Back to Bluche

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Whitney

So after 6 intense months of being in South East Asia I am now back in Jamaica preparing to return to Bluche for my next semester.

When you go off on your internship you don’t really realize how involved you get with the place until you leave it. Cambodia was such an awesome experience and I have made many good friends who I will hopefully get to work with in the future.

I could not have asked for a better or fuller experience at La Residence d’Angkor.
As a Management Trainee I was able to move through more than one department, gaining a more complete picture of the operational areas of the hotel. I spent the bulk of my time in Food and Beverage, 1 month in Front Office, 3 weeks in Housekeeping and rounded out my time in the executive offices working with the Executive Assistant Manager. As the hotel is small and intimate, I have had the opportunity to work very closely with the managers of each department and to join the heads of department morning briefing, which has been so valuable in gaining insight into the workings of the hotel.

As one of the few foreigners at the hotel, I was able to really get to know the Khmer people. I answered a lot of questions, most about “my country” (not many people knew where Jamaica is) and I asked a lot of questions about how they live. It’s funny how little parts of their culture travel with you when you leave. I have found myself trying to thank people first in Khmer, then in French and finally, the right language for this country, English.
My last weekend there, my dear friend who worked in Malaysia came to visit and I was able to play a real tourist for a bit and then amidst tearful goodbyes I got on the plane back to Jamaica.

The holiday here at home has been too short, but so good to recharge and get ready for the fun we are all bound to have in the Kitchen next semester.

Bon voyage! to all who are returning and Bien venue! to those we will meet for the first time back in Bluche.

Whitney

Happy New 2012 & less than a week to go…

Posted on January 12, 2012 by Filippa

I have a feeling that this year is going to be awesome with lots of fun to look forward to! It started off really well with New Year celebrations in London with good friends, and in just a few days I will be on a plane to Switzerland for my third year at Les Roches, and in June it’s already time for graduation…

And who knows what’s gonna happen after that?! My goals are set high and I’m going to work for what I want really hard. As long as I put my mid to it I think everything is possible. Friends are also a very big part of my life and I can’t wait to meet new and old classmates. During my time at the Marbella campus I had the privilege of meeting people who soon became very good friends. A hand-full of them are actually transferring to Bluche at the same time as me, and knowing that makes me really happy because they are some of the kindest and funniest people in the world. I know that together with them and all the new friends I will make, we will have a fabulous year.

I know that many of you new students are probably a bit nervous (I know I was) and I’m sure that a lot of thoughts are going through your mind right now, so I thought I’d try to answer some questions I got from a soon to be HOI student.

Are you happy with your choice of Les Roches? Was it tough in the beginning with a lot of work, feeling homesick etc?

I am very happy with choosing to study at Les Roches, and although I haven’t finished my studies yet I know that I have gained a lot of experience and developed important contacts for my future career that I would never have done without the help from the school. Just remember, especially when it comes to looking for internships, that the school will push you along the way but in the end it’s what you do of it that counts. Hard work and dedication are what will bring you forward in this industry! I don’t want to lie; first week of HOI was a shock to me and I wasn’t sure if I was going to make it. As you probably know, first year is “service” and for a whole week I was in stewarding polishing glasses and cutlery. I said to my self “This can’t be what I paid all this money for, to make glassware shine?!”, but it quickly became clear that this was only a small part of my education and good things only could come from it. Today, for example, I know how hard the stewards work in restaurants and that their job is very important to the business, and not only putting dirty dishes into a dishwasher. When striving to be a Hotel Manager, you need to learn the hard way and you must know how every department of your hotel works. There will be times when you feel homesick, and the best ways to cheer up is to surround yourself with friends, Skype with family, read a good book or why not STUDY HARD… Managing time is what you will come to learn at Les Roches because otherwise you will be swamped with exams and projects in the end… I say this from experience.

You did your first internship in Sweden. Does the school find it OK that you do an internship in your homeland?

I have been traveling and living abroad for a large part of my teenage years/early twenties and because of that developed a good knowledge of English. When I was offered to do an internship at a luxury hotel in Sweden for my first year, I didn’t hesitate to take it because I knew I would gain a lot of experience from it and still not drop my level of English. I think it’s a very good opportunity for students to move to places they’ve never lived before and learn a different culture and improve the language skills. I think the school also would agree on this.

I also noticed that your internship started in June, does that mean we won’t get a summer holiday?

You have to do a minimum of five months internship although many hotel’s prefer to hire you for six. Some want the interns to start in June and other’s in mid-July. It is up to you to find out how many days off the hotel can give you if you have signed for a six months internship. The shorter summer holiday you get the longer winter holiday, and vice versa.

And one last question… How can I improve my English in order to pass the language test in first year?

Some last minute advice is that you read an English novel and perhaps write down the words you have a hard time understanding and look them up as you’ve finished the book and make sure to keep yourself updated with the latest online news.

That’s all for now folks, see you end of this week.

Stay cool and keep warm!

X Filippa

Back from midterm break!!!

Posted on October 18, 2011 by Pamela Calvas

The time has passed so fast and unfortunately I have not been able to keep up with my blogs as usual, the school really has kept us quite busy with assignments and midterm exams! I will compensate with some important information, fun stories and events at Les Roches that I have been collecting in the last few weeks for those of you who are interested in the student life at the school.

