I wanted to be in shape for this. I watched Coral and Mike dangling like monkeys on that first Challenge for Battle of the Seasons, and I wanted to be prepared for everything. I even practiced hanging from a pull-up bar at they gym. I went to the gym almost every day. I ran 3 miles a day too (almost). I stretched, I lifted. I wasn’t hardcore like Cameron Diaz training for Charlie’s Angels, or anything, but it was a lot for me. I was feeling prepared, relatively.

I wasn’t horribly worried about the social aspect. I mean, I avoid conflict and I knew I wouldn’t have a romantic storyline. I don’t annoy people usually (in person, I can’t speak for on camera). Athletically, I knew I wasn’t the best, but I was sure I wouldn’t be the worst. I didn’t think I’d be voted off immediately because I knew people would be at each others’ throats, and those people are the first to go. I was afraid Puck would harass me, but everyone said that Puck is actually a nice guy. I know that a lot of people are two-faced and full of shit, but I don’t personally know anyone like that, so I just thought I’d be nice to people, they’d be nice to me, and I wouldn’t worry about anyone’s lies. Rarely has someone put in a lot of effort to make my life miserable because I don’t give anyone a hard time. I like to be relaxed and have fun. When people are horribly upset all around me, I get sad because the fun is ending. This will make sense later…

So, I did what I could. I learned how to drive stick shift, I strengthened my grip, I worked on endurance like holding my arm in front of me for several minutes. I tried to learn a little more about politics, and I figured out ways to make my hair not look so thin. (Don’t want to go through that shit again.) I was ready, I was determined.
I knew I wouldn’t get much sleep before I left. I was nervous. I had been having nightmares about it. I knew it wouldn’t matter anyway because from my Casting Special experience – no sleep, so much adrenaline. The night before I left, my best friend had a serious break-up, so he and I talked on the phone into the wee hours of the mornin'. I had to be at the airport at around 6am, I think. So, I got my hour or two of rest, and headed off with my enormous bags. It's hard to pack for something like this. I mean, you want to be prepared for a month, but you feel so damn cocky showing up with all these bags like there's no chance in hell you're going anywhere for a while.

I always get to the airport 2 hours in advance because they tell us to. This time, I went an hour in advance because two hours is just always too much. I sit there before any stands even open up, and I eye the magazines, reading their covers through gates. I thought it would be smart to go this normal amount - an hour, like everyone else does. I was flying American Eagle to JFK, then American to Jamaica. When I arrived, there was a line for the desk of about 10 people. I stood there for 20 minutes, and not a single person had moved. I started to panic. My plane was leaving in only 40 minutes, and I was no where near the front to check my bag. As the minutes rolled on, I wondered where that person was that goes around asking who’s on that flight to push them up to the front. A woman finally comes around, and I tell her my situation through my panting and my brimming tears. Her response, “Well, that’s why you’re supposed to get to the airport two hours in advance,” and she turns away. You want to kill her, but if you do ANYTHING wrong, you go to jail, so, I wished her harm in some insignificant but annoying way, and began to sob. The kind family in front of me allows me to go in front of them. The flight now leaves in 15 minutes, and the woman looks at my bag and says, “Sorry, it’s too late to check this.” I ask her what I can do, and she says, “Nothing.”

Now, you know when you’re on the plane and there’s no room for your bag so they say, “We have to check this”? Well, I thought I could just bring my bag and they could say, “You can’t carry this on, we’ll have to check it for you.” The woman told me to go the gate and see. I get there, and I’m sobbing as the kind cop lady scans me for metal. She tells me everything will be fine. I get to the gate and a completely apathetic man and woman tell me I can’t bring it. They say, “You either stay here or go without your luggage.” Wow, those are some serious options. I ask about putting my bag on the next flight, but my flight for Jamaica leaves only an hour after I arrive in NYC, so the bag would not be able to go to Jamaica anyway. My mind scrambles for ways to get my bag to Jamaica, if I could do without ANY CLOTHES for possibly a month (being optimistic). I don’t even have a bathing suit on me. Could I buy some wife-beaters? Could I make my own skirts out of grass? Finally, after 3 minutes of their telling me that I’m shit out of luck, they say, “Or you could drop it.” Basically, I CAN bring the fucking bag, I just have to check it at JFK. After all this goddamn crying and them saying there is NOTHING I can do, they tell me I can bring my bag. It’s not like they just remembered it, like they were like, “Oh, actually, you can do this…” They just sort of casually threw it out there in the end.

