Another crazy Tribal Council! Unfortunately for me, it went against my way yet again, and secured my position on the bottom of the Himba tribe. It sucks how in the snap of a finger I go from being in the power alliance which is running the game, with seemingly everyone in that alliance having me in their end game plans... to where I am now, on the chopping block and am lined up as one of the next to leave.
Based on what happened at the previous Tribal Council, where Grant was eliminated 4-3-
2 after Julie flipped, we knew we were in a 4-4 deadlock situation. Stephanie/Kristina/David/Mike vs. Sophie/Ashley/Whitney/Julie. Obviously we tried to convince Julie to flip back to us, and sold the Ovambo/Nama tribal lines where we held a clear 5-3 advantage. We made it clear to her we were all prepared to go to rocks, and her only option was either to join us in the majority, or draw a rock and risk being eliminated. All of us tried making some Final 3 deals with her, I told her Kristina/Mike/David aren't a tight three and at the Final 5 we can easily convince one of them to join us. Mike won immunity, so should it go to rocks, we had the odds in our favour.
But... she didn't budge. Which surprised me, I really thought she would. It didn't really make sense for her to go to rocks for a group which just used her to make a move, I mean, she already did them a favour and owed them nothing. We put our four votes onto Sophie, because she's clearly the biggest threat to win the game and nobody stands a chance against her in front of the jury. With the prospect of a Hidden Immunity Idol being played, we told Julie we were all voting for Whitney because she was "least likely to have the Hidden Immunity Idol" in hopes that we'd come out on top with a 4-3-1 vote against Sophie. If she told them we were targeting Sophie and an idol was played on her, we'd be screwed. In the end, it was Ashley who found the idol and she played it on herself.
Nama + Julie voted for Kristina! Apparently for being the biggest threat on our end. They were apparently going to be voting for Mike, until he won immunity. Five minutes before Tribal Council, Julie told me they were voting for me. So I was a bit nervous, but wasn't really surprised that she lied about the target like I did to her. Once it was revealed it was a 4-4 tie, each side started campaigning for members of the other side to flip. I made my final plea to Julie, as did all of Ovambo, but it was a lost cause. Apparently she was bitter cause we lied to her and said we were voting Whitney. Yet she lied to us too and said they were voting me! So I was completely prepared to go to rocks and have a one in four chance to be eliminated on the spot out of pure luck. Unfortunately, David had other ideas, and flipped to vote out Kristina. TOTALLY screwing me and Mike in the process and leaving us on the outs.
Thanks a lot! He said he's "worked too hard to go out on a rock and couldn't risk it" well that's great to know, clearly you don't care about winning, cause you just destroyed your chances. I'm playing this game to win, I have since the beginning. It takes guts to be prepared to draw rocks, I have it and David doesn't. I was prepared to go out due to pure luck with a rock pick just cause I had a fifty percent chance of coming out in the majority. That was my best play to win, that was my only play to win, that was David's only play to win. Clearly David isn't playing to win, he just lost three jury votes in me, Kristina and Mike, and probably the others on the jury who don't respect his cowardly flip. It's one thing if there was any strategy behind it, he just did it cause he was too scared to go to rocks. He didn't want to go out at Final 8, so he made sure he's safe for the next couple of rounds and will be out at Final 5. If he does somehow make it to the end, which I doubt, he just turned himself into a complete goat!
I was somewhat surprised that David flipped to avoid rocks, but not totally shocked. If anyone was going to do it, I knew it would be him. Even if Mike wasn't immune, I don't think he would've flipped. Even if it was someone else on the chopping block, I don't think Kristina would've flipped. They all understand the logic of if you flip, you have no chance of winning. David told me he was pretending to Nama that he might flip, but he's really with us. So I suspect he was considering it even before Tribal Council. Since the pre-merge, I had a Final 4 alliance with me, David, Mike and Grant. I asked David now that Grant's been eliminated if that solidifies me, him and Mike as the Final 3, and he was hesitant to commit to that. He just said "I guess we'll get to Final 4 and see who's the biggest threat" so that was a huge red flag to me.
Julie thinks just cause she made one move to flip at Final 9, she's off the hook for being a useless, pathetic follower. That wasn't even her idea. She told me flat out she was approached by the Nama girls to join them and vote out Grant. Ashley said publicly it was her idea after the vote, Sophie is the one who took the risk and played her idol on Whitney to ensure it worked. Julie literally had nothing to do with it so it's hilarious she thinks she's playing a good game cause of that, and can just ride it out with that majority until the end by doing nothing, and expect to have a chance of winning. To be honest, Kristina and Grant kind of both dug their own graves. They played way too hard when it wasn't necessary and made themselves out to be huge targets which needed to be eliminated. I was able to avoid elimination by keeping those two threats around, and I'm glad that strategy has paid off for me.
