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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Way to go, Eva.
00:02I mean, I got to start by wishing you a massive congratulations, you know, second place.
00:07But you're on the podium, you know, to use some some Olympic hockey parlance.
00:10I guess the first thing I want to ask is what was sort of your response to how everything shook out?
00:17I mean, I would imagine that you, of course, wanted to take home the win.
00:21But after you end up going through with this final Tribal Council performance, what was sort of your assessment as to how the jury votes would shake out
00:28and whether that would correspond to you winning?
00:31So I I knew that I had the biggest uphill battle in this final Tribal.
00:36And that was of my own doing, because my strategy in this game was to make people think that I was stupid.
00:42If somebody was not part of my alliance, I would just say, oh, I'm just doing what Joe's doing.
00:46Or I would I would purposely add numbers together wrong.
00:49I wanted people to see me as just the dumb jock.
00:52Like I I knew that I was coming to this game as a physical threat.
00:56I can't hide my muscles and a social threat that I cannot turn down my personality.
01:00I am who I am.
01:02And so I was like, I have to limit my threat level in some way.
01:05So that was to make myself seem like I was not strategic at all.
01:08And that was a big lie.
01:10I am very, very strategic.
01:12I I'm a lot smarter than I was I was putting on.
01:15So I was like, I in this final Tribal not only have to convince them to give me a million dollars,
01:19but I also just have to convince them that I'm smart.
01:21And so that I had two things in both Joe and Kyle only had one thing they had to convince the jury of.
01:26And I successfully convinced them that I was smart.
01:29I did not convince all of them that I deserve the money.
01:31And that is that's my downfall there.
01:33But I I think going in that, yeah, it was going to be a hard battle.
01:37And I had a jury votes.
01:40I I there like I had I expected that I could win for there for people that I thought that I could win.
01:46And I won two of those four.
01:48And so I'm very proud of that.
01:49But no, I wanted that win.
01:50Can't be happy with second place.
01:52So what were the two that you thought that you would get?
01:57And what was sort of your your reaction when you didn't?
02:00Yeah, so I David had said from the start, he wanted to have a an honest and loyal game.
02:06And apart from having to turn on David due to the way that he was attacking people like his behavior,
02:13it was was not due to his paranoia.
02:15It was due to his behavior kind of becoming a bit of a bully.
02:17I love this man, but he got very aggressive out there.
02:20And so I had to shut him out, get him out of this game.
02:24I felt that I had played this very loyal game that he he idolized, that he said that's what he wanted to do.
02:29I thought that he would respect that.
02:31I did that.
02:32I fulfilled his dream, but he did not.
02:35He he had his his own ideas out there.
02:38And then the other person I thought that I could get that I didn't was Cedric.
02:41I knew that he was going to be an emotional voter.
02:44And I thought that I could get that emotion swayed towards me with my story, with with speaking from the heart.
02:50And unfortunately, his emotions were swayed towards Joe, who also deserves like a million votes.
02:57So I'm glad that he got one.
02:58I'm very glad of that.
02:59But I thought that I was going to get four and that that would be enough, that that could tie it.
03:03And Joe had told me that he would vote for me.
03:06He he said he was expecting it to tie and that he was going to give me the million.
03:10So I let myself down and not getting those two people.
03:14That's so interesting.
03:15So I guess even rewinding a day to get back there, because Star ends up saying at this after show, right, that like you locked in her jury vote due to everything that happened in fire making.
03:25And obviously, we saw from our perspective, despite that, that was not a situation that you wanted to see yourself in, just considering how incredibly overwhelming it was, both in the moment and obviously the afternoon beforehand.
03:36So how do you look back upon what you were able to get done there and how difficult it was for you to get to the final three, to your point, in a very different way than Joe and Kyle did?
03:47Oh, yeah, that the fire building, it was not that I didn't want to be in fire building because I couldn't build a fire.
03:53Like I said on the show, I built fires every single day in my backyard.
