One couldn’t help but notice the comfort that radiated off 22-year-old Ashley Trainer. Two weeks stranded on an island getting doused in cold rain, battling sleep deprivation on bruising bamboo and gagging on slug guts has a way of putting things into perspective. So when she sipped on her coffee at Starbucks in her hometown of Maple Grove, Survivor: Samoa’s youngest contestant—and the sixth castaway voted off—was all smiles as she reflected on what she called the “best experience” of her life.
BH: What was the toughest part of being on the island?
AT: The rain. It’s weird because you’re soaking wet, you’re freezing, and you can’t get away. It was supposed to be dry season in Samoa; I looked it up before I left. But it was nowhere near dry season. I mean, we had rain for four days straight. It was absolute torture.
BH: How did those conditions make the sleeping arrangements?
AT: You’re not really sleeping, but you kind of go in and out of rest. The nights that it’s not raining, you’re freezing. But when it’s raining, it’s so much worse. You literally get no sleep at all. You just lay there because you’re getting poured on. We slept on bamboo, which is torture. You can’t sleep on the ground because of the bugs, and there’s snakes, crabs and rats. So you don’t want to sleep on the ground, because you’ll get eaten up, but the ground would’ve been way more comfortable. It was horrible. By the time I left, I had bruises on my arms, my ribs and my hips because it’s just straight-up bamboo.
BH: What did you expect going in, and how did it play out in comparison to those expectations?
AT: I thought it would be a lot easier than it actually was. I don’t know why. But you watch it on TV, and you kind of have this idea of what it’s going to be like, and then you’re actually there, and it’s so much different than what you can even imagine. It’s hard. Your body goes into shock when you get there because you’re not eating, you’re not drinking and you’re not sleeping, so you don’t know how your body is going to react. You’re a completely different person.
BH: What was your favorite part about being there?
AT: I really enjoyed playing the game. That was my favorite. I absolutely loved just being able to play, because I’m a huge fan of the show. So just being able to strategize and see how it all played out, that was the best part.
BH: What were your relationships like when you were there?
AT: They put you with a bunch of people you know you’re not going to get along with because everyone has these crazy personalities and everyone is completely different from you. I developed friendships that will last a lifetime, but I also developed some friendships with people that I absolutely hate and can’t stand now because I think they’re horrible people.
BH: On that note, how did you view your relationship with Russell? Russell Hantz, a 36-year-old oil company owner from Texas, played nice to all the contestants’ faces, but connived behind their backs, admitting to trying to make life as miserable as possible for everybody. He called Ashley the “dumb short-haired blonde.”
AT: Russell was really good to my face. He was a really nice guy, he was kind of fun around camp, and he would go get our food. But I was watching it when everyone else was watching it, so I’m realizing what everyone else is: how horrible he is. He’s said these really negative things behind our backs. It’s hurtful, but at the same time, you know he’s playing a game. But I think he crossed a line he shouldn’t have crossed, because he didn’t need to say those things to make himself go further in the game.
BH: I can’t help but ask: Can you bring us through your encounter with the sea slug guts smoothie? For a food challenge in the fifth episode—the one in which Ashley was voted off—the members of each team had to spin the wheel and drink an obscure smoothie made from “questionable” ingredients. Ashley was the only one on her team who couldn’t finish.
AT: I ended up with the worst (smoothie) out there; even (host Jeff Probst) said that. It was sea slug guts, he hardly blended it and mixed it with water and garnished it with sardines. It was really chunky and horrible. I’ve never tasted anything so horrible in my life. I got almost all of it down and then my body just started rejecting it. I’d take a little and it would come right back up. It was horrible. I don’t think that was the reason I got voted off, but a lot of people do. I don’t think it was because there were so many different aspects that you don’t see because you’re playing the game constantly. But I didn’t get mine down, and I think my tribe saw that as a weakness. And I thought I was going to be a strong one in that challenge, because I’m a very experimental eater.
BH: What did you learn from your experience on Survivor?