Midterm break really was a breath of fresh air allowing us to continue with school assignments and lessons. As I have stated before, the teaching system at Les Roches evaluates the performance of students in several ways and some projects require you to put all your effort and integrate the knowledge you have of all subjects. Examples of these are the so-called IP projects.

But what is IP? It stands for Integrated Project and although it is not a very popular term among first year students it is all you will hear among people from third year (H03) and postgraduate students (like me) just before the midterm break! After it has been submitted, there are only a few exams or projects left et voila! The ambiance at the school changes as everyone gets ready to leave for midterm break! Bellow just some random pictures of some of my friends after those long study hours at school haha!

Now, passing to a more interesting topic, I wanted to talk about internships. As we all know, here at Les Roches, internships should be done after the completion of a course.

Depending on the program that you are following, the school encourages you to get work experience in hospitality related establishments in order for you to apply all the techniques learned at the school into real work situations according to a specific hospitality area that draws your interest the most.

Within any hospitality related establishment there are endless opportunities for students from our school to participate, learn and get professional and life experiences which in the near future might be highly valued by an employer. Besides, you never know what abilities you are capable of and some new talents might surface as you progress in your internship.

The options are endless for you to find your new location in the world; from a 5 star hotel in a cosmopolitan city in Europe, to an exotic beach resort in Southeast Asia or even a ski resort in the mountains of Switzerland, there really are no limits as long as you keep an eye on immigration regulations and more specifically into the requirements that recruiters are looking for. You have to get informed about where you are going and a new blog post will be informing you more about it next week.

For now, I would like to share with you an interview with Johanne Fremmich, current H02 student at Les Roches who gladly agreed to give us feedback about her internship experience. We wanted to find out how involved she was with her role as a trainee at the Hotel Arts Barcelona and as you will see, the results are great and she loved her experience!

Welcome to Summer Batch!

Posted on August 15, 2011 by Pamela Calvas

Hello everyone! It has been a while since I last posted blogs and I have really missed it!

After finishing an internship in Geneva, I am returning to Les Roches in order to complete the Postgraduate Program in Hospitality (PGD II). I am positive this semester is going to be amazing for everyone and I really hope the blogs I will write will help current and prospective students to know more about the school and its activities.

First of all, I would like to give a warm welcome to everyone, although by the time this is posted it will already be week 4 … New and returning students have been arriving to Les Roches for summer batch in the last couple of weeks and there have already been a few activities going on.

One of them of course was the Swiss National day that took place on the 1st of August when most students were already on campus. We had the pleasure of seeing the parades in Crans-Montana and afterwards an amazing show of fireworks that lasted around 15 minutes, which was awesome. You could really feel the happiness of Swiss people during this day, I have made a short video about it…

After my internship in Geneva, which I will talk about in my next post, I went back to Ecuador to visit my family and friends, it was a nice break from Europe but I was actually looking forward to coming back to Blûche. Each batch, either Winter or Summer batch, enjoys a special feeling when they come back after an internship period. In the first couple of weeks, it was a feeling of excitement to see everyone again, not only your classmates but also the returning students from last summer batch in different classes, teachers and everyone who helps out at Les Roches.

We all get to share a lot of stories regarding the previous internship and the places we have discovered. All this is real feedback that you get from your friends which is really important because you start building up different criteria concerning future job or internship opportunities that might help you to find the right path in the field of Hospitality which is so broad. I will share some advice and tips in regards to internships from my previous experience in Geneva.

Here a few pictures of new friends and people having already a good time at Les Roches!! I am really happy to be back!

PGD 2 returning students welcoming PGD 1 new class! In Atlas, a little pub in Bluche where you can meet everyone!

Making friends with my new classmates…. So happy to be back !

Midterm break, special weeks, workshops and activities…

Posted on October 15, 2010 by Pamela Calvas

In the middle of the semester we have our midterm break, 1 week off which most of us have used to relax, do some traveling or go back home to visit family and friends.

Many of my classmates and friends have taken advantage of this time to discover and explore some new areas in Europe.

Garda Lake

As I have mentioned before in older posts, living in Switzerland gives you easy access to most of the cities in Central Europe that can easily be reached by train. There are a variety of convenient flights available to reach other cities further away in a matter of just a couple of hours.

I went to northern Italy with my family, there we visited Venice and Milan and stayed most of the time by the Garda Lake which was beautiful.

Milano

For the prospective students who read this post and want to get more information about traveling within and outside Switzerland it’s good to check the national train system website: www.sbb.ch which I highly recommend to become a member of.

Besides the regular academic schedules and the practical activities that the students need to perform, there are Special weeks in which the students have different schedules and have a chance to attend workshops and execute other tasks. My class had a chance to experience serving in a banqueting style setting and also attending a workshop on the same day.

Here I have got a video of us during a very interesting and fun workshop of Molecular food that is a new concept that many of us had never experienced before. In this video, our professor Chef in the “A la Carte Restaurant”, is giving a demonstration of Molecular desserts using compressed nitrogen to freeze or lower the temperature of these ingredients. As for the best part of molecular cuisine, check out how all of us are eager to taste this!