World of Big Brother Blog

Yesterday was the final of Expeditie Robinson.  
 
At the previous tribal council, Rita won the second spot in the final, next to Marina. Later today, Jeroen, Dennis and Marcel will battle each other in a final challenge to determine the third finalist. Rita is very happy she reached the final. The men say they never expected her to make it to the finals because she is the weakest and had a lot of trouble with the food. Later, Rita and Marina look back to the start of the show, which started with sixteen women. Marina thinks back of the first challenge she won, with which she won a place in the final and the meeting with the men, while Rita thinks back about the time where the fourteen women lived together on one beach. They are happy that two women made it to the final two.
 
The men are anxious for the final challenge. Jeroen regrets losing the challenge to Rita, he was so close to making the final. Marcel says that winning the final challenge is part of his strategy. He thinks the other men will underestimate him because he is the oldest, but he knows he is stronger than the others think. Before the men go to the challenge, Rita makes a meal for them with loads of snails, salt and rice.
 
Dennis, Jeroen and Marcel go to the final challenge. This consists of many parts. The men have to untie a rope, swim a part, run through a mangrove, do a puzzle, run a bit, collect cubes, build a tower of fifteen cubes, make fire, light a torch and throw this torch into a wok. The first one to throw their torch in the wok wins the challenge and qualifies for the final. When the challenge starts, Jeroen takes an early lead. He unties the rope with no trouble and dives in the water. Marcel is second, followed closely by Dennis. During the swim, Dennis catches Marcel but Marcel overtakes him again. Jeroen keeps his lead and runs to the puzzle. He knows he is not strong at puzzles, which allows Dennis and Marcel to catch up. The men take a long time to do the puzzle, but it is Dennis who is the fastest. Marcel is the second to solve the puzzle while Jeroen keeps having trouble.
 
Dennis manages to collect the cubes and starts building the tower. Marcel catches up to him and collects the cubes, so he can start building as well. In the meantime, it seems that Jeroen has given up on the puzzle. He complains that the puzzle is not fair and it’s silly to lose the final on a puzzle. Marcel starts building the tower at the moment Dennis tower collapse, so they are at equal footing. Finally Jeroen manages to solve the puzzle and runs to Dennis and Marcel, who have a lot of trouble with building the tower. Jeroen manages to build the tower in one go but when he walks away, the tower collapses. Dennis has also build his tower, but his also collapses. Jeroen is quick in rebuilding his tower and is allowed to continue. Dennis rebuilds his tower as well and leaves Marcel, who keeps going and finally manages to build his tower so he can start to make fire. When he arrives with Dennis and Marcel, he sees neither of them has fire so they are at equal footing again. Marcel knows very well how to make fire and catches one. Soon after, Jeroen also gets fire while Dennis has none. The fires of Jeroen and Marcel have to burn through a rope, which Marcel’s fire does first. He can pick up a torch and light it. For the final part of the challenge, he has to throw the torch in a wok on the water. He has ten tries for this. He misses the first try, but since Jeroen’s rope hasn’t burned through he can go for a second time. Again he misses, so he goes for his third try. He throws this against the wok, but not in. He tries to get his fourth torch, but Jeroen has burned through his rope and can throw his first torch.
 
Jeroen misses! So Marcel can throw his fourth torch, but again throws it against the wok instead of into it. Jeroen can throw for a second time and also throws his against the wok instead of into it. Marcel has his fifth go and makes the same mistake again. Jeroen goes for the third time and misses again. Marcel can go for the sixth time, while Dennis still hasn’t made fire. Six turns out to be the lucky number: Marcel throws his torch in the wok and wins the challenge. Marcel will go to the final with Rita and Marina, while Jeroen and Dennis are eliminated. Marcel is in tears, he cannot believe he made it to the finals as oldest contestant. When he arrives back at the camp, Marina and Rita welcome him with open arms. Marcel is happy to spend the last day with two women and no men. They spend their final night with tearing down the camp and burning all their stuff. The next day, the finalists prepare for the final. Marina is sad because she has to leave the island. Marcel is not nervous for the final tribal council, while Rita is happy that she has achieved what she wanted to achieve. But now she made it to the final, she obviously wants to win.
 
The finalists arrive at the final tribal council, where they meet the jury, consisting of Simone, Igor, Marjolein, Kurt, Esmeralda, Dennis and Jeroen. After questions of the hosts, Rita says she is very happy to have made the finals. When the merge happened she was feeling very weak but she didn’t want to quit. She didn’t want to come this far and then quit. She hopes her body will be able to recover. Marina was the outsider of this show because she made it to the final after the first challenge. She is happy to be in the final because it has been enough. She says she is not a quitter. She thinks many people will think she had it easy because she was already a finalist, but mentally it was a big challenge to come this far. Marcel says that he didn’t sleep this night because he kept thinking about the challenge. He is proud because he played the game the way he wanted. He used strategy when he needed to and apologizes to Esmeralda because she hurt him. Esmeralda drops in and asks him if he can live with the idea of being a traitor. Marcel denies that he is a traitor because he thinks it was between Esmeralda and him to be eliminated. For some reason it’s the only question the jury asks, because the jury has to vote now. Igor, Esmeralda, Marjolein, Kurt, Simone, Dennis and Jeroen vote. Without seeing how they voted and what their reasons where, the votes are revealed. Then it is shown that Marina didn’t receive any votes. She finishes in third place. Then it is shown that both Rita and Marcel have two votes. The next one to receive a vote is Marcel. When he also gets a fourth vote, he is revealed to be the winner of Expeditie Robinson 2009! 
 
Votes:
Esmeralda & Simone voted for Rita, all others voted for Marcel.
 
Own opinion: I’m very surprised about Marcel winning. The show was putting Jeroen on a pedestal so I was sure he would win. When he got eliminated, I thought Rita would get the votes, but I had no idea that Marcel would get all these votes.

After the voting, Dennis and Esmeralda are very angry. Marcel, Marina and Jeroen don’t dare to talk with the two and go to the sea to catch some fish. In the meanwhile, Dennis is complaining a lot about everything and makes fun of Marcel because he apparently doesn’t have friends waiting for him at home. Later, Jeroen goes to Dennis and explains him why he voted for him. Dennis is not happy with the explanation and says Jeroen has always said that he wanted to go to the finals with the strongest people and now went against his word. When all candidates are present at dinner, Marcel asks Dennis if he wants to talk. Dennis refuses, because he is angry Marcel didn’t come to him. Marcel says Dennis could’ve come to him if he wanted to talk, after which Dennis says he doesn’t want to talk and walks away. Before they have to battle in the elimination challenge, Dennis and Esmeralda promise each other that whoever wins, will do everything in their power to make sure that Marcel and Marina do not win the game.
 