03:57It was because for like days and days, I was letting myself down.
04:02I was failing in these challenges.
04:03In episode 12, we saw I got disqualified from one challenge and I would have won the second challenge if I could just throw a ball straight up in the air.
04:10And so I was already tearing myself to shreds in my head.
04:14And with my autism, I get stuck in a cycle and things build and build.
04:17In episode five, we saw a very quick build and come down.
04:20This was a build slow burn over days and days where I just was building this cycle in my head that I am a failure.
04:26I'm a failure.
04:27I can't do anything.
04:27And what we saw in the episode of me having this autism episode, that was actually a very toned down version of what really happened out there.
04:36It was much, much worse.
04:37I was when they showed Kyle and Joe talking, hear me screaming in the woods.
04:41I was screaming and shaking.
04:44I was stimming on the ground, scratching myself.
04:46I was very in the thralls of this.
04:48And Joe comes to help me, but he can't pull me out of this.
04:51I have to pull myself out.
04:52And it was a very, very intense situation that I'm disappointed they didn't show because people like me who have autism, I wanted them to see at my absolute lowest that I still was able to come back because that is something that is so important that I battled through what I was going through in my head.
05:09And I was able to then get myself righted with the help of an amazing ally, Joe, him helping show me the way that I could do it and believe in myself again.
05:19And I pushed through in dramatic fashion.
05:21I'm very, very proud of that.
05:23Yeah, absolutely.
05:25So you talk about, you know, coming in with this big game that you wanted to talk up.
05:30It seemed like from our perspective, something that took a little bit of the wind out of the sails was Kyle dropping this bomb, at least from your perspective of, hey, not only were Camilla and I working together, but, you know, we came up with these things to help turn you and Joe against people like Shaheen.
05:44What was your response to that?
05:45Was that anything you were picking up on while you were out there on the island before day 26?
05:49So I will say that anyone who claims they knew Kyle and Shaheen were as or not that Kyle and Camilla were as close as they they actually were.
05:57They're lying. These people like anyone.
05:59I know an exit press.
06:00Everyone's been like, oh, I had an idea.
06:02Like, I knew that they were really close, just didn't care to do whatever.
06:05Like, no, out there.
06:07It was a it was a shock to everybody because I spent more time with Kyle than anybody.
06:12We were very close.
06:13He's like a brother to me.
06:14He is very similar to my my hockey teammates back home.
06:17So we were always shooting the shit, being very close, like great friends.
06:20He never talked to Camilla.
06:21The times you see on TV of them talking together are the only times that they interacted.
06:25And the audience just perceives this as being a very big, like all the time that they're strategizing together.
06:31No, no, no.
06:32Like he was hanging out with me and like this.
06:34They he would like go go walk one direction and run back to go meet up with Camilla because he didn't want anyone to see them together.
06:40Like he did a great job hiding this.
06:42And so that that was the bomb.
06:44It was not I know like they made it look like that.
06:46It was like, oh, like this idol play was that Shaheen had a fake idol.
06:49That was not what swayed me.
06:51Kyle didn't tell me Shaheen had a fake idol.
06:53Camilla did.
06:53Why would I believe Camilla?
06:54She's not my ally.
06:56Kyle told me the truth, which is that Shaheen was coming for for Joe and I.
07:01He had brought this up at the reward that Shaheen was going to vote for Mitch to make it seem like he was with us, but that it would tie three three and he would swap and and and then get me out.
07:13This was the plan.
07:14So Shaheen voting for Mitch was was still part of his plan with Kyle and Camilla to come after me.
07:21But Kyle told me the truth.
07:23It was this little added idol thing was more to make sure that Joe would not go straight to Shaheen and be like, is this true?
07:29That was for Joe.
07:31That was Camilla's role in this.
07:32I didn't believe that.
07:33I didn't care.
07:34I had an idol.
07:35It was really the fact that Shaheen was coming for me and Joe.
07:38I don't care what he has in his pocket.
