How were the castaways prepared for Survivor?

Each castaway would have to undergo a series of psychological and medical exams. Then, they will have to go through a more thorough assessment with board-certified Internists. It isn’t easy to obtain these clearances. But when they have been cleared, then they are ready for the island.

It’s common knowledge by now that each castaway will be subject to starvation and rigorous physical activities. They have to build shelter, gather wood for fire, and do everything to make their little tribe work.

Hunger is the toughest to hurdle. Castaways would probably be overconfident in the fact that since they would be living on a beach, coconuts would proliferate their camps so there wouldn’t be any problem. We’re Filipinos and we know there is more than one way to eat a coconut.

Guess what? There were no coconut trees lining the beach.

One particular exception was the lone buko the Naak tribe found on their first home. But now, nada.

Just pine trees.

You have been introduced to the perils that lurk in Tarutao.

But there was more to it.

We had to deal with the downpour of rain. We slipped, got squished, and we were greatly susceptible to respiratory diseases.

We dealt with the humidity.

We dealt with high tides and low tides that dictated some of our activities: what we could do in challenges and how they influenced the limitations of our boats.

We walked in waist-deep water when it was low tide because our boats could not approach the shore. We had to wade in it even if we knew we might come across some pissed off manta ray, sea snake, or sea urchin.

We climbed trucks, rode speedboats and long tail boats. Surviving these modes of transportation is already an achievement for us. Surviving these rides without any transportation-related injury is a reason for us to rejoice.

And then there were the actual challenges.

These challenges got tested. This was where the dream team came in.

In a nutshell, the dream team members were the guinea pigs that tested the challenges. Ergo, we learned from their experiences. We modified the rules or the physical set-up of the challenges to make them safer, harder or more achievable. Thus, the dream team’s contribution was nothing short of heroic.

As doctors, we belonged to the group of people who check the safety of each challenge.

And yes, we got to be part of the dream team once in a while because of this.
(What a great reason to be able to fulfill our aspirations to be part of the dream team!)

So what happens when something medical or something traumatic happens?

Each camp was 15-20 minutes away from our base camp and we could easily be alerted.

In that remote island, there were no ambulances going to the nearest hospital. Instead, we had speedboats, trucks and a chopper on stand-by. And a half-naked underwater camera-dude manning the oxygen tank.

This was the setting for our 18 castaways and our 190-member Filipino-Thai production crew.

This was our daily challenge.

39 days. 5 trucks. 4 long tail boats. 3 speedboats. 1 chopper.

Survivors, ready?