2nd week..

today im working A shift. 7am to 3pm! i slept at 11+pm, and woke up at 5.20am. wah been long since I slept like this. jialat man. i was dozing off while standing too.. haha.. aircon is fixed today, so it was super cold. haha.. i had to walk in and out to the porch to keep warm. morning shift was very mundane, not much to do, and ive learnt most of the procedures at the bell counter. It's just the information part at the concierge I have to keep on absorbing. keep on finding out and be on the ball. =)

sleepy day today. phew. off to bed! 7am-3pm tmr! =\ gd nite!

5th & 6th day..

5th day of work, i've learnt about more of the concierge hierarchy. My chief concierge taught me more about who does what and what is what at the concierge.

Basically, the breakdown is as follows:

Pageboy/Mailboy - Delivers msgs & pages for ppl
Doorman - Opens doors of cars and hotel, helps carry bags too
Porter - carries bags to bell counter
Bellman - sends bags up to guest rooms
Bell captain - supervises bellman and takes orders from concierge
Concierge - information and services
Assistant concierge - above all besides chief concierge
Chief Concierge - points fingers and things get done.[but a good chief concierge leads by example too]

And I've realised that, we at Gallery Hotel are multi-tasking. We are one and all. One full-time staff per shift, performing ALL these duties mentioned above. wah. tough man.

6th day.. was a very Indian day! We had lots of Indian customers. 4 families of Indians together in a group. and then another group after that. I refuse to believe that Indians are rude and arrogant, its stereotyping. but these group of them were quite arrogant. Anyway, they pissed off the concierge ppl with their requests and instructions, and then pissed off the front desk for some reason, and pissed off the concierge again for change of plans. haha what a day.

btw, I learnt how to stack 25bags into 1 luggage trolley. my god. they had 25 big and small bags for 4 families. I did checking in for them at concierge, which involves bringing their bags up to the guest room. I almost died. I took 5 heavy bags up for my trip, lugged them into the room and left. After that they called and asked to transfer room. I had to go up again, take out the 5 heavy bags, and transfer them to the other room. wah piang. after that, when i reached downstairs, they called to request for newspaper, and we had to send up once more. zzz. but its an experience nevertheless. =)

good to learn!

4th day at work..

Today is yet another day of training at the concierge. Meeting more types of ppl now.. haha.. there are rude ppl, ppl who dun even acknowledge u.. and stuff like tat..

sometimes ppl will walk by and just say call me a taxi, without even looking at u.. my colleague whispered jokingly, " You taxi." Get the joke? haha..

I dealt with some chinese guests from China today. MY GOD. Their accent and speed of talking was so fast, I was just trying to understand what they were saying. After that I have to try to give them answers in my poor Chinese. haha.. but it was a challenge yeah.

I'm one who is usually afraid to deal things with external parties, such as calling them up to enquire. but in this situation I had no choice, for they were asking for information, and I could not tell them so I had to call up the company to enquire. It's a good experience and chance to come out of my shell.. haha..

I'm actually impressed with myself for at least being able to help them with my poor chinese.. I was afraid they wld get impatient and stuff.. but they even thanked us and apologised for taking up so much of our time. I felt good to be of help to them.

I was lucky uncle Yak came to my rescue after his dinner break, haha.. He speaks chinese way better than I do, and he took over explaining to them.. haha.. an eventful 4th day of work. TMR I"M OFF!!! YAY!!

3rd day of work..

Today has started to get abit mundane. Not so much to learn as of concierge, except for gathering information about everything and anything. It's still fun to meet guests and talk to them though. =) oh and i saw some guests on monday checking in, and today they are checking out.. so cool. =)

So the highlight for today is... going out with uncle Foong the driver on the Gallery shuttle bus for a routine trip, and delivering a letter to a certain company too. So now i know where uncle Foong drives to and stops at for the various destinations. like, outram park.. wisma atria.. chinatown point.. great world and places nearby.. and the delivery of the letter, i had to find the place and give them the letter, in turn for a cheque. heh heh, good experience. I feel like a postman.

Another highlight of the day wld be meeting my Front Office Manager for some training. Ms Susan Lim, my FOM, taught us more about the Hotel Information System and how to use it. It's basically a system just below Fidelio. very chim to me, cos alot of things to remb and take note. I have to memorise the rooming list now, and lots more. INFORMATION OVERLOAD!!

Guess what, she will be testing us real soon. Friday or smth, but i'm off on Friday. ah well, see how. I hope i pass the "test", cos i dont wanna be giving a sloppy impression. I wanna show tat hey, I'm serious about learning and working here!

But for now, i'm still very blur abt alot of stuff. takes time i guess! signing off! cya! btw, im very tired today. haha ciaoz.. =)

2nd day at work!

Today is my second day at work. I started the day badly, oh so familiar. But I ended the day very well! I feel that SIP@Gallery may just be my medicine and direction for finding myself! The experience these two days so far has influenced me and motivated me so much more then I can motivate myself. Fun I have had too, working in the concierge department.

I feel that I am more open now, more able to talk to strangers, in this case, guests. I have more confidence in talking to them, although I still tend to be abit shy. But I believe that will change with time and experience.

