RealityNewsOnline: Hello, Laura, and thanks for taking the time to talk to us here at RealityNewsOnline! Jumping straight to the Tribal Council we saw last night, leading up to that final vote of the revote, was there any doubt in your mind that it would be a tie and you would be safe?
Laura: I knew from the first vote that I was going home, because I knew about the John plan. The minute the second Laura vote came up, I knew it wasn't just Shambo. I knew the whole plan Monica and Brett had put into play didn't work
RNO: How did you know John would flip?
Laura: One thing that nobody knew is Brett and I got out there, saw each other when we started playing, and realized we knew each other from church. Brett and I therefore had a really tight alliance and he told me everything. Nobody knew this. Everything the Galu four boys would say, Brett would come and tell me. Therefore, I knew John was gunning for me back in Russell Swan days, when John and Dave and Erik were talking and John was saying that. I knew all that. So John thinks he's kind of under the radar but I knew it all.
RNO: What did you try to do to counter John's plans against you?
Laura: We knew one of the boys had to go, and we got out Erik. We weren't too worried - when I came back from Foa Foa, Brett leans over and says they're going to try to throw the challenge and vote you out, but Dave and I aren't going to do it. When Shambo sits me out, I was like, "Oh shoot, they're really going to do this." That challenge took so long, I was thinking they were doing it, but it was just a tough challenge. That again confirmed John was coming after me.
We didn't really do anything to counter it because I knew Brett would never vote against me and neither would Dave. I wasn't too worried at that point about John until the merge came. When the merge came, I knew Russell was coming for me, I knew Shambo was, I knew John was, I knew Erik was.
RNO: Were you surprised at how much hostility Shambo had for you, or did you know it was that bad?
Laura: I knew it was that bad just because she was always coming after me. I think that's where she got the whole "90210" thing and she was always coming after me and my tribe. She would accuse me of things I didn't do and when my tribe would try to correct her, she felt this whole "90210" thing that they were sticking up for me. I think that made her even madder and made her feel even more she was on the outskirts.
She was constantly irritated with me for something. It's frustrating to watch because if you go back and watch, there's not one thing I did to Shambo. You see her calling me names and being really mean. Trust me, if there was footage of me being mean to Shambo, CBS would show it. Okay, I called her a Gilligan, but that's a little different from [the names she called me]. It's sad that she has that much bitterness towards somebody.
RNO: Based on what you just said, you'll probably disagree with my next question, but in retrospect, do you wish you, Monica, and Kelly had treated Shambo differently?
Laura: I guess my question would be what did you see us doing mean to her?
RNO: Excluding her.
Laura: That would be what? Not to be combative with you, but I can't answer a question I feel we didn't do. We didn't exclude her - she chose to sleep in the tree. What else did we exclude her from?
RNO: I don't know, I wasn't there!
Laura: (Laughs) That's just what the fact of it is. I know that's what people are thinking. Just tell me one thing we excluded her from. There isn't because we never did. To the contrary, we would invite her [to do various things] and she would say her back hurts or her neck hurts. They showed it from the very first scene, we were in the water
(Writer's Note: I know the above reads as being combative, but I want to be sure readers know Laura's tone the whole time was quite jovial. She was not arguing or getting upset, she just wanted to make her points about the Shambo situation, and tone is hard to read in a printed interview.)
RNO: I know you can't read minds, but any idea why she didn't like you?
Laura: I'm glad you said that because I don't know, I can't read her mind. I can only tell you what my tribemates said and from determining myself. I think when Shambo came in the game, she wanted to be the strong female in the tribe, and time and time again we would go to the challenges and I would be [designated as] the strong female. Great, she hates me even more!
Also, I'm from the islands so I know about them, and [our tribemates] would ask me questions. I think - I'm assuming - it all culminated together. She wanted to be the one people asked questions to and the strong female. I got along with everybody - the two girls are like my daughter's age. It sounds like a mother, but I think she was just jealous. I was the strong one, I am her age, I knew how to do a lot of things, I got along with everybody - I think that's what she wanted her role to be.
