The fans and favorites tribes are mixed up. At the reward challenge, several players are hurt and an injury threatens to take one castaway out of the game. Also, Amanda catches a shark that provides a feast for her tribe. The newly formed Malakal faced Tribal Council and, with their tribe split evenly between four Favorites and four Fans, it was clear that either a Fan or a Favorite would have to flip….Upset that she was included as a ‘weak’ player and concerned she could soon become targeted, Cirie lobbied to Amanda and Ozzy to keep the less threatening and disposable Chet in the game and get rid of Joel, the tough gamer and physical threat to all.
At Tribal Council, Cirie’s plan worked. As she did with Yau-Man, Cirie once again convinced her tribe to send home someone who threatened her game, and Joel was voted out of the new Malakal 6 votes to 2. Dazed, Joel leaves his final words: “The tribe picked Chet. Over me. A little bit humiliating. Insulting. Wow. I don’t understand why you would want to keep somebody like Chet. It’s just very, very confusing. I’m angry, I think I’d like to wring a couple people’s necks right now, but I’m stunned.”
How it happened: Drop your buffs
As the Fans and Favorites arrive at what they suspect is a Reward Challenge, Jeff Probst makes a surprise announcement: “It’s time you got to know each other. Drop your buffs. We are switching tribes.” The shocked and anxious Survivors draw rocks to decide team captains for a school-yard pick. Ozzy draws the purple rock for Malakal and Natalie draws the orange rock for Airai, giving them first choice of the contestants. Alternating, Survivors will choose teammates, but Fans must choose Favorites and Favorites must choose Fans. Natalie, without hesitation, selects James for the new Airai tribe, and Ozzy in turn picks Joel, matching James’ strength on the new Malakal tribe. As the tribes shake out, the new Malakal consists of Ozzy, Amanda, Cirie, Ami, Joel, Erik, Tracy, and Chet. The new Airai tribe members are Jonathan, James, Parvati, Eliza, Alexis, Natalie, Jason, and Kathy. “We are no longer tribes of Fans vs. Favorites,” declares Jeff Probst. “We are now Malakal versus Airai.”
Reward Challenge
After tossing the tribes their new buffs, Jeff Probst reveals they will compete immediately for Reward as new tribes…. The new Airai tribe wins their first challenge and a huge reward of steaks, veggies and wine.
…As the tribe settles in with full bellies, Jonathan’s injury from the challenge turns serious. The Survivor Medical Team arrives in the dead of night to stitch up the puncture below his knee. During the painful operation, Jonathan grits his teeth to endure the agony. He speculates, “There could be an infection and it could work down towards the joint of my knee. So let’s hope it doesn’t get worse.” Later…Jonathan, James, Parvati, and Eliza take charge leading the new Airai tribe in clearing a bigger living area and shelter away from the water’s edge. Skilled Survivors after their previous seasons’ experiences, the Favorites quickly erect a solid shelter. The Fans are excited to have an upgraded home and new life in the tribe. “The new members of Airai, I mean, they’re just on it,” Natalie respectfully admits. “They’re quick, they’e making it happen, it’s getting done and it’s brilliant.”
… After being annihilated by the Favorites in both the Reward and Immunity Challenges, the Fans once again found themselves at Tribal Council on Day 11.
…As the Malakal tribe prepares a meager breakfast of chicken feed, they’re surprised by yells from the beach. “Hey guys look what I caught!” hollers Amanda as she strolls into camp lugging a shark that she’s wrestled out of the fishing net. Ozzy instantly lights up, impressed by his amour, Amanda. He gushes, “She basically wrestled a 4-foot shark by herself! That’s pretty attractive to a guy like me.”
Amanda: Slayer of 4-foot shark.
Ozzy: Very impressed with Amanda’s mad fishing skillz.
Immunity Challenge.… four members from each tribe will alternate throwing rocks at suspended ceramic tiles, breaking them to release four bundles of wooden puzzle pieces. Collecting all four bundles and handing them off, three other tribe members will race to assemble the pieces with help from a caller on top of a tower. The first tribe to solve their puzzle wins Immunity and is safe from Tribal Council….Airai comes from behind to win Immunity and send the new Malakal to Tribal Council.
…With Tribal Council looming for the new Malakal tribet… as Chet’s name gets tossed around as the obvious vote for the night, Cirie is unsettled. “Erik seems to think we should get rid of the weaker players in the tribe,” explains Cirie. “Which is fine with me except I’m included in the [group of] weaker tribe members.”…They believe Joel’s distracting and bossy performance in the tribe, which cost them Immunity, the three decide to turn the tables on Joel. “Let’s take his ass out,” cries Tracy.
At Tribal Council, in the end, Cirie’s plan to protect the weaker members of the tribe, and herself down the road, works. A completely stunned Joel is sent home as the fifth person voted out.
Possible Spoilers in the next week or two (multiple Internet sources)
Jonathan Penner is medivac’ed off the Island.
Chet steps on a coral and is removed from the Island.
Kathy is removed from game pre-merge after a “mental meltdown” in which she tries to cut her own fingers with a machete.
Stay tuned. It sounds like the game is has some major twists and turns ahead!
“The Clintons are in a difficult position,” said Dennis Goldford, a political science professor at Drake University in Iowa, who has tracked the presidential race. “If she wins the Democratic presidential nomination, she would need Obama’s supporters. But she needs to be careful. If this talk of him on the ticket is seen as a cynical maneuver, it could backfire and hurt her,” Goldford said.
The Clintons are shameless but we already knew that.
At the start of this thing I actually backed Clinton because I thought Obama needed more experience. But Barack could handle the task. He’d surround himself with good advisers and before the end of his first term he’d be a powerful leader who undoubtedly would secure a second term. The instant he stepped into the White House he’d be 10X, 100X better than the person currently occupying it.
Hillary and Bill have disappointed us on so many levels, time and again. They are no doubt well-seasoned political animals and that’s precisely what we do not need. We’ve had sharks like that in control of the White House since 1980.
I agree with Former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota. On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Daschle said,
“It may be the first time in history that the person who is running number two would offer the person running number one the number two position.”
Think of 10 Internet years ago compared to today. Remember when AOL was a major player, Google was a quaint-looking but fast growing start-up, Pets.com–remember them with the talking puppet commercials on television? No one really knew what Amazon.com was, people become dot.com millionaires overnight. They were flush with success as were so many other dot com companies. And then it went bust. And then Web 2.0 was born and so it goes. The Internet moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it (the next big shift).
Is anyone familiar with the behaviour of corporate America? It’s silly to believe that a corporation is there to take care of it’s employees or contractors. It’s the 21st Century! Each person is their own corporation. If you don’t have a mindset where you conduct your career as such than you are at the mercy of people that don’t necessarily have your best interests at heart.
Whatever is going to happen with this economy is out of our hands personally. It’s best that you accept that and plan for your own future in whatever form that takes.
Take control of your life. Have a plan and a back-up plan. You need it now more than at any time in perhaps the last thirty years, as the American economy is in a downturn.
It’s going to get worse before it gets better. You need to know that and plan accordingly.