07:40I had a million things in my pocket, so it was it was that was not a bomb.
07:44The bomb was definitely just that Kyle and Camilla were so tight and they did a great job of that.
07:50I'm so impressed with both of their acting skills.
07:53I want to talk about another very unique relationship you had out there on the island, which is with Star, who, you know, is your adversary through the first two phases of Loggi.
08:04She gives you the beware advantage that turns into an idol.
08:07You end up targeting her in the post merge.
08:10Then she ends up voting for you.
08:11It's tough for even us to keep track of.
08:13Talk to us about sort of the up and down that the two of you had throughout this game.
08:16Oh, yes.
08:17Yeah, I Star is the most unexpected person in that I've ever met.
08:24She before the game, she stared at a table for five days straight and did not make a peep.
08:31I was not expecting this girl's personality when she gets out there and I am wowed by her.
08:35So first off, love Star.
08:37But in the beginning of the game, I did not like Star because on those first key three days where we're building our shelter, we're meeting each other's group.
08:46Star was like already going and looking for idols.
08:50I am a I'm a I'm a hard worker.
08:52That is my biggest principle is work ethic.
08:54I am carrying the whole forest of bamboo and Star is nowhere to be found.
08:58She'd be gone for an hour, come back with two sticks.
09:01So automatically I was frustrated because I'm like, I'm working my ass off here and you're not doing anything.
09:06So this this kind of put us at odds from the start because she did not care about making relationships with our tribe.
09:12She wanted that that beware advantage and she found it.
09:14And so I wanted her out super early on and she wanted me out for sure, too.
09:18When we go to the swap and then I have this big moment where I share about my life, about autism.
09:26Star also understood me better because Star also had not liked my direct like my my direct way of speaking.
09:32I had said that Star should sit out from this one challenge because she can't swim.
09:37I'm just very logical, straightforward.
09:39And I was not very delicate with that because I'm very bad at that.
09:42That's one of the things I struggle with with my autism is I'm too blunt.
09:45But now Star understood I was not trying to be rude.
09:48I was not trying to be mean to her.
09:50That is just who I am.
09:51That's how I communicate.
09:52She recognized these things and she saw she there was understanding.
09:55And this allowed us to connect and have this amazing exchange where she gave me this idol, which was also a great move for her to get this target off of her back because everyone knew she had it.
10:04That was very smart of her.
10:06But I and we did work together for a while.
10:09Those handful of first votes at the merge, I told Star, I was like, hey, I already have a very public alliance with Joe.
10:14Like, let's keep this under the radar.
10:16Like, I'll tell you who we're voting for.
10:18You give me information from the bottom.
10:19So we were we were talking to each other about stuff.
10:22But then Star started lying to me.
10:26And I I'm a very black and white thinker.
10:28And it's like, you're with me or you're against me.
10:30And when Star started making stuff up, she I I felt that she was trying to take advantage of the fact that I that I'm not good at reading lies.
10:39And I felt she was she was taking advantage of me here.
10:41So I started being like, yeah, I want to start out because she is feeding me direct lies all the time.
10:46And this is part of her.
10:47She was doing this to everybody, not just me, but I took it a little personally.
10:51And additionally, she at one point was going around asking every single person what their final three was.
10:58She went to everybody on the island very direct, like, who's your final three?
11:01She did not come to me.
11:03And I was like, she does not value what my future in this game is.
11:06She is lying to me.
11:08I cannot trust Star anymore.
11:09I know she gave me this idol, but I don't owe her anything because she she does not she does not see me as a player she wants to play with in this game.
11:17So I I then took moves to get her out of the game.
11:19And she respects me for that.
11:21And I respect her for her own game.
11:23And so I'm glad that she was able to to then see who I am and still vote for me in the end.
11:29Well, talking about that episode five episode, for lack of a better term, I mean, you talk about how it's a quick bounce back.
11:34But it is such for many reasons, a moment outside of the game where you reveal this incredibly personal part of yourself.
