At the end of September last year, I received an email from Samsung with tickets attached for flights to Puerto Rico and a chance to win my own private island.
Alright, now that I got your attention with a bit of excitement and disbelief, I'll take us back a bit. It was a cold, dark, winters morning in August and I was over 1000km (~2.4 million Babylonian Trade Cubits for those wondering) from civilisation, in the middle of the Pilbara Region of West Australia. It was about 530 in the morning and I was going through my normal routine of reading the news before work started When I came across an article stating something very similar to "Samsung is doing something ridiculous for the sake of advertising again", on the technology news site BGR. I click through the links, discovering a Survivor type deal, showing off new camera/mobile products with training from Survivorman Les Stroud, set on a desert island. I think - Hell, that sounds amazing and something I'd be great at, may as well apply. So I send off a quick application and a photo, not expecting to ever hear anything back again, but hey, it was a way to keep myself occupied for a few minutes.
Fast forward a couple of weeks. I'm back on site and I'm the only rig geologist there, along with my supervisor, after a rather brutal cut-back due to costs. Early morning again, checking my mail, a subject line with "Samsung" catches my eye. I open it up to find a message telling me that they found me interesting and would like me to fill in the second round of applications - follow this link. So I click on this link and it takes me to the longest, most in depth and detailed questionnaire that I have ever seen. I mean, I thought Rio Tinto's application process was long and intensive with multiple police checks... So there's no way I can do this in a few minutes, so I leave it for the moment and off I go to work. Being the only rig geo on site, it was fairly busy and tiring so this email sat there for a few days. Until I can't get to sleep one evening and have the chance to try and fit what seems like my life story into this application. I fill in a few questions thoroughly, but quickly grow jaded and pessimistic at the chance of getting a response and so end up filling in a fair few answers with a single sentence or sarcastically. I finish that up, attach a couple more pictures and send that off, thinking to myself, what a waste of time...
Alright, now that I got your attention with a bit of excitement and disbelief, I'll take us back a bit. It was a cold, dark, winters morning in August and I was over 1000km (~2.4 million Babylonian Trade Cubits for those wondering) from civilisation, in the middle of the Pilbara Region of West Australia. It was about 530 in the morning and I was going through my normal routine of reading the news before work started When I came across an article stating something very similar to "Samsung is doing something ridiculous for the sake of advertising again", on the technology news site BGR. I click through the links, discovering a Survivor type deal, showing off new camera/mobile products with training from Survivorman Les Stroud, set on a desert island. I think - Hell, that sounds amazing and something I'd be great at, may as well apply. So I send off a quick application and a photo, not expecting to ever hear anything back again, but hey, it was a way to keep myself occupied for a few minutes.
Fast forward a couple of weeks. I'm back on site and I'm the only rig geologist there, along with my supervisor, after a rather brutal cut-back due to costs. Early morning again, checking my mail, a subject line with "Samsung" catches my eye. I open it up to find a message telling me that they found me interesting and would like me to fill in the second round of applications - follow this link. So I click on this link and it takes me to the longest, most in depth and detailed questionnaire that I have ever seen. I mean, I thought Rio Tinto's application process was long and intensive with multiple police checks... So there's no way I can do this in a few minutes, so I leave it for the moment and off I go to work. Being the only rig geo on site, it was fairly busy and tiring so this email sat there for a few days. Until I can't get to sleep one evening and have the chance to try and fit what seems like my life story into this application. I fill in a few questions thoroughly, but quickly grow jaded and pessimistic at the chance of getting a response and so end up filling in a fair few answers with a single sentence or sarcastically. I finish that up, attach a couple more pictures and send that off, thinking to myself, what a waste of time...
But, much to my surprise, a few days later I received another email saying that they really like me and could I send in a video entry. Well damn, I don`t particularly like being in front of a camera at all, let alone on video, I much prefer to be behind the lens. That, and I didn't exactly have much time to put together a video during my 12 hour shifts out in the desert with limited connectivity. I managed to find a few minutes to quickly record something during the day and then send it off that night straight from the camera with no editing. Phew, that was hard work being in front of the camera, but now I'm sure they will realise that I'm a terrible choice and I'll never hear from them again. 24 hours later... "We really liked your video, but we need you to record it again as there was too much wind in the soundtrack."
I heave a sigh of resignation, I'm going to have get on camera again... But even more difficult than that, is finding a place out of the wind in the Pilbara... At some point during the day, I managed to find a few minutes again, somehow, miraculously found a place a little bit sheltered from the wind, re-recorded my video and sent it off again that night. I wake up to an email saying thanks for the entry, we'll be in touch in the following weeks. To any of you interested, here it is:
Somehow, I've yet to figure that out, this video got me a place competing on Samsung SOS Island. The first thing I think when I get notified of this in September is - hopefully I can get the time off work. Luckily, due to a variety of circumstances and having already asked for two weeks off at the time, I was allowed an extra week to head over to Puerto Rico!
Here I spent a week doing live streaming shows, with some training by Les Stroud on various survival techniques such as building shelter, finding water, making a fire and survival food. You can check out the full story here.
Unfortunately, I didn't make it through to the actual island, but I reckon I got the best deal out of it, I got a free flight to Puerto Rico, free survival training, met some great people, and then had 2 weeks to travel around and explore Puerto Rico.
You can check out all the videos on my YouTube page and I've put a select few below for your enjoyment.
Until the next time!
I heave a sigh of resignation, I'm going to have get on camera again... But even more difficult than that, is finding a place out of the wind in the Pilbara... At some point during the day, I managed to find a few minutes again, somehow, miraculously found a place a little bit sheltered from the wind, re-recorded my video and sent it off again that night. I wake up to an email saying thanks for the entry, we'll be in touch in the following weeks. To any of you interested, here it is:
Somehow, I've yet to figure that out, this video got me a place competing on Samsung SOS Island. The first thing I think when I get notified of this in September is - hopefully I can get the time off work. Luckily, due to a variety of circumstances and having already asked for two weeks off at the time, I was allowed an extra week to head over to Puerto Rico!
Here I spent a week doing live streaming shows, with some training by Les Stroud on various survival techniques such as building shelter, finding water, making a fire and survival food. You can check out the full story here.
Unfortunately, I didn't make it through to the actual island, but I reckon I got the best deal out of it, I got a free flight to Puerto Rico, free survival training, met some great people, and then had 2 weeks to travel around and explore Puerto Rico.
You can check out all the videos on my YouTube page and I've put a select few below for your enjoyment.
Until the next time!
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