The elimination battle is won by Dennis. Esmeralda is in tears when she has to leave, but is not angry anymore. She is happy with the things she achieved in the game and hopes Dennis or Rita wins. Dennis, because he is her best friend, and Rita, because many people underestimate her: they think she physically the weakest girl, but is mentally the strongest. When Dennis arrives back at camp, he immediately goes to Rita and complains to her about Marcel and Marina. Rita doesn’t want to hear this, she wants to spend the final days in the game in peace, without the constant gossiping, but Dennis keeps on going with the complaints.
 
During the challenge, the candidates battle for a positive vote at tribal council. The candidates have to hang from a pole. Marcel is the first one to fall, followed by Jeroen. Dennis and Rita are the final two in the challenge. The last one to fall is Dennis, so Rita wins the positive vote. Rita is extremely happy with the victory, it’s the first time she wins an individual challenge. Besides the positive vote, she also wins a stay in a hotel, where she can sleep, eat and go watch elephants, an experience she also enjoys.
 
At tribal council, the candidates discuss the voting for Dennis and Esmeralda again and talk about how difficult it is for Marina to not take part in any challenge because she already has a place in the final. But, after today she will not be the only person in the final. The candidates will vote for who will be the second finalist. Rita already has one vote, the one she won in the challenge. After this, the surprised contestants cast their vote: Marina votes for Marcel, because they have been friends since the beginning. Rita votes for Jeroen because she thinks he is the strongest player. The votes of Jeroen, Dennis and Marcel are not shown. When the host reveals the votes, it is shown that Jeroen and Rita both have two votes, while Marcel and Dennis have one. Because of the tie, Jeroen and Rita will take part in a challenge. The winner is sure of a place in the final. The challenge is a fire challenge: the candidates have to watch a fire. When the fire goes out, the candidates have to put their hand on a symbol. The first one to do so, goes to the final. When the fire goes out, both Jeroen and Rita put their hands on the symbol, but it is quickest is… Rita. With Marina, she is sure of a place in the finals. The three remaining men will battle next week for the third and final spot in the final. 
  
For the voting, it went like this:
Dennis –> Jeroen
Jeroen –> Dennis
Marcel –> Rita
Marina –> Marcel
Rita –> Jeroen

(After the show, Marcel’s vote for Rita was shown, so only the second vote for Jeroen and the vote for Dennis are unknown and because people couldn’t vote for themselves, they must have voted for each other).

Blog post by Arthur

Episode 12

Jeroen and Kurt take part in a battle to stay in the show. It’s the toughest and longest battle so far, with the tower of cubes almost reaching the length of the two men. At the end, it’s Kurt who loses the game by bad luck: a wind blows the tower over. Jeroen wins and gets to stay in the game. Meanwhile, Rita is having major trouble with the lack of food. She has lost a lot of weight (she is so thin that it is almost scary to look at) but does not want to leave the game. She is so close to the finals that she really wants to stay. She survives by trying not to think about food, although that is difficult because everybody is always talking about food.

When Jeroen arrives back at camp, Marina is very disappointed. Not only because a strong player returned but also because the other candidates pretend to be happy to see him. According to Marina they are hypocrites: first they vote him off and not they pretend to be happy to see him. Jeroen asks the other candidates to not vote for him at the next tribal council because he has taken part in two tribals already. Esmeralda is not impressed by this and still wants to vote for him, but Marcel is open for suggestions. He knows that Dennis and Esmeralda are strong people as well and asks Jeoren if he would be interested in voring for them. Even though Jeroen has always said that he is not interested in the tactical game, he realizes that he will not win if he does not play the game. Later, Marcel talks with Esmeralda and tries to get her to turn on her best friend, Dennis. He tells her that he would never vote for her and he hopes that she will do the same.

At the immunity challenge, the candidates have to go through an obstacle course. At the end of the course are four meals and one mystery price. The fastest person gets to choose their price, followed by the second fastest and so on. Jeroen is the fastest and picks the mystery price. Marcel is second and picks an hamburger with french fries. Esmeralda is third and picks the pizza. Dennis is fourth and goes for the chocolate and Rita is last and wins a sandwich with cheese. Once everybody has eaten, Jeroen receives the mystery price. He hopes that this is a challenge, but it turns out to be an extra vote. He is not happy with this, he says one vote for or less won’t make a difference. After this, the candidates take part in the immunity challenge. For this, the candidates have to guess how much time they took to go through the challenge. At tribal council it will be revealed who was closest to their true time and wins the challenge.

After the challenge, the candidates compare their times. Marcel finds out that he is way off and will probably not win the immunity. He is very disappointed abuot this. Marina is also very disappointed because the other candidates got to eat and she had to go without again (as guaranteed finalist she cannot take part in the challenges). Later there is a twist: the candidates can give up the individual immunity in exchange for fruit. All but one candidate (Jeroen) vote in favor of this, but the other candidates convince him to also give up his chance for immunity. Everybody can eat some fruit, but Jeroen says he is sure that he will get the most votes at tribal council again and complains some more about this.

Right before the candidates go to tribal council, Marcel talks with Jeroen and tries to convince him to vote for Dennis and Esmerlada. He says he will get Marina to go with them so they can eliminate Dennis or Esmeralda. At tribal council, the hosts show who would have won individual immunity if the candidates had not gone for the food. This turns out to be Esmeralda, who was five seconds off. After this, the candidates vote and these are revealed. It turns out that Marcel, Rita and Jeroen have two votes and that Dennis has three and Esmeralda four. Dennis & Esmeralda will battle eachother in the next challenge.

So in details the voting:
Dennis = Marcel & Rita
Esmeralda = Jeroen & Rita
Jeroen = Dennis & Esmeralda & Esmeralda
Marcel = Dennis & Esmeralda
Marina = Dennis & Esmeralda
Rita = Jeroen & Marcel

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 11

The elimination battle, of putting cubes on top of eachother, is won by Rita. Marjolein is not able to place the seventh cube on the sixth, which makes the tower collapse. She has to go, something she regrets but she is also happy with the things she achieved. When Rita arrives back at camp, she is welcomed greatly by the other candidates who are much happier to see her than they would be to see Marjolein.