11:42How did you feel that impacted the way that you approached the rest of the game?
11:48Do you feel like that was like a fundamental moment that changed the way you approach the season?
11:54So I think that it's this moment I was shown so much support by everybody, not just Joe.
12:01Like Joe was obviously my biggest supporter.
12:03I love him so much.
12:04But every person out there, they connected with my story in their own personal way.
12:08They were nodding along.
12:09They like they showed me that they it did not matter to them that I had autism, that they were proud of me and that they saw me as a competitor still, that they were not they did not look at me any differently because of my autism.
12:22And I laid it out in the open that I had this and that I did struggle with social cues, that I did struggle with reading when people are lying.
12:29And so this just even more pushed me into my method of being extremely open and honest with my alliance, that I was like, if I am honest and give my whole heart.
12:38And they recognize that I this is who I am, then they will reflect honesty back at me.
12:43And I had that absolutely happen.
12:46I was very lucky that these people did not take advantage of these things that that I struggle with because they connected with me that I had these social relationships.
12:53So people like Shaheen, Joe and Kyle, they they I was honest.
12:57They were honest back.
12:58And I'm very grateful for that.
13:00So it did kind of push me more into being who I am in this game and not trying to play the skeevy line game, because I knew that the thing that I had been been kind of hiding was out there and I was free to be myself completely.
13:11Yeah.
13:11So on that note, you end up getting to the end with your team as you sort of espouse over the course of the season.
13:17So what has it been like, you know, having those relationships outside again, especially this moment with Joe really does speak to a life moment, not even a game moment.
13:27So what have things been like knowing that that's sort of like eternally kind of bound you to each other, that you are not only a part of each other's survivor journeys, but assumingly, and you can tell me otherwise, you know, life journeys from here on out.
13:40Oh, absolutely. Joe and I, I that is a relationship that I will have forever. I finally was able to meet his amazing wife, Katie, and I am dying to meet his kids soon. And I just I know that we will always be together. We will always we live on opposite ends of the country. I'm in Providence. He's in Sacramento. But we call all the time. And I know that he is always there for me. And I will always be there for him. This is a very strong relationship like nothing else in my life.
14:09And then other relationship, Kyle is what he was a member of this team, too. And Kyle, well, I have this this relationship with Joe that is very almost father daughter like, right? Kyle is like a brother to me that we are sister brother. I'm his little sister. I'm always annoying him and being there for him. I'm making sure the world knows that he peed his pants in that first individual immunity challenge. Yep, he did. He did. And they didn't show it. And that's why I was chirping him about it.
14:34In that next one, we're holding the grip thing because Kyle peed his pants and as his sister. I must tell everybody that. But Kyle is someone that I am even almost even closer with than Joe because we're closer in age. We have this more peer sister brother bond.
14:50And so the two of them in my life now are these two supports that I could not imagine my life without. And I am so grateful for both of them. And it is a relationship that I will have forever.
15:02Well, I sure in terms of support that I'm just, you know, once one amongst the many throng that have been in support of you this entire season, Eva, as has been talked about, it was far from easy to even have you come out there in the first place, given the stuff that we had talked about even beforehand.
15:17And the fact that you were able to get all the way to second place to push through what seems to be some of the hardest moments in your life.
15:24I know you said that first was the goal and, you know, everything else is settling, but you should be so incredibly proud of yourself.
15:31And I know that you've received so much support from so many different people from so many different communities as well.
15:36So congratulations, sincerely.
15:39Thank you so much.
15:40Yeah, I think you have really impacted a lot of people out there.
15:44And that is so incredibly important, especially in today's day and age.
15:48So thank you, as always, for being so open and so honest with me and with everybody else by proxy.
15:54Absolutely. Thanks.
15:55And I, yeah, I didn't win, but, you know, I had always had this team mindset that I want to get my team to the end and my team won.
16:02Joe, Kyle and I, that's my team and my team won.
16:04I didn't get the job, but we did as a group.