I get to NYC, and I check my bag. Phew. Bad start. Very bad. I go to my gate, and I don’t have my glasses on, but I do see one girl in the distance that has MTV written all over her. She has pin-straight hair, faded sun-glasses, a tight beige top, glossy lips, a necklace, and striking facial features. I walk over. It’s Rachel from RR Campus Crawl. At this point, the show had only aired a few episodes. She was talking to Eric Neiss, Mr. Real World himself. I came over and joined the crowd. Shane joined us in a minute – tanner than ever. The adrenaline was kicking in.
Rachel and I sat next to each other on the plane and talked the whole however many hours it was. She was a nice girl, totally cool, intimidated by nothing. She’s a girl who doesn’t mind confrontation if it needs to happen, probably doesn’t even get nervous when she’s about to get pissed. Me, on the otherhand, I can hear my blood pumping in my ears, and my mouth goes dry if I need to talk to someone about anything negative. I made her laugh a few times and told her that I was probably going to be on my way back to Boston tomorrow. We didn’t know how the show was going to work, but Eric had a theory that it was going to weed down to one girl and one guy, and then they would compete for the title of ultimate winner. One person. I laughed at the idea of EVER being in that position. No way.

We heard cameras were going to be at the airport when we got off, so Rachel and I applied our lip glosses and eyeliner only to discover no cameras and a humidity I cannot begin to describe. At the airport, we met up with a few others – Antoine, Eric (RR 11), um…Jake, shit, I don’t remember. We get onto a bus, are handed some Red Stripes, and we’re off. I’m immediately checking the weather to see if any laying out is in for the day. We don’t know anything, when the missions will begin, how it’s going to work – nothing, but soon, we pull up to Round Hill, and the cameras are there. Feels like yesterday.

The girls head down to our little area. People seem to have already picked their beds, and we are the last bus to arrive. I get the bed in the corner of this enormous room of beds. It was nicknamed the Orphanage. Naturally, the room with the most people has no air-conditioning. Okay, have you been to Jamaica? No air-conditioning is equivalent to sleeping under a blow-dryer on extra heat. Your lips constantly taste of salty sweat, and your hair sticks to your back like wet grass. Sucks.

All of a sudden, I’m surrounded by faces I’ve only seen on TV in the years of watching the show, and I have to tell you, it was strange and exciting. I gave everyone a hug (like a true fan – feeling like I already know them), and walked around confused and weirded out. I saw Tonya who was so excited to see me because we had talked a bit when we were both in NYC a few weeks before. The TV doesn’t lie, that girl’s body is just ridiculous. Luckily, I knew Melissa already, but people were telling me that I fight between her and Julie had already occurred. “Before we got here??” I asked.

Apparently so. I knew that was going to happen. Melissa and I had already discussed it on the phone. Julie’s fan club didn’t so much exist in Jamaica. It’s the truth. There were very few who liked her, very few who trusted her, and everyone had either had a previous bad experience or had been forewarned about her, and NOT by Melissa. Julie’s sketchiness is well known in the world of BMP types, and this was the first I met her. I’m not good at hating people I don’t know personally. I’m not good at being mean to someone when I haven’t witnessed something fucked up first hand. And if Julie is truly as bad as everyone swears, then the girl is DAMN good at what she does because she comes of really genuine and really sweet to me. Melissa said, “You can’t see through that bullshit?” I reminded her that she didn’t see through it in the year she was friends with her during New Orleans. She agreed. I’ve never known a true liar and manipulator. A good one has you constantly buying their shit (just like the best players seem like the sweetest guys and not creepy at all). Well, I bought her shit, and I know I trust easily and give people the benefit of the doubt – so I just steered clear of her to avoid having to be on one side of the situation or another.
So, we’re settling. We have all the way until Monday before we begin missions, and it’s Friday night. I guess it gives us time to form relationships or enemies, I don’t know. It’s only a matter of seconds before we feel like we’ve been there forever, and it seems clear that it’s going to be an interesting time. No one is a pain in my ass, and I don’t seem to be a pain in anyone else’s. At this point, I don’t have many expectations, don’t know anyone’s feelings on anything or anyone. Everyone seems pretty cool, and I’m hoping my opinion remains this way. However, we’re in BMPs land – and it is not possible to be happy and relaxed here.