AT: People look at me—I’m small, I’m blonde, and I’m a female—and they automatically think that I’m weak and I can’t accomplish anything. I learned how strong I actually am. I have done things that I never thought I could ever do in my life. I’m so proud of myself. I can do anything; I really think I can now. It’s a good feeling.
BH: How has your life changed since you’ve been on the show?
AT: I feel like I’m a lot happier of a person now that I’m home. I appreciate things a lot more than I did before I went on the show. I just look at life a lot differently now, and I’m really thankful for that. But my family looks at me the same, and my friends look at me the same, so I’m no celebrity or anything.
BH: Would you say you were pretty transparent compared to other people, as far as letting your true personality show, or did you try to hide it?
AT: I went in and wanted to pretend that I wasn’t knowledgeable about the game. That was my initial plan, but then you develop this friendship with these people, and your true personality comes out. You want to show them who you are, because you want them to trust you. If you’re pretending you’re someone you’re not, that person may come out, and that will end up screwing you in the end. So I think I was showing people who I was, but I think the Minnesota-nice kind of kills you in the end. We’re just too nice.
BH: What do you think you had going for you as far as assets go? And what weaknesses didn’t work for you?
One thing that I think that was very helpful with me is I’m light. The perfect challenge that I showed how agile I was: There was a challenge that we had to go across these ropes. The women were very good at it because we have really good balance. So the balance competitions were really good for us. I would say, because I’m small, that was a weakness, too, because I’m looked at as weak. I was called out as the weakest link from Week 1. Why? I don’t know, because there were other women on my tribe that were just as small as me, if not smaller, yet I was looked at as the weakest. Also, everyone knew that I knew the game really well, and I think that scared some people. In the end, going back, I wouldn’t say I watched every season like I had told them. Maybe I’d go back and say I’ve only watched a couple seasons. I think I was the only one out of all 20 people that had watched every season.
BH: Who is a teammate that you really clicked with?
I got along with Natalie (Natalie White, a 26-year-old pharmaceutical sales representative) extremely well. We bonded. She was like my sister out there. I was so thankful I had her out there with me. If there was ever a bad day, I’d go to her, and she’d come to me. You’re going through this weird time, you’re away from everything, you’re secluded, you don’t know what time it is during the day, it’s such a weird shock to you, and then your brain goes crazy and you’re thinking about all these crazy things and you can’t contact your family. She helped me through a lot of stuff. If she wasn’t there, I don’t know who I would have gone to.
BH: Didn’t she end up voting you off?
AT: Yes she did, but we made a deal at the beginning of the game. We had a secret alliance with just us two. We had a deal that if there’s ever a time in the game when she has to vote against me to make herself go further in the game, just do it. If she would’ve voted with me, against Liz, like I did, she would have had a big target on her back and would’ve been voted off next. So that was our agreement.
BH: If you could go back and do everything over again, would you do anything differently?
AT: I would try to get a girl alliance going. This season, the men were running everything on both sides. It’s weird watching it play out: The men on Galu are in control, and the men in my tribe (Foa Foa) are in control, and the females have such a huge disadvantage, because we’re looked at as so weak. And in challenges, if you want to win, why keep the women when they’re not as physically strong?
BH: What was the first thing you did when you got back?
AT: The first thing I did was eat because you’re so hungry. The first thing you think about is food. You think about food constantly. I ate and ate, and I couldn’t stop eating. I wanted peanut butter toast so bad. That was the first solid thing I ate. Then I had a meal, and I kept eating and eating. I had cookies and everything you can think of, I ate it that night; it was crazy.
BH: Do you get random people who recognize you from the show and approach you?
AT: Yeah, from time to time people would be like, “Are you the girl on Survivor?” When I got voted off, it was a little bit different. But when I was on there, I got pictures with people. That was fun. I enjoyed that.
BH: Would you do reality TV again?
AT: It depends on what it was. I’d do another competitive show like Amazing Race or Big Brother or something like that, but I don’t think I could do any of the dating shows. So it depends on what it was.
