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by Jim Van Nest Published: October 19, 2001
AFTER TRIBAL COUNCIL The show starts right after the Boran tribe returns from Tribal Council. Clarence is relieved, but he knows he has to do some serious work over the next few days if he wants to make it through the next Council vote. He's talking with Jessie about how he thinks Diane set him up to be the bad guy and that he did nothing wrong. Jessie is quick to point out that he ate the beans and that was wrong no matter what Diane did. He seems to be back in line now. We also learn from Lex that Tom's vote for Clarence was planned. They knew Diane was gonna be the one to go. But they wanted that vote out there to let Clarence know that he was still on thin ice. Over at Samburu, we see the tribe waking up and we're told how incredibly cold it gets overnight. Seems odd considering how hot it is during the day. Also, sleeping on the ground is taking its toll on all of the tribe members. They decide they need some sort of cover over their shelter to shield them from the cold. Frank takes charge, as usual, and is quick to upset Lindsey and Kim with his barking of orders. It's at this time that we learn that Carl is getting tired of doing everything. Seems there is some serious tension going on at Samburu. REWARD CHALLENGE #1 Mail call. Let's start with the reward. Blankets, food and everything that the Survivors couldn't carry on their very first day in Africa. Quite a prize so early in the game. The winner of this one would have an incredible advantage over the next few days and more importantly, challenges. The challenge, though, is a tough one. Each tribe has to carry five logs of different lengths with a platform on the top of them through a maze of obstacles to a tower situated a few hundred yards away. The idea is to set the logs up as a staircase; so one member can climb to the top of the tower. The first tribe to get one member to the top will win the reward. Since Samburu has one more person than Boran, one tribe member has to sit out. Jeff reminds the tribe that the same person cannot sit out two challenges in a row. They decide on Linda. The teams start off with the same strategy. Put the strongest member out front and ride him to victory. Samburu starts with Silas. Boran with Ethan. Though Samburu gets off to a quick start, by the time the first log is in place, the tribes are even. Here's where strategies change a bit. Samburu sticks with Silas leading the way. Boran switches to Clarence. Boran starts to pull away a little. Log 3 sees Ethan back in the lead, Silas still carrying the bulk of the load for Samburu. Samburu takes the lead after the third log. Tom takes over for Boran and they pull themselves back to even once again. For the final log, Ethan once again leads the charge while Silas proves his strength. Basically, it becomes a footrace to the tower and both teams are pretty even when Kim J. for Boran trips over a log and falls down. They cannot send someone up the stairs until all tribe members are there. By the time Kim J. gets there, Kim P. had already climbed the tower and was celebrating a second straight challenge win. Back at the Boran camp, Kim takes credit for losing the challenge and begins her quest to not be voted off next by trying to convince everyone that it won't happen again. She knows she's in trouble at this point. The next morning at Boran camp finds a lot of tired, dejected, weak tribe members. Jessie seems to be the worst. We soon learn that she has yet to drink any water do to how nasty it is. It's described as tar-like and just not very appealing. The tribe is worried about her, but they're also a little tired of watching her not help herself. It's hard to tell now who is the most vulnerable, Kim or Jessie. ALLIANCES FORM We knew it would happen. And it happens sooner in each new Survivor season. Alliances begin to form in both tribes. In Samburu, the line is very obviously drawn between the young folks (Brandon, Kim, Lindsey and Silas) and the older folks (Carl, Frank, Teresa and Linda). The bottom line is this; the older folks are doing all the work. (Well, Silas helps a little.) And the young folks sit on their butts all day long. I can see exactly why Frank and Carl are pissed. What they don't realize is that the kids don't want a drill sergeant in the African bush. They want to be treated as equals. Which side will break down first? Only time will tell. I will say, however, that Frank and Co. are much more strategic than their younger counterparts. They realize that to truly be successful as an alliance and a tribe is to get the big hoss, Silas on their side. On their very next water run, Linda stays behind and Carl, Teresa and Frank take Silas where they can let him in on their plan. The guy is big and strong and definitely is there to win. After courting him for quite awhile, he decides to jump onboard. A very confident Samburu Alliance heads back to camp where Lindsey is very suspicious. After overhearing Frank (who for all his smarts in the game, is really pretty stupid when it comes to being secretive) talking about Silas being on board, she decides to confront Silas, face to face. When you see these two talk, it is really reminiscent of Jerri and Colby from Survivor 2. Silas swears he is not with Frank and that he and Lindsey need to stick together and boot Frank off first chance they get. He is just like the Colbster the way he's playing both sides. I figure he won't actually choose a side til he finds out which one will be better for him. Over in Boran, it seems a little alliance is brewing as well. Lex, Tom and Ethan seem to be getting along rather well and are plotting the route the tribe needs to take. Lex and Tom have made the solid alliance and Lex is trying to get Ethan to join him. Lex sees himself, Ethan and Tom making it to the final 3 before they need to turn on eachother. This takes us up to the next mail call. This one is the immunity challenge. By the small clues in the mail, it is pretty obvious that this is the immunity