Board Thread:Season 30 - Svalbard/@comment-26930156-20160127090143/@comment-27299215-20160127193959

Before I answer this, I want to take you up on your offer. Once this is over you and I are definitely going to grab a beer in ponderosa my friend.

With that being said I want to really dive in and fully explain my answer to your question. I honestly never stopped playing at the post merge spot. While I will confess that I missed a challenge due to work, everything after that was all strategy. When I missed that challenge, almost everyone stopped talking to me, it was as if I had become a ghost to 75% of the cast. I then started fearing for my safety, especially when Chris and Bas got voted off, so I came up with a strategy. Unless the next immunity challenge is one you know that you will be able to win, skip it. I skipped the challenge, and received my second strike. That second strike opened up a lot of opportunities for me. I came out and told everyone that I was alone in the game, which aside from me talking to you, was the truth, and all of the sudden I was no longer a ghost. People started messaging me again and started to trust me. I’m sure some of the driving force for people wanting to work with me was their belief that I would eventually miss a third challenge and be disqualified, but from the moment I received my second strike I was completely invested in making it to the end.

While I have answered your question, there is another thing I want to address since it is clearly weighing on your mind, which was the last few paragraphs of my opening statement. To be honest with you, after reading Rhiannon’s statement about this games’ powers (as she had a power as well) I do want to retract the accusations I made towards the hosts, however I do want to explain to you why I made the statements, because it wasn’t just Tatianna using the power and me calling rig, there was more to it. After the power was used Brett and I talked it over and we both agreed that it was unfair for, to many extents, a Tyler Perry idol being used at f4 so late in the game. After talking it over with him, I went to the hosts and basically said “while there is nothing that can be done about it, tatianna already has her power, we think it’s a little unfair that someone had the ability to use a power in the final 4.” One of the hosts literally responded by saying they made a mistake allowing the power to go to final 4 (they did this in front of all 4 of us). The response just really rubbed me the wrong way, and I knew that either Brett or Thomas’ game was about to be ruined after almost two months of playing for a mistake that was completely out of their hands. I understand that it is survivor and twists happen, but at final 4, everyone should be vulnerable. Your ability to get to the final 3 from the final 4 should be based on your alliances with the other 3 players as well as your gameplay, not by having a special power.

With that being said however, I feel that the main reason I deserve your vote is because I was strategically, better than Tatianna. I was playing the game a day ahead of everyone and only making votes that I knew would keep me safe for the day of the vote, as well as the next one. In terms of my voting decisions, I have honestly no regrets for all of them, and honestly, every vote from f7 on went exactly as I knew they were going to go.

It has been amazing playing with you Wouter, can’t wait to talk to you again friend.