So now it's clearly Mike and I on the outs in a 5-2 minority. Realistically, there is no chance of getting the numbers back now. Sophie knows she's my main target, Ashley is well within that majority, I've voted for Whitney twice and she's too much of a follower to make a move, Julie was prepared to go to rocks to stay with Nama... if she didn't flip the previous vote, it would make no sense for her to do it now. And David has clearly just jumped off a sinking ship and has found greener grass, wanting to be with Nama and gives zero fucks about me and Mike. He's telling us he's going to act as a "spy" and get info about Nama's plans for us, but we know that's completely untrue. Sophie told us he's telling her he's gonna be their "spy" and tell our secrets to them. He's playing both sides big time and it's so pathetic! Realistically nobody's going to trust him with any meaningful info.
I'm going to stir up the pot a bit and try my best to get people to flip back to us, but to be able to get two on our side for a 4-3 majority seems almost impossible. My best, and probably only chance of making it to the end of this game, is to find Hidden Immunity Idols and win individual immunity challenges! I was a strong competitor at the pre-merge challenges and was a large reason why Ovambo merged with numbers. Particularly the "Balance Beam" challenge right before the merge, which I won for our tribe and gave us the 7-5 majority. But since the merge I haven't been performing, so I'll have to step it up. I think Mike, Ashley and Sophie are probably my biggest competition, they've been very strong, much more so than David, Whitney and Julie.
Thankfully, I found the Hidden Immunity Idol! After Ashley played hers at the previous Tribal Council, it was rehidden, and I knew I had to get my hands on it. I found it eight minutes after the clue was posted at camp.
For the people of Herero
Came peace and light,
When keeping with the holy fire,
meant doing everything right.
The answer was "njambikarunga". I thought it would take a lot longer! But I was impressed with my skills! <3 Obviously I'm going to be playing it at the next Tribal Council if I don't win immunity, I know my head's on the chopping block. It will be either me or Mike being targeted. Ashley and Sophie are both assuring me that they're targeting Mike because he's such a huge threat, great in challenges and will be hard to beat at the end. It just seems all too convenient that they're sharing this info with me when they know there's an idol floating around. I just feel they're telling me it'll be Mike, but then they switch the vote to me as the safer option, without telling us. I think they'll even tell David to vote Mike, but Sophie/Ashley/Whitney/Julie vote for me, to ensure the plan isn't ruined. Sophie is certain one of me/Mike has the idol, so I can't believe a word that comes out of her mouth. I'm not going to risk leaving the game with it in my pocket, especially when I'm assuming it will get rehidden anyway and I'm confident I can find it again! So no matter what, I'm in the Final 6! <3 Ideally I'd win the challenge tonight, and I'll have individual immunity AND the idol, and be in the Final 5!
Mike is the only person I've told I have the idol, he's the only one I trust at this point. We're not telling David a thing. We're fairly certain they'll use David to split the vote 3-2-2 on me/Mike. But they can't be certain David is really on their side, so who knows. I know Sophie is very paranoid she'll be idolled out by us so it'll be interesting to see how she tries to manage the votes! Ideally, one of Mike and I will win immunity. If he wins it, I'll play my idol and we'll both be safe. I have a feeling Nama will then put the votes on David, which would be HILARIOUS if he goes out one round after he was too scared to go to rocks! I told Mike I'll consider playing my idol on him if he wins immunity, but really I'm not. That would just leave me to be vulnerable the next round without any protection. If I thought I had a decent chance of getting anyone to flip with us, I would give it a thought. But we'd still be outnumbered 4-2 and would need someone to flip to even make it a tie and go to rocks. Realistically, not gonna happen.
I think we're either gonna be targeting Sophie, for being the biggest threat. Or we might target David and push him out the door for revenge. He's never going to come back on our side anyway, so we may as well. It's disgusting how much of a coward he is, it would be awesome! If one of me/Mike wins immunity, I suspect they'll split the vote on the other person and David. And if me/Mike vote David, that'd eliminate him in a 4-3 vote or something of the likes. We discussed that and thought it could be a good idea! We're still going to attempt to get Julie/Whitney to make a big move and turn on Sophie/Ashley, drilling it into their minds that they have no chance against them at the end and need to step their games up. Mike is trying to frame Sophie for having the idol, so people are more tempted to blindside her. Like I said, I'm not banking on it, but it's worth a shot. Also I'm kind of torn at this stage, cause realistically my only chance of making it to the end is through idols and immunity wins. I think Mike is my biggest competition for both of those, so if he leaves, it might not be such a bad outcome.
Anyway, I'm definitely extremely involved in this game now. It's going to be an uphill battle and even though I'm on the outs, I'm only a few rounds away from the Final 3! I will stop at nothing until I get there.
by Jeff Probst » Thu Apr 03, 2014 8:56:53 pm 