I feel good and enjoy working in Gallery Hotel because they have a very cool corporate culture in my opinion, and I want to share it with you. The staff at Gallery are very friendly, they smile at you even if they don't know you! The staff here knows almost everybody within the hotel too! They can strike a conversation with almost any other hotel staff they see. I admire that friendliness and homeliness here. And also, they don't mind going out of their way to help others, including me as a trainee! If they were to knock off at 5pm, they still wounldn't mind staying around to help out if they are free[some of them la]. Gallery is only a 4-star Hotel, but the staff put so much effort into providing good service, it is such a nice feel i get here. I myself get inspired by the actions and behavior of my colleagues. I really hope to learn as much as I can here at Gallery, for it is after all a different environment from other hotels.

One more thing I like about concierge department is the teamwork they portray, never failing to help each other out. Even tips received are pooled in a cash box, to be split at the end of the shift. I feel that this promotes teamwork and unity, along with a sense of togetherness. I feel good working in concierge.

cheers guys, now it's time for bed. working 11am-7pm tomorrow at concierge again. learning never stops here. =)

First day of work!

23rd May today, the start of my 5 month long internship attachment at Gallery Hotel. It is a very nice place, and I like the way things are going so far! The people here are quite friendly in general, and I like the way everyone helps one another to do things. I like even more the way they talk to guests, so polite and friendly, like they know the guest in person!

So Brian, Christina and I met up at about 8.30am outside Gallery Hotel to get changed to our uniform and report at 9am at the front office. We got in, collected our uniforms[mine is F24, remember ah fagan!], changed and reported for work. We still had to exchange our I/C for a visitor pass today, because we have not received our staff pass yet.[grr.]

So we were given each a Fact Sheet about Gallery Hotel. Gosh it was thick man! Alot of things to remember by hard, I guess it will take time. We were then approached by the Senior Guest Services Manager, Rizwan, for our short briefing and introduction. All is well so far.

We proceeded to tour the hotel, on a short orientation. There are facilities such as:
Business Centre
Concierge
Swimming Pool
Inter-Fitness Gym
Royal Thai Spa(Ayuthaya)
Retail Outlet(Mercy Xchange)
Art and Photography Galleries
(Gira Soleil, Ruamrudee Gallery, Mercy Relief Gallery and Mabel Lee Photography)
Zenden Restaurant & Lounge
Ode Cafe
Bar 84
Cocco Latte
Moloko Cafe & Bar
The Liquid Room & Sound Bar
Sky Oasis Poolside Bar
Japanese Ramen Restaurant
Eu la la Mediterranean Restaurant(renovation)
4 different function rooms

Five different types of rooms:
Gallery
Glazzhaus
Bookend Club
Observatory Suite
Executive Studio

It's really interesting and cool this hotel.[I just wanted to type all that above.] =)

Lunch break was at 11am, for 45mins. Went to the staff canteen, rice and 3 diff dishes buffet style! Returned after lunch to join the concierge, where I will be working for the rest of this week.

Concierge is really fun. It is defined as additional services to the guests after check-in. Basically we multi-task and do ALOT of different duties. We do doorman duties[open car door], bellhop duties[carry bags], concierge duties[answer their queries], postman duties[deliver msgs and items to rooms], deliver their luggage and/or escort guests up to their room, and much more.

Basically I learnt today that to be working in concierge, I have to be VERY knowledgeable and able to talk to ppl easily. That I need to improve and keep learning. I believe SIP@Gallery will help me with my punctuality too!

I am very motivated by some of the staff here already, on my 1st day. They are very helpful, smart workers, and so friendly to guests. They have guided me along alot too. I would feel good too if I was a guest. This behavior of theirs motivates me strongly to behave like them. I feel so mature working around them. Guess the lil' boy in me has to go! haha.. I admire the positive attitude and manner that guests are treated, and will strive to be likewise!

Recommendation tat I could make wld be to do something about the small book lounge on level 5. It is free for guests to roam and read there, with a small selection of books. The selection is small because, guests usually take the books with them. haha.. so there could be a way to take care of the books and make sure they don't disappear!

Reflection would be that my own bus guide is very helpful for me and concierge too. I could bring it to work and use it in conjunction with the street directory they have there. It would compliment each other when needed. Adding my own knowledge and help to the arsenal of information at the concierge. HEHE..

That's all I will say, i'm tired and information overload! Working 1pm-9pm tmr.. rest time! gd nite. =)

last week of hols!

I'm into the last week of my hols. SIP is starting on Monday. oh man.

And I don't even know what time to report and what to do yet! I better go check it out. If I'm not wrong, I gotta report at the HR Dept, 9am. In my uniform. oh dear.

SIP.

Uniform Fitting

This is my new internship blog. I will be posting here on details regarding SIP@gallery.

Well, so I went down to Gallery for my uniform fitting. Somehow, gallery looks quite slack. I'll find out in awhile. I might be in for a rude awakening. Anyway, i tried the uniform, its black short sleeve shirt and grey pants.[Abit gay.]

The sleeve is super short! So I bargained to take one size bigger. [phew.]
At least I look a lil' less gay. [shh, dun tell em!]

Anyway, current thoughts? [I dread SIP.]
Why? [6day workweek? Crap.]
Hoping to enjoy it. =)

Positive attitude & positive focusing. =)

Whatever tomorrow brings I'll be there.
With open arms and open eyes.