Leslie Whitted:  

Life Sit down for a spell and get comfortable – this is what I’ve done over the past twenty years. 1985-worked at McDonalds in Callaway until Thanksgiving. Moved to Cocoa Beach to live with grandparents. 1986-Auditioned for Disney and was hired to dance in a parade. Moved to Orlando. 1987-Worked at Disney during Easter, summer, and winter. 1988–Worked at Disney during the Easter season. Also worked for Sheraton hotels. 1988-1990-Air Force-please click on the tab above..... 1991-Moved back to my mom's. 1992-1993-1994-1995–Attending part time college by night; worked a variety of odd jobs by day: substitute teacher, cahier at Publix, Call Center Operator, secretary, hostess at the Outback Steakhouse, receptionist at a stock broker’s office, and a summer day camp counselor for the County Parks and Recreation. Because I was always working and going out late at night, I got quite good at line dancing. I started teaching at a local country bar and had tons of fun doing that. 1995-Summer–Moved to Nashville; worked for Ticketmaster and a medical insurance office by day and the Outback Steakhouse by night. I made some good connections in the video business and then…..my car got repossessed. 1995–Fall-moved back to Orlando to stay with a friend. I needed a job that didn’t need a car. I contacted an acquaintance who worked in the cruise ship business in Port Canaveral and it led to a job with Premier Cruise Lines. I worked as a Warner Brothers costume character for 5 months until I tore up my knee and had surgery. 1996–April–Applied for and was hired by Royal Caribbean Cruise Line. Worked for over a year on the Entertainment staff. We were responsible for bingo, team trivia, pool Olympics, karaoke, line dancing, theme nights, movie nights, and other social activities. We were Vanna White and Julie McCoy all wrapped in one. I met over a thousand people a week. Traveled to the Caribbean, south Florida, the Bahamas, southern California, and Baja Mexico. It was lots of fun and I became a very “social” person!!! I did not know this side of my self!! In high school, I thought I was a social wall flower, petrified to even speak to (gasp!) cute guys!! I broke myself of that fear rather quickly! But I can say for sure I never imagined myself in this job – getting paid to socialize and travel!! In 1996 my grandmother died while I was on a break in between ships and I was able to be with my family. 1997-I joined Celebrity Cruises and went to Alaska, the California coast, and the Panama Canal, and worked in the same job as I did on Royal Caribbean. Also traveled to St. Thomas, St. John, Martinique, Antigua, Barbados, Aruba, Belize, and Honduras. 1998–Went back to my grandparents’ house and back to college. 1999–June-I got a call from a cruise line to be a Social Hostess/Onboard Wedding coordinator. Went to the Bahamas and Key West. 1999–November–Moved to Ft. Lauderdale for a job with a magazine publishing company. Job perk: cruise ship travel! I really enjoyed this job. Had two female bosses who were always arguing with each other. Realize just how much I missed being at sea full-time and how much I hated my arguing bosses. Made some phone calls to some contacts and inquired about a job I had my eye on since 1997–on a ship that went to Europe. They had 3 openings, I gave my notice, and one month later I was in Rome. 2000–October-Arrived in Rome to join Renaissance Cruise Line. Wrote, edited, and printed the daily program that announces the next day’s activities. During the day I was in front of a computer; by night myself and two other people on the staff hosted activities but not to the scale that other big ships did. Continued in the "school" section here..... please go to the "school" section...... School Continued from "Life" section..... This was on Renaissance Cruise Line with only 700 passengers – it was a 5-star luxury line that catered to Americans with money and with time to spare! Our cruises were 15-days in length and all our departures were from somewhere in Europe. After one year away, which included a short vacation at home and a 3-week stay in Amsterdam, I went to a new ship in a new job with the Tour Department. We answered questions about tours that passengers could take in all of our destinations and we sold tickets for the tours. Ninety percent of the time I was also on a tour because I would go as an ‘escort.’ I traveled to Italy, France, Spain, England, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Estonia, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Morocco, Egypt, Greece, Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria, and Ukraine. My third day back from vacation and my third day in my new job was September 11, 2001. We were in Belgium. It was surreal. We were able to complete our cruise (we were on the 10th or 11th day) but we were in limbo for about 5 days because no one could leave (all flights were cancelled) and we couldn’t send off our old passengers nor collect any new ones. People were canceling their cruises left and right. We completely understood, but we also had a business to run. It didn’t take long for our company to file bankruptcy. We finally got our passengers on planes to the U.S. By law, a bankrupt cruise ship belongs to the country where it belongs financially. In our case, France. But with our bankruptcy, nobody wanted us to dock in their port because they were afraid they wouldn’t get paid (for port fees). We floated around the Mediterranean for about 20 days until finally Gibraltar let us in. We remained in Gibraltar for another 2 weeks. It was bittersweet – we were still getting paid, we had free internet, we didn’t have to “work”, and we had no passengers! But our jobs were over and we didn’t know what we’d end up with (we got a plane tic...Expand for more