from Blair and Zack that there is a way to make it start again, but I didn't know that then. So my shower was done. Got dressed, packed my backpack, grabbed a piece of bread to munch on the road, and set out.
5:30-6:05 - Walked 1.6 miles to the railway depot.
6:05-6:15 - Changed into my uniform. Swiped in and got on the train.
6:15am - 9:15pm - At work. This meant, variably: preparing for customers, hanging out and looking at scenery on an empty car (because for some reason the bosses assigned us to shadow someone who had a "dead car" for the first 2/3 of the trip), switching to a car in the care of Sarah, a non-drinking, 26-year-old Mormon from Louisiana, listening to Steve the rail guide narrate and describe the area around us, schmoozing and chatting with passengers, and helping to mix, serve, bus and ring in drinks. I also ate hot lasagna train lunch around 2pm.
9:15-11pm - Loaded onto a bus and went to the local supermarket/superstore "Fred Meyer" to buy dinner food. Then got back on the bus and was driven to the Fairbanks Best Value Inn, or the BVI as it is not-so-affectionately known. Most train employees hate the place because it's not very nice, but I had my own room, and a TV and a better shower than I have in Anchorage, so I didn't mind. I've stayed worse places. I decompressed for a bit, mostly watching That 70's Show repeats, and went to sleep.
Sunday, 5:20am - Woke up and got ready for the return journey.
I was again on the clock from 6am until 9:15 or 9:30 at night. I walked homewards with four other train people, and arrived at home around 10:30. Miraculously, Zack had just finished making dinner and invited me to partake. I already love living with him. :)
Some first impressions: the days are long. Obviously. The mornings are early, and I was tired and very hungry when there were still hours to go in any direction. This run also was extremely easy and laid-back compared to how I've heard it can be sometimes, and I was just learning and helping, rather than serving a whole train car of people myself, so I can only imagine how tired (and hungry, and foot-sore, and burnt out on people-time) I will be when I have to do this all alone. At the same time, the scenery is incredible and beautiful. There are kabillions of trees. Aside from those, the world here is all mountains and huge wide open sky with bounteous and lovely clouds and perfect streams.
Another major perk: wildlife. In my 17+ years of living in Maine, I never managed to see a moose. On my first day on the train, I saw 4. I missed a couple other people saw too. Yesterday I saw a great horned owl in her nest with her almost-grown baby and a bald eagle with a fish grasped in its talons. Haven't seen any bears yet, but I expect that I will.
There's lots more to say, particularly about my sudden plunge into some form of real life adulthood and how I'm coping with that, and I have words about sunlight in Alaska as well, but I'll save all that for my next post.
(6/6/11)
Last Sunday, May 29 2011 I graduated from Brown University with a Bachelor's degree in Literary Arts. I'm as surprised as anyone that I actually made it through to the end and got handed a diploma. I was pretty sure I'd find a less conventional way to finish, or not finish, but I got swept up in the moment and forgot to thumb my nose at the proceedings. I don't mind. I had a glorious and strange, tumultuous, complicated and beautiful four years, learned and changed a great deal, more outside the classroom than in, but both were involved, and Commencement was as good a way to cap it off as any. Better than most, I imagine.
I had a day or so to finish packing my room up and transition, and by Tuesday night (5/31) I had arrived in Anchorage and found my new home. I'll be living here until the end of September, working as a bartender for Holland America/Princess (HAP for short) Alaska Rail Services.
"What does this mean?" you may well ask. Let me explain. Two cruise lines that have a bunch of ships up here decided to join forces and allow passengers to extend their trips with various wilderness adventure and "land tour" options, including the chance to ride from Anchorage up to Denali National Park or farther up to Fairbanks (or back down south) on luxury glass-domed scenic tourist trains. I had the good fortune to score a gig working on the upper level of one of these trains for the duration of the season.
Two of my old friends from Portland, Hope and Nicole, worked on the train last summer as food servers, and told me about it. They are both back this year. They live with Hope's aunt about 40 minutes outside of Anchorage in a town called Wasilla. However, they set me up to room with a friend of theirs named Blair. Blair found a house for me and two other "train people," (Zack, who's awesome, and Debbie, whom I still haven't met) so all I had to do was show up, shell out tons of money for rent and food and getting situated, go through two quick days of training, and get started.
I went out for my first practice "run" this past weekend. I was assigned along with fellow trainee John to shadow a more experienced bartender named Alex. The way it worked:
Saturday, 4:45 am - Woke up, groggy and cranky. Got into the shower. After 5 minutes, the water stopped coming out of the shower head. I've found out since, from Blair and Zack that there is a way to make it start again, but I didn't know that then. So my shower was done. Got dressed, packed my backpack, grabbed a piece of bread to munch on the road, and set out.
5:30-6:05 - Walked 1.6 miles to the railway depot.
6:05-6:15 - Changed into my uniform. Swiped in and got on the train.
6:15am - 9:15pm - At work. This meant, variably: preparing for customers, hanging out and looking at scenery on an empty car (because for some reason the bosses assigned us to shadow someone who had a "dead car" for the first 2/3 of the trip), switching to a car in the care of Sarah, a non-drinking, 26-year-old Mormon from Louisiana, listening to Steve the rail guide narrate and describe the area around us, schmoozing and chatting with passengers, and helping to mix, serve, bus and ring in drinks. I also ate hot lasagna train lunch around 2pm.
9:15-11pm - Loaded onto a bus and went to the local supermarket/superstore "Fred Meyer" to buy dinner food. Then got back on the bus and was driven to the Fairbanks Best Value Inn, or the BVI as it is not-so-affectionately known. Most train employees hate the place because it's not very nice, but I had my own room, and a TV and a better shower than I have in Anchorage, so I didn't mind. I've stayed worse places. I decompressed for a bit, mostly watching That 70's Show repeats, and went to sleep.
Sunday, 5:20am - Woke up and got ready for the return journey.
I was again on the clock from 6am until 9:15 or 9:30 at night. I walked homewards with four other train people, and arrived at home around 10:30. Miraculously, Zack had just finished making dinner and invited me to partake. I already love living with him. :)
Some first impressions: the days are long. Obviously. The mornings are early, and I was tired and very hungry when there were still hours to go in any direction. This run also was extremely easy and laid-back compared to how I've heard it can be sometimes, and I was just learning and helping, rather than serving a whole train car of people myself, so I can only imagine how tired (and hungry, and foot-sore, and burnt out on people-time) I will be when I have to do this all alone. At the same time, the scenery is incredible and beautiful. There are kabillions of trees. Aside from those, the world here is all mountains and huge wide open sky with bounteous and lovely clouds and perfect streams.
Another major perk: wildlife. In my 17+ years of living in Maine, I never managed to see a moose. On my first day on the train, I saw 4. I missed a couple other people saw too. Yesterday I saw a great horned owl in her nest with her almost-grown baby and a bald eagle with a fish grasped in its talons. Haven't seen any bears yet, but I expect that I will.
There's lots more to say, particularly about my sudden plunge into some form of real life adulthood and how I'm coping with that, and I have words about sunlight in Alaska as well, but I'll save all that for my next post.
(6/6/11)
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