In Survivor South Africa Malaysia episode 3, lazy Lisa dodged yet another bullet, as her former ally Viwe was eliminated. Hopefully the other side realizes they still have the numbers to dump her. Granted, I think she can wait. I’d much rather see the other tribe lose so that Elsie, one of the most obnoxious reality contestants ever, gets the boot. Speaking of the other tribe, we also saw Survivor history when Hein made fire without anything manmade.
Angela states the obvious: Hein and Dyke are the only ones doing any work on the tribe. Elsie, aside from being obnoxious, is also the laziest. Nichal fishes in the morning, but that’s about it. Both Angela and Rijesh complain about Amanda being lazy.
Rijesh believes he’s being a puppetmaster, and nobody’s noticing. Oh, they’re noticing alright. This guy’s way too transparent. Grant doesn’t want anybody to know he’s an attorney, a wise move to make. He’s a much less transparent puppetmaster.
The reward challenge is called the fish bucket. Tribes must select two people to get in their canoes and paddle to the raft. One person will get off the canoe and start loading fish, then they paddle back to shore, where someone else will unload the fish. The person unloading the fish must throw it to the next person down the line until it gets to the scale to reach 25 kilos, with multiple trips if necessary. Bajau selects Hein and Dyke as can be expected. Iban selects Irshaad and Mandla. Iban seems more fit, but the Bajau team seems better. The reward is a harpoon, mask, flippers, snorkel, and rice. Bajau is offered flint because they never got it, but they already know they don’t want flint. What if their fire goes out, though? It could take days to remake it. I’m surprised that, since they made fire on their own, they don’t just automatically get flint. Elsie sits out for Bajau. Iban heads off into the middle of nowhere in their canoe, giving Bajau a big lead. Iban finally gets to the raft, then Irshaad promptly floats away after Mandla starts loading fish. There isn’t any suspense here at all. Bajau wins before Irshaad even makes it back to the raft. Additionally, Bajau is rewarded with the two biggest fish from their haul.
The tribe blames Irshaad for the loss. They probably would have lost either way, but blaming Irshaad is very convenient. Irshaad says he thought nobody knew how to paddle, and if somebody else knew, they should have spoken up. Lisa pretends that everybody thought he knew how to paddle (based on what?).
Not surprisingly, Dyke is familiar with all the fishing gear they won, which will allow him to work even harder at providing. He does share his knowledge with the rest of the tribe. Let’s see if they use it.
Angela, who doesn’t trust Rijesh any more than anyone else, makes an alliance with Rijesh and Nichal. She knows up front she will probably need to break this alliance and is willing to do so, which she foolishly openly tells Rijesh. Just play along and pretend you’re with him. She then quickly relays to Amanda that Rijesh will be targetting Amanda, who is also on to the fact that Rijesh is playing too hard. Everybody, finally, is now realizing that it was stupid to even discuss getting rid of Hein or Dyke, so now it will become a matter of who can position themselves better in their eyes.
The tribes get a communique before immunity, one which sounds like a tribe shuffle. Somebody always gets screwed by this, while somebody else normally gets helped. Either way, Dyke and Hein will be hugely valuable (and hopefully still on the same tribe), while Lisa and Elsie will still be useless (and for the sake of everybody else, hopefully not on the same tribe).
At the immunity challenge, the tribes must line up on opposite ends of a bar and will be pushing against each other. At the challenge, everybody must remove their buffs and put them in bags, men in one bag and women in another. The new tribes are…
Iban:
Irshaad
Angie
Rijesh (previously Bajau)
Amanda (previously Bajau)
Elsie (previously Bajau, and not hiding the fact that she’s pissed off about moving)
Dyke (previously Bajau)
Bajau:
Angela
Nichal
Hein
Lisa (previously Iban)
Lorette (previously Iban)
Mandla (previously Iban)
Grant (previously Iban)
First the bad news. Both Lisa and Elsie are in the majority numbers on their new tribes, which means both have good potential to be kept around for the numbers. I didn’t like seeing the Dyke/Hein split up, as they made a good team, but it could prove beneficial if both are able to establish relationships with their new tribes. Lorette is unlikely to be as useful as she was on her old tribe, but I suspect she’ll hit it off with Hein as his new coworker. While Dyke is safe, he’s safe with three people I doubt he has any use for. Grant will continue to stick up for Lisa, but the third member of that alliance, Angie, got screwed, as she’s now in the position of being one of the easiest choices to boot.
Angela sits out for Bajau. She got screwed, too. I sense her as the first boot unless she can somehow weasel Nichal out of there. I don’t see the other tribe breaking up, regardless of how useless Lisa is. The losing tribe will go straight to tribal council, which means no plotting. I can’t decide if this is lame or not, but we will get an honest vote that may give whoever’s in the minority a shot at shaking things up.
This challenge is all about brute strength. Following the shuffle, it’s clear Bajau has the advantage. The tribes were well balanced before the shuffle, but now it’s just a ridiculous mismatch. They just completely bulldoze over Iban. And in a challenge that looks like it was designed by the producers of Big Brother, the way they’re shoving, it’s pretty clear there’s serious danger of something going wrong… which it does. In the replay, we see that Elsie, who was in the middle, for whatever reason decides to run to the side. In the process, her hand gets crushed by the huge wooden bar. Mark’s at least not afraid to jump right in and lend a hand to prevent it from getting worse than it could have been.
When they get to Bajau, the former members of Iban are completely blown away. Life is much different on this side of the island. It’s like when people went to Chapera in Survivor All Stars. Fire, good shelter, extra food, and on and on.
As they walk to tribal council, it’s obvious Elsie’s injuries (one hand, other arm, back) will make her useless (moreso than she was already). She won’t be able to effectively participate in any challenges. Even if they do vote her out (or if she’s forced to leave for medical reasons), the old Bajau tribe will still be up 3-2, though new Bajau will be up 7-5 in total numbers, and it’s primarily composed of ex-Iban members. Ultimateily, though, if new Bajau continues to steamroll over Iban in challenges and Iban just gets rid of ex-Iban members, we could be looking at strong numbers for ex-Bajau post-merge. Before going to tribal council, they figure out that they can’t sit Elsie out of challenges any more. That’s about all it will take to get Dyke to turn, and the others will follow if they’re smart. At tribal council, Elsie says if she was in their position, she would vote out the injured person. Is she trying to get them to send her home?
It’s time to vote:
Elsie
Angie
Elsie
Elsie
5-1 Elsie’s gone. Wouldn’t have happened without the injury. I suppose it would be more politically correct to feel sorry for her, and while she wasn’t too bad this episode, based on her actions (and mostly her big mouth) in prior episodes, I say good riddance.
Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another recap of Survivor South Africa: Malaysia Episode 5.