Back at camp, Marina attacks Jeroen because Jeroen said at the last tribal council that he thinks he is received votes because the other candidates think he is too strong and the other candidates would rather go to the end with their friends than with someone strong. Marina says she didn’t vote for Jeroen because he is strong and says he’s arrogant to say that he is the strongest. Nobody backs Jeroen up, which upsets him. Later he notices that his old friend Kurt spends more time with Marina and Marcel. He thinks he is losing all his friends because of tactical reasons, people don’t want to be around someone who receives many votes. Meanwhile, Kurt, Marina and Marcel discuss the voting and say they want Jeroen and Dennis to receive the most votes at the next tribal council. Jeroen, because they don’t like him, and Dennis, because he is playing too many sides.

For the immunity challenge, the candidates get a certain number of balls in a “tube”. The challenge is to grab one ball from your own tube, climb a construction and put the ball in someone else’s tube. When someone has twenty balls in their tube, they are eliminated and the person with the most balls after fifteen minutes is eliminated as well. This continues until one person is left. At the beginning of the challenge, Esmeralda, Dennis, Rita and Jeroen take out Kurt. The next one out is Jeroen. A while later, the fifteen minutes are up and because Marcel & Rita are tied for number of balls, both are elimnated. Esmeralda and Dennis continue to fight, but fifteen minutes later it is obvious that Esmeralda has more balls so she is eliminated. Dennis wins the challenge. He also wins an extra price: he gets to meet someone’s loved one. At the previous tribal council, one name was drawn and the loved one of that person is the one Dennis will meet. He obviously hopes that this will be his boyfriend, but it turns out to be the wife of Kurt. Dennis and Kurt’s wife go to a little resort, where Dennis can eat what he wants and can tell Kurt’s wife all about her husband. When the meeting is over, he tells everything to Kurt who is really happy to hear something from home.

Later, Dennis and Jeroen have a discussion where Jeroen complains that he might be eliminated because he lost immunity. Dennis explains him that it is smart to vote for the strongest people because otherwise he will be eliminated. Jeroen takes something else from the conversation: because he thinks he will get the most votes, he thinks it is smart to vote for people who will get a lot of votes, so there will be more people in the elimination battle and his chances of being eliminated get smaller (why he doesn’t just make an alliance, I don’t know. It’s probably his holier-than-thou attitude). Marcel and Kurt also discuss the voting. Marcel explains that he will try his best to keep Kurt in the game because Kurt has said he will never vote for him. He will cast his votes for people who may get the most votes, so Kurt will be saved.

At tribal council, everybody does what they have been doing all along (which kinda makes all the conversations useless) and vote for the people who have received votes. When these are revealed, it turns out that Esmeralda has 0, Marcel has 1 and Rita has 3. Kurt has 4 and Jeroen 6, so the two men will battle eachother in the elimination battle.

Since Jeroen had 6 votes, everybody voted for him. Other votes shown were Jeroen & Rita voting for Kurt. I think Marcel, Marina and Kurt voted for Rita, so Dennis & Esmeralda would be the other voters for Kurt and Jeroen voted for Marcel.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 10

At the previous tribal council, Kurt, Igor and Marjolein received the most votes. Kurt doesn’t understand this at all and blames Dennis & Esmeralda. They are the cooks at the camp and he is sure those two do more than just cook. Marjolein understands why she got the most votes and doesn’t really mind: if she has to go, she has to go. Before the elimination battle, Igor goes meditating to prepare his mind for the challenge. When the challenge begins (build a tower of cubes, the person who makes this tower collapse is eliminated), he is not nervous at all. Nevertheless, it’s Igor who loses after Marjolein does a tactical move and places a cube in a manner which makes it very difficult to place a new cube on top of it. Igor is disappointed that he has to go. He says he won’t miss the people, but will miss the island.

The candidates get a letter which states that on top of the hill on the island, there are six flags. The six people to grab a flag can take part in the immunity challenge. The seventh person has to stay behind with Marina on the island. Marjolein immediately runs away and is followed by the other people. It’s Rita who is the slowest one because she is not wearing shoes and cannot run through the jungle. When Marjolein, Kurt, Marcel, Jeroen, Esmeralda and Dennis have grabbed their flags, Dennis and Esmeralda complain once again. This time about Marjolein, who is lazy around camp but suddenly had the strength to climb up the mountain.

For the immunity challenge, the six who grabbed a flag are divided in two teams: Kurt, Jeroen and Dennis on one team and Esmeralda, Marjolein and Marcel in the other team. The challenge consists of three parts: a strength part, a puzzle and an individual part, where the winning team compete for individual immunity. The three men easily beat the two woman and oldest man in the strength part, but the women and Marcel are much stronger in the puzzle and continue with the individual part. Here Marjolein takes an early lead, but it’s Esmeralda who beats her and wins individual immunity.

It’s not just immunity that Esmeralda wins: the hosts have got letters from home. Esmeralda gets her letter and can select two other people to get a letter. The letters of the people she doesn’t choose will be burnt for everyone to see. Esmeralda picks her friend Dennis and Marina, because she cannot take part in the challenges. Marjolein, Kurt, Marcel and Jeroen have to watch how the letters, drawings and photo’s their family, children and friends send them are burnt.

Back at camp, there are the usual tears because of the letters and complaints about the work Marjolein isn’t doing. Right before the team goes to the tribal council, Esmeralda confronts Marjolein with the complaints. Marjolein bursts out in tears when she says she doesn’t understand why she is strong in the challenges but weak around camp. She tells Esmeralda that she is really doing all she can, but her body isn’t strong enough. This touches Esmeralda who feels sorry for Marjolein and decides not to vote for her at tribal council. That doesn’t matter, as all other people vote for Marjolein and she gets the most votes. The second person with the most votes is Rita, the other weak person around camp. Right before the voting, Jeroen and Kurt told the hosts that they want to make the finals with the strongest people, so the weakest people get voted out. While the other candidates leave, Marjolein and Rita stay behind to take part in the elimination battle.

