Survivor: Victor Island

This film was made on the territory of the Anishinabe and Haudenosaunee peoples.

I am not sure when this idea came to mind, but I do know that for several months, I imagined, envisioned, created, designed, structured, planned, mapped out, and organized the ultimate Survivor-themed Surprise Party for the love of my life, Victor Chan.

I have watched Survivor since the television show aired on May 31, 2000. My family and I would watch every episode, every season. We invited friends and neighbours over to our house for “Survivor Snacks”, while bidding on who we wanted to win.

When I moved to Tkaronto in 2012, I would watch Survivor alone in my room on my laptop. After each episode, I would call my mom to gossip about what happened on the show that week.

When Victor and I became very close friends in 2013 (and then, of course, more than friends), I quickly introduced him to the show. It was not long before Victor and I watched the show with his roommates every week.

Now, it has become our tradition, every episode, every season, we watch together as a family of friends, eating “Survivor Snacks” and ‘bidding’ on who we want to win. We have called ourselves the “Survivor Night Crew”, with a continuous Facebook message thread of plans for watching the show (as well as countless photos of dogs).

Fast forward to the beginning of Season 36 of Survivor. As we watched each episode, I kept thinking, "How cool would it be if I hosted a Survivor-Themed surprise birthday party for Victor this year?"

Honestly, Victor's birthday is my favourite day of the year! I love creating plans to make his day as special as it can be. For his 24th birthday this year, I wanted to do something a little extra special. Victor is finishing up his Master's degree, and rarely takes time "off" for himself. He is way past a well-deserved break/day of fun, so I wanted to do something extravagant with all his friends! Also, considering it was the last season that the “Survivor Night Crew” would all be living in the same city, I wanted us to celebrate the finale bigger than we have ever done before.

I was not sure how to pull off such a big surprise close to Victor's birthday, and we wanted to have the party close to the Survivor finale. So, we picked a date - one month before Victor's actual birthday, and a week after Survivor’s Season 36 finale - Saturday June 2nd, 2018, at Huron Street Public School Playground in Tkaronto, Ontario, for a bonus season special: Survivor: Victor Island!

When the big day finally rolled around, Victor thought we were just going on an afternoon date... I told him that I was taking him on a private tour of special places in our neighbourhood. The first stop - Huron Street Public School Playground, just around the corner from Victor's house.

As we walked around the corner of the school, I took out my GoPro and immediately started filming. He noticed his friends sitting in a circle at the end of the playground, unsure about what was going on. Every step, his smile grew bigger and bigger, and the anticipation grew stronger and stronger. The Survivor Theme Song was playing in the background on my portable speaker, and everyone sat quietly until we arrived at the circle. Then, I yelled the surprise, and Victor's smile exploded into a big cheer!

Survivor: Victor Island has officially started!

Survivors were split into two teams: Team Fire and Team Water. There was a total of five team challenges and two merge challenges.

When a team won a team challenge, they were safe from losing a team member. When a team lost a team challenge, they lost one team member. Although, no team members were voted out until all five team challenges were completed. Each team had a separate tribal council at the end of all five team challenges, voting out five players in total.

When an individual won a merge challenge, they were safe from tribal council and everyone else was at risk of elimination (except those who had a hidden immunity idol). Tribal council was held after every merge challenge.

After there was three final players left in the game, there was a final tribal council to determine the winner. The jury, comprised of every single player voted out (team and merge), voted for the final winner.

I hid four hidden immunity idols and one hidden clue that led to a hidden immunity idol. Hidden immunity idols could be used at the team or merge tribal councils. Hidden immunity idols could only be used once for one person.

Truthfully, I had originally set out for seven team challenges and four merge challenges, but I did not account for the transition and break time needed for the day to run smoothly. But, I am reminded to “Be like water and go with the flow”, so whenever there was a delay or hurdle, I communicated with the Survivors about what they thought was best, and we would always make a group decision before moving forward. If you are another Survivor fan like us, and you are reading this to create your own Survivor-themed Party, I urge you to be flexible if your plans do not unfold the way you hoped or planned. It’s always good to have backup plans too! For example, there were two ties in the first two challenges, and, luckily, I had several “Sudden Death” matches in the case of a tie!

