HLS Students Ends Stint on 'Survivor'

Harvard Law School's (HLS) honeymoon with the CBS hit show "Survivor II" ended last Thursday night as second-year student Nick Brown lost his bid to win the million-dollar endurance contest.

Brown was voted out of the Australian outback, where the show was filmed, after "surviving" until the 10th episode. Brown will now join a jury with the other people voted out of the outback to decide the fate of the remaining six contestants.

"I was happy to get...back to civilization," Brown wrote in an e-mail. "It's such a weird experience to be cut off from society and from your family for such a long time."

Many HLS students gathered every Thursday night around a TV in Harkness Commons to watch Brown and can no longer root for their fellow student.

"It's disappointing, but I think people will still watch," said law student Frank T. Buford.

Brown held out on the show longer than some had expected. After many of his teammates from the Kucha Tribe were voted off, Brown's chances looked slim. But Brown, an army officer, used his physical fitness to win immunity challenges, which allowed him to avoid facing a vote on his fate.

Sickness and weariness, however, did Brown in. After a month living outside, Brown told CBS's "The Early Show" that his back was starting to hurt and the inside of his mouth was red and irritated.

"It's been rough. To last out here a month is no joke," Brown said in his final speech on the show. "The last few days have been really rough on me and it'll be good to have a meal, a shower, a shave."

Brown said that he had grown personally during his often grueling, month-long experience in the Australia.

"This game's taught me a lot about myself...I feel invincible at times, and Survivor has been a big reality check for me. It's taught me what I can and can't take," he said in his last moments on the show.

HLS student Kristina S. Bennard said she sympathized with Brown's plight, but is disappointed that he will no longer be on the show.

"He looked kind of hungry and sick and tired, so I thought it was good for him to get a decent meal and shower and call his family," she said.

While on "Survivor II," Brown caused a small sensation at a school not used to immersion in popular culture. The Harvard Law Record, HLS's newspaper, wrote an articles updating Brown's progress each week.

HLS spokesperson Michael A. Armini said that when it was announced that Brown would be on the show, reporters called HLS from all over the world wanting to talk to Brown, his professors, or his friends.

"The publicity is all part of the package," Brown wrote in an e-mail. "I didn't apply to be on 'Survivor' to be famous, but you don't apply for the number one show in America without expecting to get noticed everywhere."

--Staff writer William M. Rasmussen can be reached at wrasmuss@fas.harvard.edu.