As for the full voting results, it probably went like this:
Dennis = Marjolein & Rita
Esmeralda = Kurt & Jeroen
Jeroen = Marjolein & Rita
Kurt = Marjolein & Rita
Marcel = Jeroen & Marjolein
Marina = Jeroen & Marjolein
Marjolein = Kurt & Rita
Rita = Kurt & Marjolein
Not too sure, as it seems unlikely that Dennis would vote for the two weakest girls as he voted for the strongest men before, but since he was attacked for voting for the stronger men, he might have changed his strategy. The votes for Kurt are most unclear because he is hardly in the show and we don’t know for sure who likes/dislikes him.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 9

At tribal council, Simone and Jeroen received the most votes. This means they will compete in a battle and the loser of the battle will leave the game. Since the battle will take place the day after tribal council, Jeroen and Simone get to spend a few more hours with their team. During these hours, Jeroen asks Dennis why he voted for him. Dennis says he thought there was an alliance between Jeroen and Simone, which Jeroen denies. He doesn’t stay mad with the team, soon he is friends with everybody again. Simone is less happy: she warns everybody for Dennis & Esmeralda, according to her, they are the people they have to watch out for.

The next day, Simone and Jeroen battle in a challenge. For the challenge, they have to put cubes on top of each other until the tower of cubes collapses. The person who makes the tower collapse, has to leave the show. The unlucky one is Simone, so for the eleventh time in a row, a women leaves the game.

After Jeroen returns to camp, the candidates compete in an immunity challenge. This is a wrestling match: the men have to wrestle on a little platform and the women on another platform. The task it to push the members of the same sex of the platform and swim to a central platform, to grab the immunity necklace. The fastest person wins. The battle between the men is a short one, after all men push Igor of the platform, Jeroen manages to push the other men off. At the women platform, Rita is the first one to be pushed off. Esmeralda and Marjolein battle each other for a long time, but since Jeroen has already pushed all men off, he can swim to the immunity necklace and wins. Besides the immunity, he also wins a trip to the capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lampur. He can take one women with him and chooses Rita.

In Kuala Lumpur, Rita and Jeroen have the time of their lives. They can eat and drink what they want, can wash themselves and see themselves in a mirror for the first time in a very long time. Rita is shocked when she sees herself, she has lost a lot of weight.

The other candidates, who stayed behind on the island, discuss the next voting. Igor and Marjolein know they will vote for each other in hopes of not being the one who gets the most votes. Dennis and Esmeralda also discuss the voting. Dennis complains that Marjolein doesn’t do any work and wants to vote for her. In the meantime, Marcel and Kurt manage to catch a goanna. Earlier, Marcel caught a little shark, so the team has enough to eat.

After Jeroen and Rita returned from Kuala Lumpur (in new clothing), the team goes to tribal council. There, Marina complains about her place in the final. She cannot compete in the challenges and says the show is a little bit boring for her because there is no excitement for her. Kurt tells the other candidates that he does not want to make alliances and Marcel says he plans on winning the game by making friends with the other candidates. After this, the votes are cast. Marcel votes for Dennis because he thinks he is too friendly with the other candidates, Esmeralda votes for Kurt because she doesn’t trust him, Marjolein votes for Igor because he is an outcast and Jeroen votes for Marjolein because she does the least work around camp.

When the votes are counted, it turns out that Marcel and Esmeralda have no votes, Dennis has one, Rita has three, Kurt and Marjolein have four and Igor has six. This means that Kurt, Marjolein and Igor will compete in a battle and the loser will have to leave the show.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 8

The show starts where it ended last week: team Noord and team Zuid come together for what they think is the merge. However, only ten of them will make it to the merge and three will be eliminated. Who this will be is decided by a fire-making challenge. The only person who won’t take part is Marina: she is already a finalist and cannot take part in any of the challenges. She is sent to the beach where she can prepare a feast for the ten winners. The other twelve start the challenge. The challenge is to make a fire tall enough to burn through a rope. Once the rope is burned, the candidates have to grab their bag and run through a jungle. The first eight people to put their bag in the chest the men carried through the jungle a few episodes ago will go to the merge.

The first person to make fire is Marjolein, followed by Jeroen and Jill. Of the three, Marjolein is the only one to make her fire tall enough to burn through the rope. She grabs her bag and runs. The fires of Jeroen and Jill stop burning, whil Kurt, Marcel and Igor all make fire and burn through the rope. They also grab their bags and run to the jungle, where Marjolein is the first one to put her bag in the chest. She can continue walking to the beach, where Marina has started a barbecue. She is followed by the three men, Kurt, Marcel and Igor. Later, Dennis, Rita and Simone also arrive at the beach. Seven people have finished the challenge, only one more will qualify. Jeroen is the first one to make fire and runs to the jungle, but is closely followed by Yolanda. Jeroen wins the sprint and is the eigth one to place his bag in the chest.

The four losers are Yolanda, Jill, Eva and Esmeralda. The four will battle in a final challenge to determine who gets the last place in the merge. For the challenge, they have to build a tower of blocks. The one who builds the tallest tower in two minutes wins. Yolanda takes an early lead and is followed by Eva. Both towers collapse after one minute. Esmeralda is then in the lead and because her tower does not collapse, she wins the challenge and is the last person to qualify for the merge. The three losers are Yolanda, Jill and Eva, who have to leave the show.

The ten people who made it to the merge, Dennis, Esmeralda, Igor, Jeroen, Kurt, Marcel, Marina, Marjolein, Rita and Simone, take part in a huge feast. During the feast, Marcel drinks too much and is awake the whole night, talking gibberish. The following day, the other candidates start working while Marcel is still sleeping. He has an headache and wants to take a ‘day off’ to recover. While working, Igor takes off with a coconut again. Dennis sees him drinking the coconut and later accuses him of stealing. The whole team gets involved in the argument, which ends with Kurt making fun of Igor, which upsets Igor who calls him a stupid clown.

The immunity challenge is one where they have to eat horrible food. The candidates battle in three heats and the three winners of the heats qualify for the final. The first heat is between Dennis, Esmeralda and Igor. Igor wins this easily and beats the two people who he continuously argues with. The second heat is between Jeroen, Marcel and Marjolein and is – to the surprise of many – won by Marjolein. The third heat is between Simone, Kurt and Rita and is won by Simone. The three winners battle eachother in the final. This turns into a big battle between Simone and Igor, one that is won by Igor. He wins immunity and cannot be voted out. The other candidates are not happy with this, they all wanted to vote him out.

