08/03/17

So last week and this week couldn't be any more different. We had a 'boat race' (it's where you down your drinks, Nan) and played a game of celebrities with our guests. This week we have to come out for mid-service shots and slap them in the face with cheese.

In my last post I said about that guest who owed us a favor? Well we turned them into masterchefs and made the favor helping us with desserts and it went from just having Will helping us to having Ollie and Will helping us (and we got a cheeky cheeseboard from them too). Cheers guys, our heroes. Photos to follow.

So this week, I can't see anyone coming in the kitchen to help with any courses becuase they just come in the kitchen just to snort icing sugar off the sides (literally icing sugar, it's hilarious). Polishing off an impressive 30-40 bottles of wine a night between 21 of them, not even mad, just very, very impressed.

So of course, that amount of wine consumtion means that there are lots of drunk antics, I can't say I've ever been around so many naked people in my life...not even in the chalet; down our local too. Fully nude. Dancing on the tables. Dancing on the poles. Just. So. Much. Naked. It also means they chase Louise trying to get her teenage blood for eternal youth or something. It also means that I have to clean sick from THE WHOLE BATHROOM (how did they even manage that, like HOW?!). Not so much a drunk antic, bt they made a megabed too (5 beds pushed together) solid effort team.

Me and the bathroom of doom

A passed out guest and the Megabed

I feel like I'm Jordan in Wolf Of Wallstreet every time I have to tell them something, or doing my welcome speech.

So being with these bad influences means that y'know, maybe I can't handle my drink as well as I'd like to say (blame the altitude). Shoutout to my resort manager or walking me home after I died on Sunday night haha.

The only thing getting us through this week (apart from the mid-service shots) is listening to Natasha Bedingfield on repeat in the mornings. But you know what they say, if you can't beat them; join them.

The Good, The Bad and the Damn Right Painful

28/02/2017

An update from the alps!

The Good

After a somewhat rocky start to the season, for the chalet and our team, we've started to get on track. We're finishing by 11am in the mornings and 10pm at nights meaning prime time on the slopes or wasting time in the hot tub and sauna. We've been getting some great feedback from guests like 10/10 reviews which is amazing. It's wicked to get some comments like "Becca made our holiday" and "was the life of the chalet". So good news on the work front!

It has just started snowing which is great because it's not all the reassuring when you're skiing and you can see lumps of grass and the piste is a mogul field, so over the next few days we're expecting 120cm of snow, yaaaaaaas!

We also got free cheese on the slopes the other day.

(me at the free cheese place) 

The Bad

On the news of our great feedback we also got one saying "out of 40 ski holidays this was the 2nd worse"which I am horrified/slightly proud about from week one.

Me and Louise thought it would be a good idea to slide down a (not so) snowy hill as a shortcut, of course I got impaled by a stick resulting in my saladpets getting demolished and practically ripped in half. D'oh! (pictures to follow)

I can't really complain about our accom, we live in a bit room in the top of our chalet. I can't really complain about the wifi either because compared to most we have god wifi, but oh man this wifi is the bane of my life. So I see this ski jacket on ebay and I fall in love with it. Even better; there's a matching pair of saladpets. The best part is, with about 10 minutes left on the bidding, they're only $10 (inc P&P). So I manage to get these saladpets for $10, amazing. They're an obnoxious blue, purple starry black mess but go PERFECT with the jacket. So I go to bid on the jacket and oh, the wifi stops working. So not only do I get lumbered with these completely unmatchable saladpets I lose the bidding for a $5 ski jacket. RAGGEEEE.

Tuesday night is our night of freedom (day off on Wednesday, yasss) so we brought tickets to a commdy night  at our haunt, something new to do and hanging out with some friends. Perfect! But I should've known it was all going to go wrong when I had to YOLO taking off snow chains after realising that there wasn't any snow,but slippery, icey slush instead meaning that my wheels were going everywhere on this mountain side, my patience has gone but who knows where and I'm like I AM THIS CLOSE TO TURNING THIS CAR AROUND. From icey hillstarts and wheels giving way and sliding across the road and swearing at everyone/thing/opportunity we finally got there, only with blood pressure much higher than when we started. So naturally we stroll up to the door only to realise THE DOOR IS LOCKED. The door to the venue we were just on this 45 minute crusade up a mountain in a snowstorm through the ice IS LOCKED. So of course, if nothing else made me give up that did. We got in the van and left. Moral of the story: Don't be the driver in your chalet, the only perk is seeing the malamute in the mornings sometimes outside the hire shop.

The Damn Right Painful

This week the Pascale chalet team have taken up snowboarding. Similar to surfing, and wakeboarding (which I love but I will never pretend I am good at) so I was buzzing to get started, brought myself some protection and ready to hit the slopes (with my broken saladpets). So day 1 included a lot of falling. A lot of falling. But me and Louise, despite her constant threats of having a breakdown, made it down some red slopes and nailed this falling leave mumbo jumbo. Needless to say, it's been a while since my butt has been in this much pain. I am covered in bruises but I absolutely love it. Unlike skiing which I feel is more of a thing to do I really look forwards to getting out on my board, plus I just want to be 1000x better than Joel so I'm gonna put the hours in.

