September 21, 2006: "Aitu Takes a Holiday"
Hands down, this was the funniest tribal council ever on
Survivor. It was like watching group therapy. Between Billy and "Mr. Bully's" fight, and Billy's declaration of love for Candace, I'm not sure what
I laughed at more. It was tears-in-my-eyes laughter. I'll make a declaration of my own: I love
Jeff Probst. He is the best reality-show host out there, with
Phil Keoghan of
The Amazing Race a close second. While everyone else was laughing and/or rolling their eyes at Billy, Jeff managed to respectfully question Billy's love connection ? and he did so with a straight face. Almost.
I found it odd that Billy uttered the words "I love you" after the challenge, but I didn't think anything of it. Especially since I was looking for furtive glances and accidental touches between two other castaways. After a week of keenly watching
CBS ads that heavily promoted a romance like no other in
Survivor history, I was sure we were going to find out that Brad and Nate were a couple. I was so wrong. Time will tell if the love between Billy and Candace is real.
Love can be a fickle thing. Last week I thought for sure that Ozzy was going to be a fan favorite. I mean the way he scampered up that tree had to win him some fans. Unfortunately, Ozzy played the game like it was a
Big Brother version by masterminding eviction plots and getting people to throw the challenges. It's clear, though, after having nearly gotten himself backdoored by Cristina, that Ozzy is no
Dr. Will. It's just not cool to cannibalize one of your own. It bugged me that Ozzy took the time to draw a skull and crossbones on his vote. I just imagined everyone waiting and wondering why it was taking him so long to write five letters on his card.
Speaking of taking a long time,
why is the Hiki tribe so slow? I do not understand it. Even with Aitu "taking a holiday" as Jeff put it, Hiki almost lost. Then they celebrated as if it were a victory! I know it's nice not to have to go to Tribal Council, but they needed to calm the hell down. Seriously.
If anyone has the right to celebrate this week, it's Yul, finder of the hidden immunity idol. Good for him! I hope that this season it actually comes into play. Oh, and Puka Rocks. That team is so good (-looking) that their only problem is their tendency to get headaches. Clearly they must not vote out the Cao Boi.
Jonathan almost got the wind knocked out of him by Adam who, for some mysterious reason, is against building a platform for sleeping. Platform? How about a shelter? As a tribe, Raro has some communication issues, but they pulled it together enough to tie for first at the challenge. I guess that's all that matters.
I've watched every season of
Survivor, and I'll say two things about Cook Islands. I haven't seen so many rats around since
Gervase snacked on them in Palau Tiga. Secondly, there's an awful lot of food available on this island. There are chickens running around -- not just the ones that got away from Raro. Plus, there is an abundance of fish. It just seems a little unusual. Remember the days when getting a bag of rice was a big deal? I almost long for that time, because right now these folks are playing the Club Med version of the game.
As for the social experiment? The tribes have very little interaction with each other, making it hard to draw conclusions about race relations. On their own, Raro fought amongst themselves; Puka didn't want to talk about it; Hiki was just glad they got fire; and Aitu sacrificed one of their own. It's not looking promising.