Back at the camp, people talk a lot about who they want to voted out. The two names that are mentioned the most are Marjolein, who works the least, and Simone, who curses too much. When the ten candidates arrive at the tribal council, there is a twist however. Rather than casting one vote, the candidates will cast two votes and the two people who receive the most votes will battle eachother in a challenge. The winner will remain in the game, while the loser has to go. The candidates cast their votes and when these are counted, it’s Simone who has the most votes. To the surprise of many viewers, Jeroen has the second most votes. He got these votes because he was the closest friend of Simone. This means that Simone and Jeroen will battle eachother in a challenge. The loser goes home. Who wins will be shown in the next episode.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 7

In team South, there are three women with mental and physical problems. Eva and Sabine are very homesick and doubt whether they can continue. Rita has physical problems: she hasn’t been to the toilet in eleven days and feels like she is about to explode. Nevertheless, she wants to continue and tries to work with the other candidates. Jill also shows her face for the second time in seven episodes, when Kurt compliments her for the work she has been doing.

In team North, the atmosphere is still horrible. Because Igor spends a lot of time on his own, Marjolein tries to talk to him. During this talk, Igor explains that he decided to take part in the show to see whether he can act in a group. As a kid, he was picked on because he was very small, and when he became older, he grew a lot and became a bully himself. He was never part of any group during his youth nor during his adult years.

For the immunity challenge, one person of every tribe has to stand in a small chest, while the other candidates transfer icecubes over the beach and have to throw them in the chest as well. When the person in the chest is completely covered with icecubes, the team wins. In team North it’s Igor who goes in the chest and in team South, it’s Rita. Both to prove that they can be of use for their team during a challenge. At the beginning of the challenge, it’s a close race but eventually team North takes the lead and keeps it. They win immunity and team South has to vote someone out.

Team North celebrates their victory with a feast. During the feast Igor seems to be accepted as part of the team. He tries to act a bit more social, which seems to pay off. Except for Marcel, who says that he doesn’t think Igor is worthy of still being in the show. According to him, the most worthy people are Esmeralda, Marina, Dennis and Marjolein, while Igor and Yolanda can leave the tribe.

In team South, Rita has a horrible night because of her gut-problems. The following morning she feels awful, until Jeroen offers her a cup of tea. Because of the tea (I have no idea how to describe this tastefully), she can finally take a poo again and does so immediately: in middle of the camp. She couldn’t stop it and shat over all the camp. Even though she made a lot of mess, she feels a lot better after this and thinks she is strong enough to continue with the show. Eva and Sabine don’t think they are, both spend their time sleeping on the beach because they want to go home. Sabine is still very annoyed by this and tells the women that she would rather vote both of them out.

At a quick tribal council, it is Sabine who receives all the votes (while she votes for Rita) and has to leave, much to her delight.

The following morning, both teams receive a letter telling them to pack all their stuff. Both tribes realize that the merge is coming. In team North everybody is happy with this news, except for Marcel, who didn’t want Igor to make the merge. Team South is very happy to leave the island, there was no food left in their camp and most of them haven’t eaten in a very long time.

Both teams arrive at the new island and are greeted by the hosts. They say that there is a twist, even though this is the island where the merge will take place, not all candidates will make it to the merge. There is a challenge first and the three people who finish last in this challenge will have to leave. Marina is the only one who doesn’t have to take part, as she won the very first challenge and is qualified for the final already. She can move on to the beach and start a barbecue, while the other twelve candidates battle for the remaining nine spots in the merge.

Who makes it, will be shown in the next episode.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 6

Both teams got the assignment to choose their three strongest candidates. In team South, Rita says everybody needs to name the three people they think are the strongest. Jeroen, Kurt and Simone are mentioned the most often.

In team North, Esmeralda and Igor both say they are the strongest. The majority agrees with Esmeralda, but disagrees with Igor and Marcel and Dennis are chosen in his place.

For the immunity challenge, both teams have to throw eggs up a ladder. The person on top of the ladder has to take the egg and go down a slide with the egg, in order to place it in an egg holder. The team who transfers ten eggs without breaking one wins the immunity. Team North takes an early lead, but it is team South who closes the gap quickly and eventually wins. As special price, the three people who were selected to be the strongest can go to a resort, where they can wash themselves and send an e-mail home. Eva and Rita are upset that only the strongest people can go because they are in big need of some contact with home.

Team North has to vote. Igor, who is the outsider of the group, shows his strength by collecting a lot of food. Marcel is not happy with the job Igor is doing, because he thinks Igor is wasting strength and he doesn’t like the food Igor brings with him.

When the three strongest people of South arrive back at camp, they are welcomed with open arms. This doesn’t last long, when Eva gets emotional again. This annoys Simone, who says that someone who gets this emotional should not take part in this show. Sabine disagrees and the two women have an argument. This ends when Kurt catches a stingray and the team has enough to eat for another day.

In team North, Igor gets in more trouble when Yolanda accuses him of drinking too much juice from the coconuts. The team goes to tribal council, where Igor doesn’t get any votes. Esther is voted out unanimously because she asked, she wanted to leave for quite a few days now. After the tribal council, Esmeralda, Marcel and Dennis from team North want to make an expedition across the island, but return in an hour. It turns out that they found a lot of empty coco-nutshells. They think that Igor, who goes away to the jungle every day, has eaten a lot of coconuts when he was in the jungle rather than sharing this with the team. When they arrive back at camp, it turns out Igor has also eaten all the coconut the team was cooking. This leads to an explosive fight between Igor and Dennis & Esmeralda, where Igor accuses Dennis of talking behind his back rather than to his face and Igor gets angry at Esmeralda when she tells him that he should not curse. Marina and Yolanda have to butt in and end the fight before it gets out of hand. After the fight, Dennis and Marcel agree that Igor finally showed his true colours and they cannot wait to vote him out.

My personal opinion on the fight is that everybody was in the wrong: Dennis for being a drama queen and talking behind Igor’s back so Igor never had a chance to say what he thought, Esmeralda, for not explaining why Igor was accused of stealing wood, and Igor, for his explosive replies. All in all, it didn’t do good for Igor’s position in the game.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 5

The episode started with a tribal council: the three people who thought the show is too difficult for them went to tribal council: Birgit, Carine and Esther. At tribal, the host told them that only one of the three would go home and the three had to discuss who this would be. Birgit was selected because she refused to go back to camp.