And The Hilarious Pear Incident 

So, once a week we do a poached pear in a red wine sauce with Brandy Snaps and cinnamon cream (sounds nice, right?). The taste? Delicious. The look? It's a tough one to make look appealing when a flaccid pear looks a little bit like...well...SOOOOO this week we have a big group of 7 people in their mid 20's (they're a great bunch, they got drunk and wanted an orange so we made them sign a contract for it and everything) and Louise is doing the weekly job of taking the desserts out whilst I plate up, I then hear a roar of laughter coming from the table and damn, this group were LOVING their pears. Not the taste though.We then get all 18 faces staring at the door with anticipation for the next one. Louise takes out a bowl and BOOM eruption of laughter. This went on for 18 desserts. And there's me in the kitchen trying to plate them up as nicely as I can through tears. Maybe it was one of those "you had to be there" moments but wow, never thought I'd see so many adults chucking away, unable to breathe, because of a poached pear. It makes me think that maybe I'm not adulting so bad after all..

23/02/2017

Mid-season party!

Of course, not that it's mid season for me but if it involves a day out I can pretend.

All the staff from across (most of) the alps all went to Lake Annecy for a day of exploring, rounders and, of course, drinking. Starting early with everyone on the coach drinking at 9.30am and having the best driver ever, Stefan, blaring Techno full blast. Great place to visit and a nice day out from the ever exciting Peisey.

21/02/17

and I know when that hot tub bling 

that can only mean one thing 

19/02/17 

Another beautiful few days in the Alps. It's hitting about 13 degrees at the moment so all our snow is on the go. But after a fab week with some great guests it's really positive to look forwards to the next week.Food presentation is getting there too, so this week should be posting a few more piccys of the plates we've been serving. 

Week 3 highlights: 

-Being crowdsurfed (but not made to dry hump the ceiling) 

-Dying on my way down a red slope

- Being taught some more french 

- Deep cleaning the whole chalet (syke) 

10/02/17

Another whirlwind week over in the alps! Been a bit busy thus no post but here's a bit to fill you in on;

Skiing!

I'm on a ski season so what everyone wants to know is probably how my skiing is going and well, let's put it this way; I'm still alive.

So skiing hurts. My legs feel like jelly 50% of the time the other 50% like boulders. Heavy, rocky boulders. And I tell you what, if I don't look like Beyonce by the end of season I want my money back. I am covered in bruises across my knees and my butt.
Sometimes I don't ski though, I have to make do with sliding down slopes on my bum at the speed of light, almost falling off the mountain and getting snow sprayed up my nose. Would be more fun if it wasn't so terrifying. I have only taken out one child so far, so that's a win for me, maybe not for little Marie or whoever she is (she should've probs been in school anyway).

Jokes aside, I am tackling red slopes now (Green, Blue, Red, Black etc) and on day 6 I'm pretty happy with that. I'm getting better on my speed, purely because I'm seeing all the kids off school this week whizzing past me at 90kph and I'm Grandma Becca snow plowing the whole way.

Nightlife (or lack of) 

Our local is effectively a pub with a pool table and pole. Owned by the complete legend who is Gregg*. Similarly to my local in Tenerife there is usually only about 8 people in there. We have had a couple of good nights there, me and my partner in crime, Louise. Our favourite venture out of the chalet is on a Wednesday night (so in a few hours time) we will be heading up to band night (y'know, the dry humping the ceiling rig). Throwing 16 year old guests in the air to crowdsurf or having the band play some Sum 41. Time to get on some Jelly Bean (aka Genopi).


Life in France

Running down to the local bakery to pick up the baguettes in the morning, pretty french right? Although I speak no more French than what I did 3 weeks ago I am trying to pick up some new phrases here and there. Most of it seems to have been pushed out of my brain as I learnt a bit of Spanish last year. I suppose that isn't always a bad thing though as most of the French I know I shouldn't really be using in conversation anyway.

We're not always skiing, or drinking! ($5 for a bottle of Fanta too, oh good lord someone pass the tap water) Last Wednesday for our day off we went up to the Rodeo Park and went on the toboggans. Fair to say, like everything else snow related, I was awful and resulting in everyone waiting down the bottom for me for about 10 minutes. I still have no idea how to steer the thing and I'm just gutted that I was worse in real life at Mario Kart than I am at it on Nintendo DS.

Work

The best part about being out here...of course.
Back in good old 2007 a video came out called Charlie The Unicorn (for anyone who hasn't seen it you can click here) and after reminiscing about the good old days of the internet (A WHOLE DECADE AGO?!) we decided that me and Louise are just like the annoying unicorns constantly pestering our boss man Archie. Just to give you an idea of how it is for us to all work together.
This week our Chalet Chef, Joel, was off sick so it meant that me and Louise ditched the marigolds (part-time) and put our aprons on and bossed the cooking. Louise did a better job than me on prepping the food after my flop of honeycomb, but together we finally made it. Great thing to have people actually taking picture of your grub and sending it to other people.

