Survivor: Myanmar

Shin Maw • Day 5

"Three in a row!" Emmanuel shouted excitedly, as Shin Maw returned to their camp.

"I thought I was gonna make us lose that one," John said.

"You were fine, honestly," Shiloh exclaimed. "We all won the challenge!"

"Except me," Alex laughed. "I was sitting out." He giggled.

Brianna (Shin Maw Tribe): I feel like this tribe is unstoppable. It doesn't feel like we're ever going to lose anything. We just keep winning and winning and winning... we're like, a perfect group of ten. Nothing can get in our way at all. But in a way, that actually gets me a little worried. Because we've been such a happy family for so long... it could all come crashing down. Who knows?

"Look, our boat!" Liam stated, pointing at what was, unmistakably, a traditional Burmese fishing boat. It was a sleek wooden boat shaped like a flattened banana; the bow and stern both pulled slightly upwards, and the boat itself looked like it could comfortably fit about three or four people.

"I want the spear," Jonah interjected. "I want to try spear fishing."

"Ooh, I'll come with you," Alex said.

"Me too, I wanna see it," John exclaimed.

"I'll make a fire for if you catch anything," Liam said.

"When," Jonah corrected him jokingly, and the three boys walked out to the fishing boat, Jonah carrying the spear.

Jonah (Shin Maw Tribe): Spear fishing is something you see pretty commonly when you watch Survivor, and one of the things I really wanted to get a chance to do on the show was spear fishing. As soon as we got the fishing kit, I knew I had to try it as soon as I could.

-

Alex and John were sitting in the boat, while Jonah was underwater with his spear. They were over one hundred feet out into the ocean, and their tribemates looked incredibly tiny from how far away they were. "Do you think he's gonna catch anything...?" asked Alex.

"I wouldn't put it past him," John replied. "He's good at everything else around here."

Alex (Shin Maw Tribe): Jonah is definitely our best provider on the tribe. He knows how to get coconuts, he know show to get a fire going, he's good at challenges, and he helped us a lot on the shelter. Jonah's basically... the whole package, at this point.

Less than a minute later, Jonah popped out of the water with a beautiful gold and white fish that was about the length and breadth of a bottle of wine. "Oh my god, already?" John asked.

"You got a fish?" Alex asked. 

"Yeah," Jonah said, "this spear is a lot harder than I thought. I had to try a couple of times to actually get anything."

"Faster than I could have done it," John exclaimed.

John (Shin Maw Tribe): Jonah catches this huge fish in, like, 2 seconds, and I was like, oh my god. There's no way that's even possible. Jonah is somebody I need to start working with very soon because... I can't vote him out any time soon. Or else I'd probably starve.

-

"Oh my god, you have a fish already?" Lauren asked excitedly. "Damn!"

"He caught it, like, two minutes after he got out of the boat," Alex said, impressed. 

"Wait, you wore your hoodie? In the boat?" Kalyani interjected.

"Yeah," Alex laughed.

"Huh," Kalyani said.

From behind Alex and Kalyani, Liam let out a "Yes!" as he managed to get the fire going. "I've been trying to get that for like ten minutes!"

"Awesome!" Kalyani exclaimed, turning around. "Don't you wanna gut the fish before you cook it?"

"Yeah, I just need the machete," Jonah said.

"Oh, that's right here," Shiloh interjected, grabbing it from behind her and passing it to Jonah. John laid down two leaves on the ground a few feet away from the fire, which Jonah placed the fish on to gut it.

"Do you know how to gut a fish?" Brianna asked.

"Kind of," Jonah replied. "I have a general idea of what I'm supposed to do." The very first thing he did after laying the fish down on the leaves was using the machete to take off all of the scales, a process which only took a few seconds.

Then, he placed one hand firmly on top of the fish, and used the machete to make a relatively deep cut from right in front of the bottom fin all the way to below the fish's mouth, causing guts to spill out of the fish as he moved the blade down. "Ew!" Victoria squealed, cringing and squirming in her seat; she was unsure of whether she wanted to watch Jonah gut the fish and learn how to do it, or run away into the ocean, and kept looking away from what was going on and then back at what was going on every few seconds.

Victoria (Shin Maw Tribe): Watching Jonah gut that fish was such a weird experience. Like, it was really gross, and I just wanted to vomit, but at the same time, it was kind of cool seeing it happen. And if I had to choose between gutting a fish and dying, I'd probably pick gutting a fish.

Then, with a little help from the machete, Jonah completely gutted the fish, dumping the guts into a messy pile next to the leaves. This caused Liam, who was sitting about a foot in front of where the guts were just spilled, to turn his feet slightly away from the pile. "Does anybody have a stick?" Jonah asked.

"Here's one," Alex exclaimed, finding one just next to his feet. "We should take the bark off first, right? To keep it clean?"

"Yeah," Jonah replied. He grabbed the stick, and quickly pulled off the bark from one end of the stick. He then proceeded to slowly impale the fish with the stick, in through the mouth and out through the tail.

"Why is this whole process so weird??" Emmanuel asked frantically, watching confusedly as Jonah shoved the stick into the ground, allowing for the fish to dangle a couple of feet above the fire.

"We're gonna need to get used to doing that so we can live," Lauren exclaimed.

"Why don't we just win all the rewards like we've been doing anyways?" Liam asked. "We seem to be pretty good at that."

"Nothing we've won has been food yet," Jonah said. "Except, I guess, this reward, in a way."

Liam (Shin Maw Tribe): I was very impressed that Jonah was able to catch, de-scale, gut, and cook a fish all by himself. He's quite a bit younger than me, but... so is pretty much everyone on this tribe. And he knows a hell of a lot more than I do about survival skills out here. I'll definitely have to take some tips from him.