From Forced-Friends to Family

What happens when the unfamiliar walls start to feel like home.

At the start of the season, they throw you into a house with 30 strangers and expect you to function as a team. It feels a bit like the first day of school, except you’re all adults, have had far too many Aperols, and wearing thermals. You learn names quickly - not because you want to, but because you have no choice. These are the people you’ll be waking up with, working with, skiing with, and inevitably crying with when you drop an entire sticky toffee pudding on the floor five minutes before service.

At first, it’s all surface-level chatter. Where are you from? How did you end up here? Do you prefer Josie or Jose? The usual. But something strange happens when you live, work, and exist in the same tiny bubble. Conversations deepen, laughter becomes easier, and suddenly, the people you were randomly assigned to share a chalet with become the ones who know you best.

Friendships form in the most unexpected places - on the first chairlift of the day when the mountain is still quiet, over three-day-old flapjacks in the staff kitchen, during 3 a.m. walks home when the snow is falling, and walking down to the poubelles with 50kgs of rubbish from dinner service. There’s an unspoken understanding: this time, this place, this group - it’s temporary. And maybe that’s why we hold on so tightly.

We become each other’s safety nets. When one of us has a nightmare guest, someone else is there with a well-timed eye roll. When homesickness creeps in, there’s a shoulder to lean on. We celebrate each other’s ski wins and cry with laughter at the inevitable falls and fails.

Now, with only weeks left in the season, the conversations have shifted. “What’s next?” “Where are you moving?” “Will we still see each other?” And the beautiful thing is, the answer is yes. Because once you’ve spent a winter surviving on stolen bottles of chalet wine, questionable decisions, and the idea that skiing one slope to lunch is enough, you’re stuck with each other. And honestly? I wouldn’t have it any other way.