The men and Marina received a letter and were told that they had to pick two men who would go to the women’s tribe and had to pick four women who would come to their tribe. Because none of the men wanted to go to the other tribe, they drew and Kurt and Jeroen were the unlucky ones. After this, Dennis, Igor, Marcel and Marina decided to pick Esmeralda, Esther, Marjolein and Yolanda for their new tribe. They became team Noord, while the Kurt & Jeroen joined the other seven women to join team Zuid.

At the immunity challenge the two new tribes formed. But there was a twist: because one team had one extra person, that tribe had to decide who would leave the show right away. Carine volunteered and was taken out of the show. The two new tribes battled in a challenge and team Noord won. So team Zuid had to vote someone out.

The two new men, Kurt and Jeroen, worked their hardest to prove to the women that they deserved to stay in the show. Sabine got along great with the new men, but the other women had other problems. Carolien got really sick: she lost a lot of weight and was feeling really weak.

At tribal council, it was an unanimous vote. Everybody voted for Carolien, while she voted for Eva. Carolien left the island and finally got the chance to eat again.

For interest, a short description of the people who are left in the show:

Dennis = The male narrator. He was the one who narrated the walk through the jungle the men made. He is also the one who is most keen on voting Igor out, who is the outsider between the men.

Esmeralda = The leader. Everybody is extremly positive about her, she is by far the strongest women in the show and everybody has loads of respect for her. She was able to lead strong-willed people like Carine and Sabine, who were the previous leaders of the show.

Esther = The social girl. She does yoga and wants the teams to be one happy team. When the other women ignored Carine, she was the only one who talked with her and tried to make her part of the tribe again. She misses her family a lot and tried to quit a couple of times.

Eva = The silent girl. During the first night she got in an argument with Carine because she had said that she didn’t think Carine was a positive person. After this argument, Carine voted her as the weakest person and she was almost eliminated in the first challenge. After that, she never received much attention again.

Igor = The loner. He spends a lot of time on his own, walking though the jungle and looking for food. He doesn’t seem to have a good relationship with the other men, who talked about voting him off if they had to.

Jeroen = The survivor. Of the men, he seems to be the strongest and know the most about how to survive. He is now the big favorite to win, although we don’t know if he is able to play a strategic game.

Jill = The sky one. Another ignored person, who was only shown during the third immunity challenge, where she was in an important position and failed, which made her team loose the challenge.

Kurt = The forgotten. I don’t remember anything he did except for working really hard to be accepted by the women.

Marcel = The dirty old man. He was not happy when he found out he would start the show with only men because he really wanted to meet some women. Especially the young women. He was disappointed when Marina arrived at their beach because he was hoping for a younger person (even though Marina is seven years younger than he is), but the two now seem to get along fine.

Marina = The finalist. She won the first immunity challenge and automatically qualified for the final. She spend a night alone on a beach before the men arrived and showed there that the victory was not just luck, she was capable of surviving alone. But she was really happy when the men arrived, she got along much better with them.

Marjolein = The positive who turned negative. The first few episodes she was really happy to be on the island, but now she is done with the show because she is too hungry and she can’t stand the negative atmosphere between the other women.

Rita = The girl with the black eye. We don’t know much about her, except that during the first challenge, someone kicked her in the eye when she was swimming and she got a black eye.

Sabine = The harsh woman. She was the leader of first team Noord, where she tried to make an alliance with the younger girls. When one of these girls quit the alliance she got really angry and said she would murder the girl if she didn’t get voted out. But she got and after the voting, the teams merged after which she kinda disappeared.

Simone = The horny girl. She was voted out first by her tribe, but in a twist she was sent to the island and got to lead her camp for a while. She handled this slightly better then Carine did and was eventually accepted by her team. She is the one who longed the most for men, not only for their strength but also because she is desparate for some attention.

Yolanda = The potty mouth, she says what she thinks, but gets along with most of the other younger women.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 4

Team Noord and Team Zuid come together on Island Zuid (don’t know the exact names of the islands).

After two days with loads of complaining and crying, Marina goes back to Island Noord because she was the first finalist and has to ‘prove herself’ whether she is worthy of the final.

Back on the island, Doreen has trouble breathing. The medics check on her and decide that she has to leave the island for medical reasons.

The men finally finish their task and become part of the expedition. They join Marina on Island Noord and together they form team Noord. So the teams are now:
Noord = Dennis, Igor, Jeroen, Kurt, Marcel, Marina
Zuid = Birgit, Carine, Carolien, Esmeralda, Esther, Eva, Jill, Marjolein, Rita, Sabine, Simone, Yolanda

The women finally meet the men for a first immunity challenge. The men win this one and the women have to vote one of their own out. But because three women ask to be voted out, there is a twist. Only the women who want to leave have to go to tribal council. Everybody thinks that the three women will get to leave the island, as they wish. What really happens will be shown in the next episode.

The preview of the next episode showed that the three women who want to leave have to vote one of their own out. The three who went to tribal council are probably (we didn’t see them yet, but from the words we can derive this): Birgit (who got in a fight with Carine and doesn’t want to be on the island with her), Carine (who has no contact with the other women and people complain about her a lot) and Esther (who is homesick). We do know Carine returns to the island, so either Birgit or Esther will be voted out.

Blog Post by Arthur

Episode 2

Five men were introduced, Dennis, Igor, Jeroen, Kurt and Marcel.

They had a task: they had to carry a chest with all the backpacks of the women (with their clothing) through the jungle. All the episode consisted of them walking through the jungle.

Episode 3
The men are still walking.

The women did a challenge, which was won by team Zuid. Team Noord voted one of their own out:

Birgit voted for Marjolein
Carolien voted for Lianne
Lianne voted for Simone
Marina voted for Lianne
Marjolein voted for Lianne
Sabine voted for Lianne
Simone voted for Lianne
Who voted for Marjolein is not 100% sure, but I assume it is Birgit.

Lianne went because she made an alliance with Simone, Birgit and Carolien and the women agreed to vote Sabine out. Later Lianne disagreed with the alliance and didn’t think it was fair to make one, which upset Simone, who turned the tables and got Lianne voted out.

