Rediscovering My Love of "Man vs. Wild"

I returned home from an LDS Mission to Spain in August of 2006. A few weeks later, I was attending BYU in Provo, UT. My new roommates and I made a discovery on Discovery..."Man vs. Wild."

Imagine, if you will--for those of you who weren't there to witness it first-hand--the reaction of three 21 year-old guys living alone when they came upon that show.

It's the closest you can get to being outdoors while still watching TV.

Bear Grylls, host and star of the show "Man vs. Wild" building a fire.

For those of you who have never seen the show, here's the premise:

The show centers on a man named Bear Grylls, a former member of the British Special Forces. He now travels the world speaking and teaching survival classes and techniques. From this stemmed the show "Man vs. Wild" (as it's called in the U.S.) Each episode shows Bear being airlifted into the middle of an expanse of wilderness somewhere in the world (The Sahara Desert, The European Alps, etc.) and he has to survive long enough to be rescued or find civilization. In each episode he brings a few key items, like a cup, a knife, or flint. In a true survival situation, you would do/eat almost anything, and that is true of this show as well.

In the Kalahari Desert episode
Bear eats the leftovers of a zebra killed by lions or hyenas.

As you can understand, a show like this--so far out of the norm of television programming--would caputre the attention of (mostly) men and women around the world. We tuned in with rapt attention every week, and even printed a schedule of every time episodes would air for the rest of the school year.

So, also understandably, I was more than a little heart-broken to be wrenched from my illusion of reality when I found out that Bear Grylls doesn't do everything on his own--he recieves assistance on more than one occasion. As I read rumors on the Internet, and watched interviews on TV, it seemed everything was unravelling. For a time, I confess, my love of "Man vs. Wild" grew cold.

But, like the emergence of new life in the spring, my dormant love reflourished and grew when my wife Kathleen bought me a DVD collection of the first two seasons. As I watched them, I was at first dissappointed, because I realized things had been changed from how the episodes originally aired. For instance, in the episode that takes place in Alaska, Bear is seen eating a freshly-caught, live, uncooked salmon. In the original episode, they lead you to believe that he caught it with a stick. In the DVD version, they make it clear that Bear lost patience trying to catch one, so he ate one that a member of the crew caught.

Bear devouring "the freshest Salmon you'll ever have."

At first I was outraged that I had been so easily duped, and I if felt like I had been betrayed, or that the show had been cheapened. But then my feelings began to be pacified...I thought about it, and I realized that THIS IS STILL REAL. Do you see him eating that Salmon? Do you see that Zebra? He's really doing these things.

So, say what you may, "Man vs. Wild" is still an amazing show. The events and things he is doing are real. And if you want him to be completely up-front and honest with you, just get ahold of the new DVDs...they have changed everything to make it factual and not misleading.

And I love it.

Internship Report, Week 3

Intern Name: Mark Hamilton
Internship Site: KSL Newsradio 102.7 FM and 1160 AM
Emphasis: Broadcast Journalism
Semester and Section: Fall 2008, Section 001
Week Number: 3
Number of Hours This Week: 20

Week 3 Report:
As will probably continue to be the case, this week was much like the others, so I will do my best to highlight things that were different, and spare you a re-hashing of things that I do every week…

This week was notable because after last week’s stomping of UCLA 59-0, BYU has attracted quite a bit of attention on a national scale, and actually, as of this writing, they are ranked 11th in the polls nationally. All this attention is both good and bad for BYU, because both BYU and the Mountain West Conference need more national recognition and respect, but at the same time, it proved to be a distraction from the team’s focus.

In the opening quarter of Saturday’s game against Wyoming, BYU’s offense didn’t score. Both Max Hall and Bronco Mendenhall were flooded with interview requests and appeared on ESPN during the week, putting a strain on them that they haven’t known before. As a result, they have changed their policies dealing with the media in order to refocus. That made me think more about the fine line the media walks in their lust for information and interviews…sometimes it is hard to remember that these are real people, with real lives, that are going out of their way to accommodate you. We ought to respect that.

This week went well, as far as the day-to-day things go. On Saturday, up at KSL Headquarters, the game was a bit slower than normal, since BYU easily handled Wyoming. But that didn’t stop it from being one of the craziest days for me at work. I was following the Utah-Air Force game and cutting highlights from that at the same time I was cutting highlights from the East Carolina-Carolina game, and other top-25 games. I was answering phone calls, E-mailing audio highlights to ESPN and The Mtn., etc. I was literally running around doing 5 things at once. And it was great…time flies on Saturdays, even though it’s more than 8 hours. My job satisfaction there is great…I love working there, and the people I am working with.

Still waiting to hear word on the new car we’ve ordered through a car broker. I’m not sure my current car can keep up this rigorous schedule of commuting.

That’s it for this week.

Thanks!
~ Mark Hamilton

BYU - Helping Students by Not Helping Students

I drive. A lot. And because of how amazing my car is, I love it, except for the commuting associated with my internship.


My anguish over commuting stems from three things:

1) I have to get up at 4 a.m. to get to downtown Salt Lake from Provo,
2) I have a car that may die at any time, and in any place, and could even kill me, and
3) I have to find parking near BYU campus.

Here's an article about the situation from the Daily Universe, BYU's newspaper:

Last Friday, I recieved the following E-mail from BYU admins:

As the last line emphasizes, this is a project that will benefit students. Well, it would have been TRULY beneficial if they had undertaken this massive project DURING THE SUMMER.

During the summer, campus looks kinda' like this:

Photo by Mark Hamilton

Empty.

According to this site, the Spring and Summer Term enrollment is actually on the DEcline, and sits at roughly one-fourth that of Fall and Winter Semesters.

If you're interested in exact numbers, in 2007, there were 10,321 students at BYU for Spring Term, and just 7,563 for Summer. Compare that with the 30,426 for Fall Semester and 29,004 for Winter, and I think we've built a pretty compelling case.

Instead, what BYU has done is disrupt the already tenuous parking situation in the middle of what we have just shown to be the busiest time of the year for BYU. I have a hanging A-lot pass that I'm not supposed to use for things unless they're KSL Radio, and because of the disruption of this parking lot, those A-lot pass holders are forced into other lots too, meaning that there weren't even A-lot spots. And since I'm coming from SALT LAKE to Provo, I don't have time to circle campus looking for a spot. As it is, I was late to my quiz in class.

Boo, BYU. Shame on you. Is it so hard to take care of things like this during summer term when only 24.86% of your student body is in Provo? I think not. Planning like this would make the school's namesake cringe.

BYU-UCLA

I just thought I'd mention here how fun it was to watch the BYU-UCLA game on Saturday, and listen to Greg Wrubell's call on KSL Newsrado 102.7 FM and 1160 AM.

There's almost nothing I love better than shutting up critics in a resounding way--and Saturday accomplished that.

It's not every day a team wins 59-0.

Junior quarterback Max Hall tied a BYU record with seven touchdown passes

in the Cougars' 59-0 victory over UCLA. (BYU Photo/Mark Philbrick)

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

"BYU sure showed me: OK, I admit it, I was wrong.  BYU came out with fury against UCLA and showed anyone who might have questioned whether the cougars belonged in the BCS buster conversation that there was no doubt.  Quarterback Max Hall needs to be considered a dark horse for the Heisman if he's not already.  Obviously, a lot of contenders had great games on Saturday, but only Hall threw seven touchdowns." -- Graham Watson, ESPN.com

I'd probably feel like Verner too if my team had just lost 59-0.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)