Team Challenge 1

In the first team challenge, “Team Discovery”, both teams were to rename their team and design a team flag. Teams would be scored out of a total of 50 points:

Creativity and Originality
Symbolism of Team Flag
Symbolism of Team Name
Group Work and Cohesion
Spirit and Fun

Team Fire renamed their team to “Team Fuego” and Team Water renamed their team to “Aqua Force”. The scoresheets added up to a shocking and coincidental 39 / 39. A sudden death Survival Trivia question split the tie with Aqua Force taking the lead with one win.

Team Challenge 2

In the second team challenge, “Follow the Game”, both teams had four games stations to follow through. Each team had to fully complete each game station before moving onto the next.

The first station, “Spot it”, required everyone on the team to have a card facing down, with the deck in the middle facing up. Every team member had to match one card to the middle deck before moving to the next station. (Spot It is a card game where each card has a series of symbols, and every single card in the deck can always match one to symbol to any other card in the deck).

The second station, “Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)", had players flip through the SDGs cards, one by one, to get 15 correct total. Each team member had to get minimum 2 cards correct. (SDGs is a card game of “True and False / A or B” style questions related to the various SDGs).

The third station, “Coin in a Cup”, required shooting coins in a small, square glass jar ~1m away. Every team member had to switch after successfully scoring one and everyone had to go at least once. Each team had to score 5 coins before moving on.

The final station, “Rainbow Race”, had the players run threw an obstacle course (jungle gyms) while collecting paper bags with either a fire or water symbol on it, and numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and coloured red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink respectively. Players could only collect 1 bag at a time, and every player had to go at least once. After collecting all the bags for the puzzle pieces, the players had to run back to where the challenge started and finish building their puzzle.

Unfortunately, despite reminding the players several times to collect only the bags with their respective team symbol (fire or water), the teams had swapped a bag by mistake, and there were duplicate puzzle pieces floating around the challenge. After finding the final puzzle piece underneath the table of Team Fuego, we decided to call it a tie, and they competed in a “Sudden Death” round of “Spot It”.

For the “Sudden Death”, every player gathered in a circle, Team Fuego on one side, Aqua Force on the other side, with one “Spot It” card in their hand. Every player had to match their card with another’s. The player who matched their card with another’s, placed the card (or several cards) from their hand onto the other person’s card. The person with all the cards at the end lost, and whichever team that person was from, lost the challenge.

Aqua Force won the “Sudden Death” round, with a Team Fuego member left with the cards at the end.

Team Challenge 3

The third team challenge was a spinoff the classic “Capture the Flag”, but instead, was called “Capture the Hidden Immunity Idol” because of a big twist to the classic game. If a player had a hidden immunity idol, and wanted to play it before the other team won the challenge, they would automatically win the challenge for their team, though they would forfeit the chance to use the hidden idol at a later tribal council.

In addition to the classic rules of “Capture the Flag”, teams were collecting 8 flags, each with a letter written on it, to spell out a word puzzle: “IMMUNITY”. Teams did not know what the letters revealed at the start of the challenge; they had to figure out what the letters spelled after collecting all 8 flags.

Because we were behind in time already, I told everyone I was cutting the game off at 20 minutes. Whoever had the most flags at the end, would win, unless a hidden immunity idol was played.

At the very last minute, Aidan, from Aqua Force, pulled out a hidden immunity idol, preventing Team Fuego from winning immunity and stealing their victory!

Team Challenge 4

The fourth team challenge, “Survivor Basebee”, was another classic American game spin-off. The field was on a baseball diamond, including all the general rules of baseball. The twist – players would throw and catch a Frisbee instead of a baseball, and every time a player caught the Frisbee, they had to yell “SURVIVOR!”, or it would be an automatic turnover. This small challenge of yelling “SURVIVOR!” challenged a lot of the players, which was hilarious to watch from behind the fence.

Team Fuego finally won their first immunity challenge, defeating Aqua Force in a tie-breaking round!

Team Challenge 5

Including another childhood favourite with a Survivor twist, the fifth team challenge was called “Keep Survivor Up!”. Players had one ball and 5 minutes on the clock. Each team had to play “Keep it Up!”, while spelling out “S”, “U”, “R”, “V”, “I”, “V”, “O”, “R”, over and over again. The team who had consecutively spelled “Survivor” the highest number of times would win the challenge!

Quickly, Team Fuego adopted an effective, fast, and consistent strategy of volleying between two players, while the others yelled out letters, counted the number of “Survivor”s and guarded for any pass gone wrong.

Aqua Force switched and swapped between several strategies, unable to find a flow before the challenge was over.

Team Fuego defeated this final team challenge, quadrupling Aqua Force’s score.

