Survivalist Ed Stafford tells Loong Wai Ting that the key to staying alive in a hostile environment is to be in tune with it
CAN one survive alone on an island for 60 days? Britain’s adventurer extraordinaire and survivalist Ed Stafford did just that.
The Briton is the only person ever to walk the entire length of the Amazon in 860 days.
In his new book, Walking The Amazon, Ed recounts his experiences, from starvation and flesh-eating parasites to his encounter with fierce machete-wielding tribesmen in the Peruvian Andes.
OPEN-MINDED AND FLEXIBLE
Ed was previously warned that his ambitious journey to travel across South America through its notorious jungle would be futile and even death but the former British Army Captain’s burning enthusiasm later proved critics wrong.
Now, returning again on national television, Ed is hosting the survival show, Marooned, where he “isolates” himself in remote locations around the world for 10 days.
In each of the nine-part series, he will also put human endurance to the test.
With the constant threat of malnourishment and fear for his own life, he has absolutely no one, not even the film crew, for company in remote places in Borneo, Thailand, Australia and Botswana, just to name a few.
To document his journey, Ed records all his daily activities with a number of cameras set-up around himself and his shelter.
With his extensive background in survival, one would have thought that surviving in the wild would be a walk in the park for him.
But the 38-year-old Peterborough-born says otherwise.
“It’s difficult, really, to come up with an ultimate survival guide list.
Survival is a very specific thing and one cannot really apply that one particular ultimate list to any situation.
The most important thing in surviving is to be open-minded and flexible, and look at your surroundings,” he says.
On his Amazon expedition in 2010, Ed and his Peruvian walking companion, Cho, broke their nohunting policy when food ration became too scarce.
The two men killed and cooked a red-footed tortoise for food.
When faced with a survival situation, those who can adapt to the new environment, stand better chances of survival.
UNCONVENTIONAL FISHING METHOD
In an episode in Borneo, Ed develops an unconventional method for catching fish by using his own faeces when food becomes scarce.
Also, the unrelenting jungle’s humidity hampers his efforts to start a fire.
The climate eventually takes a toll on his body, and he develops tropical ulcer on his foot.
“The hardest and the easiest (episode) are both in Asia.
“I was in a pocket of very pristine rainforest and surrounded by Malaysian Borneo.
A large part had been deforested and so there weren’t many small animals where I was.
It was starvation for the much of the 10 days, and I lost 9kg,” he says.
“It was really limiting.
Everything was very humid and very damp.
It took me a long time to light a fire.” In Thailand, Ed narrowly escapes being crushed to death when a nearby tree takes a battering during a freak hail storm.
He relies on all of his survival skills and an ingenuity to tap into whatever resources the jungle offers.
He constructs an unusual camp which he calls home for the next 10 days.
Food is aplenty and it pushes him past the survival stage to a point where he is thriving.
KEEPING IT REAL
His love for adventure TV is the reason why Ed continues to take on challenging and crazy expeditions.
“I’ve always thought it will be more engaging for the viewers if whatever the survivalist does on TV is actually real.
If you can’t light a fire then you’ll have to suffer the consequences such as eat raw food and be cold at night.
I genuinely think it will be so much more exciting to move adventure TV away from the usual scripted show, TV crew, and towards something real,” he says.
Keeping it real is easy for Ed.
Convincing Discovery Channel is not.
“It’s difficult sometimes, to get a series such as Marooned to be commissioned because the network doesn’t know what will be going on.
But over time, it became easier to convince the people so that they don’t need to worry.
There are so many things that I need to do to survive that we don’t need to script it.
And that’s basically where the whole concept came from,” he says.
SURVIVALIST Ed is also the host for Naked And Marooned (Naked Castaway in US), which follows the same concept as Marooned.
In Naked And Marooned, he is dropped on the uninhabited island of Olorua in the Pacific where he has to survive for 60 days.
Comparing his experience in both shows, Ed says Marooned is invariably easier.
“Sixty days is an extraordinarily long period of time.
But what we decided was that if we were going to turn this into a series, the most exciting things always happen within the first week.
That ’s the point where t he a d ren a l i ne filled in every aspect of yourself.
No water, dehydration, hunger and being exposed to extreme weather conditions.
That’s where it excites!” he says.
“Sixty days with Naked Castaway and we’ve done endurance.
The interesting part is to learn to take control of each environment and to quickly get to a level where you’re comfortable.
Marooned focused on the hardest and interesting bit, all in 10 days in each location.” But if he has survived the Amazon and 60 days on a deserted island, wouldn’t 10 days be relatively a piece of cake for him? “I think it was going to be easy,” he says, “but I underestimated it.
Every location has had huge challenges and you can’t be an expert.
People who claim they’re experts are exaggerating their local knowledge of each environment.”
COMBATING ISOLATION
How does one combat isolation? “It’s a thing that has made the show a lot harder than people really recognise.
In any of the episodes, if there was just one person with me, it would have made it so much easier — somebody to laugh and joke with.
Somebody to share all the responsibilities,” says Ed.
“As for dealing with isolation, some people are really good at being on their own for extended periods of time.
When all that comfort is stripped away and you don’t have anyone to rely to, no technology or clean water, that feeling of being completely-on-your-own is quite overwhelming.
Sixty days on a deserted island has had a huge effect on me and there’s no denying it.
“I had repercussions for about a year after I came off the island, the sort of defence mechanisms that I built in order to protect myself during the survival mode.”
SCARY MOMENTS
Ed did not face any life-threatening incident, except when he was trekking in the Amazon when he was held at arrow point by the indigenous Indians and later at gunpoint by drug traffickers.
Not only that but he was also arrested for suspected drug-trafficking and murder by the police.
“On this current series, the challenges haven’t been as acute.
It’s been more really putting up with not having any food and being in uncomfortable conditions.
There have been encounters with hippos in Africa and being very close to a herd of wild elephants in Rwanda but I’ve never felt like my life was properly at risk in the same way as I did in the Amazon,” he says.
“This show has been more about the intricacies of how tough it is to actually survive with nothing.”
HOLDING IT TOGETHER
There is no hiding the fact that Ed almost lost his sanity after spending 60 days on an island in Naked Castaway.
Assuming that he was fine after he came home, Ed did not even thought of visiting a psychiatrist or psychologist to “fine-tune” his mental health.
“I just assumed that I would be fine.
Looking back it was quite naive to think that I didn’t need any professional help.
I wrote about my experiences in my book and there was no hiding about the island’s effects on me.
So, yes, there have been brushes with insanity and trying to hold it together.
But I feel like I have come out the other side and am quite lucky to do so as well,” he says.
“We think too much and we make decisions too much from our heads.
When I allow all the worries, fears and anxiety to drift off, I feel that life has gone much easier.
You’re in tune with the environment and everything becomes easier and happy as well.
Learn to let go of your worry and fear because that kind of mental activity can end up driving you mad.
That’s what I try and carry into everyday life.”
Marooned airs every Tuesday starting tomorrow at 9pm on Discovery Channel (Astro channel 551).
Repeats every Saturday and Sunday at 8pm and 2pm respectively.