After tribal council, it was announced that the six remaining women will join the eight women in team Zuid.

Blog post by Arthur

This season started off with 16 contestants and they are all women. Here’s what happened in the first episode:

The women were divided in two teams: team Noord were Bea, Birgit, Carolien, Lianne, Marina, Marjolein, Sabine and Simone, team Zuid were Carine, Doreen, Esmeralda, Esther, Eva, Jill, Rita en Yolanda.

24 hours after they met eachother (which they did at the plane and during the trip to the island, so before they actually set foot on the island), the women had to vote one of their own off.

In team Noord, Birgit had 1 vote, Bea and Marina 2 and Simone 3 votes. In team Zuid Doreen had 2 votes, Carine and Yolanda had 3. The six other women had to decide who of Carine and Yolanda had to leave and they voted for Carine because Yolanda was more optimistic.

Of course Simone and Carine didn’t have to leave, they went to the islands first and got a special task to do. In the meanwhile, the other 14 women competed in a challenge to decide who would be the first finalist of Expeditie Robinson. Third was Carolien, second was Simone and winner was Marina.

After the challenge all women went to the islands, saw the person they just voted off and did their jobs. After two days the two women who were voted out had to do their task: they had to rank the other women in their camp on base of who was the strongest.

In team Noord, Sabine said that Simone was the strongest person and Bea was the weakest (other results not known).

In team Zuid, Carine ranked the other women as follows: 1. Esmeralda (strongest) / 2. Jill / 3. Esther / 4. Yolanda / 5. Rita / 6. Doreen / 7. Eva (weakest)

After this, there was an elimination challenge and the team who lost the challenge would loose one member: the person who was put last on the strength-list. The challenge was won by team Zuid, which means that Bea of team Noord had to leave the show.

After this, it was announced that five men would have to do a task and if they succeed, they will become participants as well. Whether they will succeed, will be known in episode 2.

Elimination 1
Sambang lost the immunity challenge:

Unfortunately there was no tribal council, but the team got one day to to decide which of them would leave. They decided to all write down a name on a piece of paper, but we never got to see who wrote down which name. But two players said in later episodes who they voted for: HiuKwan voted for Hicham and Prince voted for HiuKwan.

The results of the first voting (known because the pieces of paper were read on camera, but without revealing who voted for who):

Claudia = 1
Geert T = 0
Hicham = 1
HiuKwan = 2 (with two capitals )
Marleen = 3
Prince = 0
Sarah = 0
Wim = 1

Wim was probably the second vote for HiuKwan (I read an interview in which he said he really didn’t get along with her and wanted to vote for her every tribal council), but there is no official confirmation.

EDIT: These were the full results (supplied by HiuKwan):
Hicham voted for HiuKwan
Sarah voted for Marleen
Marleen voted for Wim
Geert T voted for Marleen
Wim voted for Marleen
Prince voted for HiuKwan
Claudia voted for Claudia
HiuKwan voted for Hicham
For some reason Claudia voted for herself.

 
Elimination 2
Uma lost the immunity challenge.

Everybody voted for Dirk, except Dirk (voted for Mano) and Geert D (voted for Hannie)
 

Elimination 3

Sambang lost the immunity challenge.

Unfortunately, once again, not the full votes are known. We do know however that Claudia and Geert T voted for Hicham and that Hicham and HiuKwan voted for Claudia. If I had to guess, I’d say Sarah also voted for Hicham and Prince & Wim voted for Claudia (who was eliminated 4-3), but I am not 100% sure.
 

Elimination 4
Uma lost the immunity challenge.

Two groups were formed: Geert D, Kyra & Sharon made an alliance and voted for Hannie, while Hannie, Yin & Hans voted for Geert D. Hannie had to leave because of past votes against (the one vote Geert D casted in elimination 2).
 

Elimination 5
Sambang lost the immunity challenge.

Wim was voted out unanimously by Geert T/HiuKwan/Prince/Sarah, he himself voted for HiuKwan.

Elimination 6
Prince got eliminated in a 5-4 vote. All of former Uma (Geert D, Yin, Kyra, Sharon & Hans) voted for Prince (which caused loads of drama because Prince was – by far – the #1 favorite to win the show by the other candidates, the production and the viewers). All of former
Sambang (Prince, HiuKwan, Sarah & Geert T) voted for Geert D.

HiuKwan won individual immunity. Strangely enough, the host specifically said this was NOT the merge, however, there was an individual immunity challenge, both tribes lived together on one beach and they voted together. I’m not really sure why this wasn’t the merge, but the host specifically said a couple of times that it was not the merge? (maybe there will be a twist next episode).

Elimination 7
This time it was Geert D who had to leave. Yin/Hans joined former Sambang and voted their former tribe mate out:

Geert D = 5 (HiuKwan, Sarah, Geert T, Hans, Yin)
Geert T = 3 (Geert D, Sharon, Kyra)

Immunity was won by Yin and Hans found a hidden immunity idol, but chose not to use it yet.

There was a merge now, but I am not sure what the name of the merged tribe is as I missed the first half of the episode.

Eliminations 8, 9 & 10 are missing

Elimination 11
The results of the lastest episode:

HiuKwan = 2 (Yin, Hans)
Geert T = 2 (HiuKwan, Sharon)
Sharon = 1 (Geert T)
(Hans had immunity again)

At the previous tribal council (where Sarah got eliminated), HiuKwan let out all the dirt. This upset Yin & Hans, who then decided that HiuKwan should be the next one out. Both were gonna vote for her, while Geert T would vote for Sharon (as he made an agreement with his former team not to vote for any of them, so he couldn’t vote for HiuKwan, and he has an alliance with Yin & Hans).

The next part of the episode was about HiuKwan sobbing about this news, until she suddenly realized she had a chance: if she and Sharon join together, they can vote out Geert T. Because Geert T has three previous votes against and HiuKwan had none, Geert T had to leave. He took this news by staring in disbelieve for about ten minutes before he realized the game was over, which was quite hilarious.

Now it’s Yin & Hans vs. Sharon & HiuKwan for the next episode. Could be interesting.

Elimination 12 is missing

Elimination 13
The final three were Hans, HiuKwan & Yin. They competed in an endurance challenge and the winner would automatically qualify for the final two. Hans was the first to loose, an hour later by HiuKwan. So Yin was the first finalist.