Team Fuego Tribal Council

Team Fuego collectively decided to send three players home: Ivana, Andrew C., and Megan, to strengthen efforts moving forward. They ended with a strong and spirited cheer before moving into the merge.

Aqua Force Tribal Council

Aqua Force had less of a breeze with their elimination. They chose to go through the formal tribal council process, eliminating the team’s only power couple, Nick R. and Danielle.

Merge Challenge 1

All players in the merge gathered on tree stumps in the tribal council area for their first merge immunity challenge, “Survival Trivia”. I had found random Survival-type questions online, adding up to 30 questions total.

Players had to raise their hand as fast as they could if they wanted to have an opportunity to answer the question. I wrote a mental list of whose hand went up the fastest to create a “que” of who could try to answer the question next if the first person had answered incorrectly.

After asking all 30 questions, whoever had the highest number of answers correct won immunity.

Nick A. won the challenge with the highest number of answers.

Merge Tribal Council 1

Without needing to move, all players gathered for the first tribal council. Two players were eliminated, based on the highest number of votes for those respective players.

Merge Challenge 2

For the last immunity challenge, “Knock the Can”, players lined up in a row of 5, approximately ~10ft from a table set up with a line of cans. Each player had 3 cans lined up on the table with their respective colour.

In the middle of the line of players, there was a container of elastic bands with assorted length, width, elasticity, colour and diameter. Players had to grab any elastic of their preference, and knock the other players’ cans over. The last player with a can standing would be the winner.

After a tight battle and elastics covering the pavement, Brian won with two cans left at the end of the challenge.

Merge Tribal Council 2

All remaining players gathered for the second last tribal council. Two players were eliminated, based on the highest number of votes for those respective players.

Final Tribal Council

Again, without needing to move, all players gathered for the final tribal council. Brian, James, and Victor were the final three players remaining. Brian and Victor representing Team Fuego, and James representing Aqua Force. While Team Fuego had the disadvantage leading into the merge, they dominated both merge challenges and held their team strong to the finish.

After the final three players answered questions from the jury and gave their final statements, the jury voted for the player they most wanted to win.

There were several jury members who had to leave the party early, thus could not stay until the final tribal council. Those who couldn't make it privately text-messaged their vote to me, and, so, I wrote those extra votes on pieces of paper.

To no one’s surprise, Victor won with 13 votes! James received 3 votes, and Brian received 1 vote.

Everyone played an amazing game, but, at the end of the day, Victor is the ultimate Survivor!

The other “Survivor Awards”: Hustler, Gleamer, Challenge Beast, Water Warrior, and Fire Protector, were handed to Aidan, Andrew W., James, Omar, and Brian respectively.

Unfortunately, due to the excitement of the day and limited volunteer/staff help (i.e. no camera crew), I was unable to film the entire day, such as the hidden immunity idol plays, and every challenge and tribal council. I wish I could have captured every second of the party, though I hope that this blog and video captures enough of the day for everyone!

Honestly, I had so much fun organizing this for Victor and his friends, for our “Survivor Night Crew”, and for all those Survivor fans out there! I would be lying if I said this was not slightly selfish, as I love the show and the wonderful memories it has brought me in my life. But, at the end of the day, my love for Victor fuelled every ounce of effort that I put into this. Seeing Victor's expression, from the beginning of the day to the end, was worth ALL of it!

I love you Victor, I hope you had an amazing birthday! (Even though it was 1 month early...Hehe)

Thank-you Survivor, CBS, Jeff Probst, fans, players, friends, and family helping me create such an amazing experience for Victor, the love of my life, and his best friends! <3

I hope you enjoyed this season of Survivor: Victor Island!

Disclaimer

I grew up loving Survivor. The beautiful places of the show entangled with the social drama of humans attempting to both cooperate and compete with one another had drew me in from the very first episode.

Though, as I grow up and learn more about colonialism, especially in places like Canada and the United States of America, I am reminded that shows like Survivor are not excused from colonial violence.

Unfortunately, there is a great deal of cultural appropriation in Survivor – from the continued use of the word “tribes” to the little to no recognition of the Indigenous peoples and lands. And, while I continue to love the show for aspects such as the social competition/collaboration and physical beauty of Mother Earth, I acknowledge and recognize the social and physical violence.

I hope that Survivor/CBS will do more in the future to change their use of language in the show and acknowledge and recognize the filming location’s Indigenous peoples and lands.