One of my jobs at the chalet is to drive the van. So after learning how to deal with snowchains and driving in the ice and slush I finally got there, and of course ruined all my hard work learning by driving on the wrong side of the road. Dangit!
The job itself involves loads of cleaning, something I am very good at (not). Although it's not as gritty as my farm work back in 2015, it's never great finding condom wrappers in guests rooms before 10am.

I have been getting on with the job though, you'll be pleased to know and getting some good guest feedback! Although I do get nagged quite a lot by Archie the Unicorn but mostly for eating all the cake mix becuase he doesn't want me going off sick because of the raw eggs.

*Gregg, from Gregg's bar has been teaching me French and it's really tough to get their RUGHH sound without sounding like you're flemming hardcore.

P.S Duncan told me to give him a shoutout or say he's great or something and he said he'll read it so here it is.

"Sir Issac Newton, he's the one who had the apple fall on his head?"
"No, that's Adam and Eve"

....
These guys.

"might treat myself and put some makeup on....a bit of mascara...a bit of vaseline on my lips...."
- Louise 23:10 07/02/17

6/2/2017

I finally hit the slopes today!

My body aches.

And I only managed to get myself lodged in about 1.5m of snow off piste twice.

Winning!

05/02/2017

Week one- done! 

**

So my first week is finally completed after washing what feels like 1000 dishes, making 1000 beds and eating about 1000 cakes. It's been going really well, if you ignore the three times yesterday that I accidentally turned the showers on myself when trying to clean them. 

This week I haven't gone to ski yet, partially because I had no lift pass, partially because there's no snow, partially because I hate the cold. But with about 40cm of snow fallen from last night and my pass all sorted today and with Louise (newest addition to the Peisey team!) here I'll be hitting the slopes this week. It has given me time to do other things though, make the most of the in-house sauna, the hot tub in the garden, have an explore of the local area and meet up with Sophie and James who I did my farm work with back in 2015! From Australia to the Alps. It turns out that they are just other the end of the Vanoise Express (the big cable car from their town to mine) and only take 20 minutes to get here. Just goes to show that after travelling you've got friends everywhere! 

It was my birthday this week and with a beautiful 19 hour shift the day after it was my first sober birthday since finally "adulting" a few years back; but that doesn't mean I didn't use the rest of the week (and chalet wine) to celebrate. 

Our guests this week were all from the Army and completing some ski training, really great bunch of people. On Friday they all sang to me (something I have managed to avoid since finally "adulting" a few years back) and made me a birthday card. They also all chipped in and got me some sweets, a cake and a brand new pair of ski goggles. 10/10 guys! Couldn't believe it #Blessed.

Birthday celebrations started when we went to the next resort along, Les Plagne, on Tuesday night for our day off on Wednesday. We found ourselves in Scotty's drinking their beverages of choice (some green blue beery mess thing). I've noticed that it's becoming a thing over here to go into a bar and everyone is just topless. Like, you're surrounded by snow but 50% of the people there seem to be insufficiently dressed for the weather, lets hope they left their clothes at the door. Couldn't tell you much about Tuesday night (dem blue pints) but had a great time. 

Something I always got upset about in Tenerife was that nobody ever walked home from a night out, and everyone knows that can always be the best/worst part, but it's worth the risk, right? So on Tuesday we got the best of both worlds. Straight from coming out the bar we see some fella slip over and then immediately all his mates doing the same thing; hilarious... until he doesn't get up. An hour or so later  he's in the ambulance and that drama was all sorted (he's fine btw), onto the fun part! So to get back to our accommodation* we had to walk down the ski slope. When I say walk, I mean bum slide, penguin slide, slip and slide, whatever you choose and there's about 10 of us having a Mario Kart-eske race down this slope at four in the morning. Afraid to say I didn't win, but there's many months to up my penguin slide game. 

Our most recent night excursion included us going up to Mont Blanc Bar for their weekly bandnight, never have I seen more semi naked people being forced to hump the (very low) ceiling in the pub whilst crowdsurfing  before but with it being a weekly occurrence I'm sure it'll happen a time or two (or ten) again. 

If living up a mountain surrounded by snow, being in the quietest resort for my company and paying $5 a pint (god bless chalet wine) can't stop me from rescuing my liver, then I don't know what will.

*locally known as the ghetto which is a long corridor with some cupboards with bunk beds in and the kitchen in a microwave and a kettle on the floor in the long corridor. but once we got there we just decided to be human burritos with our duvets and sleep in the van.

Times ski'd: 0

Snowmen built: 1 

Glasses broken: 7

Canapés made: 308

Bottles of wine consumed: 2 1/2 

**Please note the snowperson's eyes are beer bottle caps. Keeping it authentic, ya know. 

Happy Birthday to me!

03/02/2017

I can think of worse ways to spend my birthday than in the hot tub in the garden with these views.

1/02/17

So this is the quiet little town I'm going to be calling home for the next couple months.