The second challenge was between Hans & HiuKwan and was a survival-based challenge, a puzzle and how well you know your former tribe-mates challenge combined in one. It was an extremely close match and right before the winner was announced, the episode stopped.

The Final
So the episode of tonight continued where it stopped last week: the last part of the challenge between HiuKwan and Hans. It seemed like HiuKwan was going to win as she had a big advantage over Hans, but blew it all in the last minutes by panicking, so Hans could get past her and win the challenge. At that moment all people watching switched off their tv as the big favorite HiuKwan was eliminated and the two most hated participants made the final two: Yin & Hans.

Both took part in the final tribal council, where they had to answer questions about how they played the game. The tribal council got really ugly: the jury (consisting of Geert D, Kyra, Sarah, Geert T, Sharon & HiuKwan) was really upset these two made the final and made it clear they thought none of them deserved to win the game. But the hosts forced them to vote, so they did. The result was this:

Geert D: ???? (not sure, but most likely Yin)
Kyra: Hans
Sarah: Yin
Geert T: ???? (not sure, but most likely Hans)
Sharon: Yin
HiuKwan: Hans

So the result was 3-3. A tie.

Both Yin & Hans had won an extra vote. Yin had won a challenge with which she won a positive vote for her in the finals and Hans had his Hidden Immunity Idol, which he switched this for a positive vote in the finals as well. Had HiuKwan made the finals, there would have been an uneven number of votes (six jury members + extra vote either Yin/Hans had).

Later, in the reunion show it was announced that five of the six jury members (all except Geert T) made an agreement to force a tie. They didn’t want to decide who was the winner as they all disliked Yin and Hans so much. HiuKwan said that the producers should find a way to decide the winner, they didn’t want to have anything to do with it anymore.

So the producers did: they asked originally 100 former candidates to come to the tv-studios and vote for who they thought should win. For some reason, it was later announced that only 81 votes would be cast. I don’t have a full overview of the people who voted (unfortunately). I do know the following people were at the show: Derek (ER3), Björn (ER4), Ernestine, Frank (ER5), John, Marnix, Marleen, Douwe (ER6), Koen (ER8), Frans, Frits, Bruno & Vinnie (ER9). All the pre-merge eliminees from ER10 were there as well, but I don’t know if they voted.

Out of these 81 votes, 7 were declared invalid (probably because they voted for HiuKwan). So 74 votes were left, who went this way:

Hans: 16 votes
Yin: 58 votes

So Yin was the winner. Right after the announcement they cut the show of and showed a memorial for Ernst-Paul, the host who passed away. As if they did not want to give Yin & Hans more attention. Yin probably won because she was a bit more down to earth and said luck was a big factor in her making the final two. I never thought she would win, as she also said that she thought Hans would make a better winner than herself. Hans probably lost because he was extremely arrogant in the final and didn’t want to apologize for what he did.

This was a very strange edition with 100 participants.

Episode 1
Kenny was the first person to arrive at the beach, blindfolded. He spend a few hours on the beach until the other 99 participants arrived (needless to say, it was a huge shock to him). Kenny was the first leader, but he quickly made four other people the leader: Mathilde was to take care of the fishing, Sven took care of finding food, Walther lead building the camp and Bruno became the head-cook.

Episode 2
Loads of drama surrounding the couple Tim S & Iraida (who was a little princess, who came to the island totally unprepared and thinking she would get a bed and loads of food). There was a famous spit-incident when Lotus insulted Iraida and Tim S spit in Lotus’ face. 25 people quit after this episode, one of which being Iraida (which greatly upset Tim S, who didn’t know his girlfriend wanted to quit).

Episode 3
Two new leaders were selected. Everybody who wanted to be a leader got to speak to the whole group, who later voted for the leaders. Ingeborg became the female leader and beat (a.o.) Jolien. Rudi beat a.o. Frans. Both selected a team and those who weren’t selected (among which was Tim S, who had been stealing food from the other people ) had to leave the island. This lead to some controversy, as both leaders got to pick 25 people. Some people who really wanted to stay on the island weren’t picked. However, right before the people who weren’t picked had to leave the island, the host told Rudi & Ingeborg they could each pick 5 more contestants for their team (probably because Sven [one of the former leaders] wasn’t picked and the production really wanted him to stay). Rudi & Ingeborg selected a few people, but all of them declined because they were angry they didn’t get picked the first time. At the end, only three people of those who didn’t get picked the first time, accepted this second chance, while basically all the other people quit.

Episode 4
Fan-favorite Farrah quit the show to go home (because of an emergency in the family). The two new teams battled against each other and Rudi’s team won, so Ingeborg had to eliminate a few of her people.

Episode 5
A challenge decided which of the two teams would have to leave the island as a whole. This was a tug-of-war, which was won by Ingeborg team (unfortunately, as all the big characters were on Rudi’s team).

Episodes 6 & 7
Ingeborg’s team did a few challenges to decide which 10 of them made it to the individual stage of the game. The winners were:
1. “Draw” = a floating item with a letter attached was at sea, the team swam out and retrieved the item. Kristien was the first one to touch the letter. When leader Ingeborg read the letter, it stated that the first person to touch the letter would make it to the individual stage, so Kristien was the lucky one (later it was revealed that the production did this “draw” because they hoped that leader Ingeborg would be the first one to touch the letter. The reason they did this was because Ingeborg wanted to go home and they wanted to “force” her to make it to the individual stage by doing this).
2. Physical challenge for the females = Lieke won
3. Physical challenge for the males = Vinni won
4. Mental challenge for the females = Muriel won
5. Mental challenge for the males = Loek won
6. All others voted which person contributed the most to the team = Mieke
7. All others voted which person contributed the most to the team = Willem
8. The seven people who were already selected got to choose three other people. After some discussions they choose Marcel, Hans & Saskia

The ten people (Arthur, Bart, Brigitte, Frans, Frits, Ingeborg, Kenny, Merel, Nelleke & Tim) who didn’t get selected were taken of the island and went to a restaurant where they got some wine and a pizza. But right before they got to eat, the host offered all of them a second chance. If they didn’t eat or drink anything, they could go to a secret island where they had to survive with basic minimals and got a chance to come back in the game. Only two of the ten accepted this offer: Frans & Nelleke