challenge everyone will be talking about long after the show is over. To use Kelly's words, "The gross food challenge." Before they go to the challenge, Clarence makes it a point to talk about how important this challenge is for him personally. He still feels on the edge here and would really like immunity for the next couple days til he can work a little more of the guilt off. IMMUNITY CHALLENGE #2 And here we are at the moment we've all been waiting for. We've all seen the other Survivors and we knew this challenge was coming. We saw previews and heard rumors. The only thing we knew for sure was that these 15 people were going to be asked to ingest something none of us would ever think to ingest. This time around, cow's blood mixed with milk. We find the tribes meeting at the Damu Bar, where Jeff is waiting to introduce them to the main diet of the tribes that inhabit this portion of Africa. That diet is fresh cattle milk mixed with fresh cattle blood. And if that wasn't enough, he brings a live cow out to show them how the blood is collected. He's assisted by "Charles" and some of his tribesmen. Whether or not these guys are actual African tribesmen, I don't know. I'm thinking they probably are, but can't be sure. Anyway, Jeff explains that the cattle are not killed and slaughtered as one might expect. These cattle are revered be the tribes and they would never do anything to seriously injure one of these most precious of animals. Basically, Charles pulls out a bow and arrow and shoots the arrow into the neck of the cow. Not far, just far enough to get blood flowing from the wound. Jeff fills the bottle and they close the wound. Buh bye, Charles. The challenge is set up like this: the tribes will drink shot for shot until all tribe members drink. Since Boran is down a person, one person will have to drink twice. Not very surprisingly, the person to drink twice is Lex. The showdown begins with Lex and Frank downing their shot and concludes with Lex and Silas downing the last shots. All in all, every person there drank his or her shot. And amazingly, none of them even looked like they might not do it. The only shaky ones, in my opinion, were Jessie and Linda. So, with the challenge ending in a tie, Jeff had to pull out the tiebreaker. Each tribe was told to pick a member of the other tribe. As I expected, Boran picked Linda. As a surprise, Samburu picked Kelly. Kelly was very excited about doing this and had no problem with her first shot. To me, this was a bad choice. I'd have chosen Jessie. She was the shakiest of the bunch. Well, the tiebreaker was a race. Jeff filled 2 glasses, in my estimation at least 12 ounces, for Linda and Kelly and filled them to the top. The first one to empty the glass wins immunity for their tribe. They pick up the glasses and chug like a couple of fraternity guys and when all was said and done, Linda's glass was the first one empty. Samburu wins their third straight challenge and immunity for the second time in a row. Not surprisingly, the rest of the show took place with the Boran tribe. Kim and Kelly are feeling the pressure of losing the last two challenges. Clarence is still worried about "Bean-gate." And Jessie is still being mentioned as a pretty weak tribe member. It was at this point that the Boran alliance really starts to take shape. Tom and Clarence (of all people) are discussing the best route for the tribe to take at the vote. They both determine that they need to stick with the plan of voting off the weakest link. Clarence, by himself, tells us that in his opinion, Samburu is not beating them with their men. They're winning with their women. In his opinion, they need to vote out one of the women that make them a weaker tribe. He does mention, though, that he still wouldn't be surprised if he is the one taking the long walk to the Final Words Confessional. The next "meeting" we see is Tom and Ethan. Tom is saying how Clarence's strength makes him a necessary member of the tribe, while Ethan acknowledges how sick and weak Jessie has become, but says he'd vote Clarence off before any of the women. TRIBAL COUNCIL #2 As Boran gets to Tribal Council once again, Jeff is waiting with several questions for them. Basically, he picks every person that has a chance of being voted off and asks them how the feel. Kelly and Kim acknowledge being a little nervous because of their problems in the challenges. Clarence seems to think his worries are behind him and to his surprise, Tom agrees with him. He tells Jeff how much better Clarence has been and that he's been very productive. Personally, I think he's lying, but what do I know? Jessie admits that this whole thing is a lot tougher than she thought it would be and that the lack of water was pretty hard on her, but she's feeling a lot better. Ok, enough of this...let's vote. They only show 3 votes this time as the people are voting. They show Jessie voting for Clarence saying she should have voted for him last time. They show Kim voting for Jessie saying that Jessie is so weak after 6 days and she's afraid of what might happen to her if she's out there any longer. Last vote they show is Tom once again voting for Clarence. Once Jeff tallies the votes, we find 5 votes for Jessie, 2 for Clarence. Once again, Clarence dodges the bullet. Seems that his strength is the only thing keeping him in the game right now. SURVIVOR QUOTE OF THE WEEK And that brings us to the Quote of the Week. This week's winner is Tom. When the Boran tribe received their mail for the immunity challenge and realized it would probably involve eating something really gross, they all started talking about how they would eat anything to win this challenge. Ethan gives the setup by saying, "I don't know...I don't think I could eat a dung beetle." Tom's response is our quote of the week, "Well, don't think of it as a dung beetle...just think of it as a beetle." Truly words to live by. As promised, my voter history has been updated with this week's votes. Until next week, my friends, take care.
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