RNO: Going back to the beginning, what was your strategy coming in to Survivor?
Laura: One of the first things was I needed to prove I was strong. Being one of the older ones and being small, I didn't want to be perceived as being weak. My second was to align with somebody - unfortunately, Russell was on the other team because he was my prefect quarterback - somebody to drive the ball and I would not ride coattails but would be their wingman. Then, on the very last play of the game, go to the superbowl, step to the side, your quarterback gets taken out.
So I wanted to align with somebody who was really aggressive in the game and was ready to play. But we didn't really have anybody like that on our team. Not in a bad way, but we didn't have a stir-up-trouble Russell on our team. So we all went into it together. But at this point in the game, I knew I had to win immunity. I needed to win every one to stay in the game.
The really frustrating part is that Brett would have given me that necklace had he hit that target and won. He told me because he knew he was safe and Shambo would not write his name down. It was really disheartening when I didn't get a chance to go for the necklace and when Mick put his arrow inside of Brett's. It's hard and I was like, "There goes my shot."
RNO: Speaking of Russell and how you would have liked to have an ally like him, when you went to Foa Foa, you seemed to bond with Russell and Natalie. After the merge, you did a full 180 and decided that Russell was the biggest snake since the Garden of Eden. What precipitated such a change of heart?
Laura: There wasn't a change of heart - I never had a bond with him on the island
But then when we merged and he showed me the idol, I knew he was a liar because he had told me on Foa Foa that Ben had it. You see when I tell him no that's not going to happen, he gets really, really upset and he gets in my face and says, "Look, little girl," and said, "I'm the reason…" and he named off all the victims in his tribe. First off, I don't need somebody telling me what to do, I'm not a 22-year-old girl. I said, "Look, don't threaten me." It almost got personal, beyond game play, and I said, "Don't threaten me." He didn't like that, it was just a culmination of things - he was frustrated and I think he just came after me hard and I wouldn't change a thing. I know it sounds funny to say because it could have cost me the million dollars, but there are some things money just can't buy.
RNO: Did it surprise you to see that you were the latest in a string of strong women who stood up to Russell and whom he therefore targeted in return?
Laura: I knew I was his next target the minute I said no. Even at Foa Foa, Natalie told me, "Russell's in charge of everything here." I knew he was the head of that family and was the one that was going to come over and try to sway people. The minute I told him, "You're not the boss of me," he got upset. I thought, here we go, I'd better start winning some challenges. I knew Shambo had flipped. Do you make a deal with the devil or hold my own? Like Dave said, let's roll the dice, let's go.
RNO: What was the first thought that went through your mind last week when Russell stood up with the immunity idol for the second Tribal Council in a row?
Laura: I wanted to know where he found it because I was at that bridge all day. I was looking under it, I was looking all over. I was looking for the idol that Erik left with because I didn't know he had it and I was still assuming we had an idol on our beach. I was at that bridge - there are only a certain amount of landmarks at camp. I'd been searching all over, so I wonder when it got placed there - it was just kind of suspicious to me.
RNO: Before seeing it on TV last night, did you know he had found his third idol?
Laura: We knew he had the third. Even though we didn't see him find it. It was kind of hilarious, him playing the cat and mouse game - that was hilarious, him running and jumping through the jungle. It was hilarious. Then all of a sudden, you see him lying on the swing. It's like the cat that just ate the mouse, he just about had the fur hanging out of my mouth. We were like, that sucker has it.
RNO: Unfortunately, I'm being told we're out of time, so do you have anything else you'd like to tell us about your time on Survivor?
Laura: It was a very rewarding thing to do because your whole life you always see these things. To actually do it and prove, okay I did it, that was awesome. To be kicked off because I was a threat, I can hold my head high and say yeah, that's okay. It was an amazing experience and I'm so thankful and so blessed I got the opportunity to do that.
RNO: Thanks again, Laura!
