Teeny Chirichillo is used to buddying up to strangers. After all, the 24-year-old found a friend and even employment by randomly reaching out to her "text-door neighbor." But Teeny has left their job to come out to Survivor , a deep-seated dream for the massive superfan. Despite their obsession with all things around the show, they admit that complicated strategy is not their specialty. But they aim to hopefully counterbalance that with their relationship skills and being able to get to the heart of their competition.
Read on for my interview with Teeny, and check in with Parade.com daily for interviews with this season's contestants and other tidbits. Survivor 47 premieres on September 18 with a two-hour premiere on CBS.
Related: Meet the Full Cast of Survivor 47
Interview with Teeny from Survivor 47
How are you doing right now?
I am feeling good that I'm talking to you. Otherwise, a little bit paranoid, taking in everybody. I mean, so thrilled to be here. This has been forever a dream of mine. And yeah, overall, I'd say pretty good.
Well, happy to be that friendly face for you! To start, give me your name, age, and occupation.
So my name is Teeny. I am currently 23 years old. So my occupation, I had to basically quit my job to come out here. But I was working as a tech consultant. And I think the story of how I got that job is more interesting and will probably appeal to more people than the actual work of being a tech consultant. I was 16 years old. I was scrolling on my phone, as I do, and I saw a meme on Instagram that was like, "If you text the phone number that's one digit above or below your own, that's your 'text door neighbor.'" Like a play on next door neighbor.
So obviously, I pull out my phone; I do it. The text goes through blue; I know it's delivered. And on the other end, the person responds. We have this back-and-forth conversation, not revealing who we are or anything. And then, at the time, I was 16, she was 26. We ended up kind of maintaining this friendship. She lived in New York City. She was the first person I ever came out of the closet to. And then when I was in college, she actually helped put me in touch with the tech company she worked for. And then, at 22 years old, when she was 32, we worked together at this company. So, yeah, that's a crazy story. [ Laughs .]
But what a perfect setup for this experience. "Hey, I don't know you from a hole in the wall. But we get to work together in this communal environment."
Yeah. I feel like that story is very representative of how I can create and maintain relationships and how I also kind of spontaneously fall ass-backward into jobs and things like that. Which is, I think, a skill that could really help me here.
So you mentioned that Survivor has been a "forever dream" of yours. In your bio, you even wrote as one of your hobbies "Literally Survivor . Avid podcast listener, attend all nearby watch parties, have played mock versions, written research essays, and find a way to weave it into every conversation I have with someone new I meet. Not kidding." Talk with me about your history with the show, and what led you to go from superfan to player.
So my mom watched the show from its conception, which is right on par with my conception. It came out a few months before I was born. She saw me running around backstage at my sister's dance recital, just kind of wheeling and dealing with all the dancers, and was like, "She's gonna win Survivor one day." So she put me onto it. It was Fabio's season, which, randomly, I feel like a lot of people start with Nicaragua .
Maybe everyone was feeling that Heroes vs. Villains glow that they wanted to check out the season that immediately followed.
Exactly. For some reason, it's a lot of people's first seasons. And for some reason, it hooks us. I feel like, if you like it and you get it, you get it, even if it's Nicaragua . So I started watching it. I was also a huge Big Brother fan. I don't know if that's a bad word to say around here. I was obsessive about reality TV and watching adults communicate and fight and all that from a very young age. It was just my passion. And yeah, I've just been obsessed with Survivor . I wore a buff every single day of high school. I've gone out of my way to pest players. I don't even know if you're aware; the two of us have a picture together.
We do! I'll admit, when I saw your face, I had quite literally a snapshot memory of meeting you.
So yeah, I've met Survivor players in extremely serendipitous ways. Like Dean Kowalski was eating at my restaurant one summer before his season even came out, and the two of us kind of forged this friendship. I hung out with Richard Hatch when I was 19. I was visiting Rhode Island, and just shot him a long DM about, "Hey, I'm a super big fan." So we went out to lunch. And I've tried to incorporate Survivor into my life in so many ways. But I think the place in life that I'm at now. In college, I'd made a few audition tapes. And I watched them back, and I was like, "There's just something not right here. I am not ready. Something about the way I'm articulating myself isn't real." I needed to get out of college, kick a few of my college-esque habits. And I lived in New York City for a year. I moved back home. I was like, "Now's the time." I applied, and it's worked out.
Well, pulling on your voluminous Survivor knowledge, give me one winner and one non-winner who you identify with the most.
So my winner is Mike White. I feel like Mike White, I relate to so much. I feel like he sort of was strategically and physically underestimated, which is what I anticipate my energy will be. And I feel like he is just really good at making genuine relationships with people and having just sort of very subtle ways of doing so. Just the way I feel like he can look at people and make them feel comforted, and just tiny moments and things like that, and just kind of foregoing the bullshit. I feel like I'm just somebody who can really get to the heart of somebody quickly in a way that he can. And I'm a writer as well, and that's something I definitely want to explore more after this. It's something I do on the side, both kind of professionally and just personally. And I feel like the way that I sort of conceptualize things is similar to him. I have a cynicism that is like him. And, yeah, I hope to play like him.
And then non-winner, I feel like Tai is somebody who I'm like. I am very sensitive. I feel like Tai is also very sensitive. The aspects of the game that are super numerical and things like that are going to be a struggle for me. The very technical strategic parts are not things that [I get]. I always need to listen to 20 RHAP podcasts to understand the prisoner's dilemma things and stuff like that. And I feel like Tai also didn't have the tightest grasp on that aspect of the game. But he had such freedom within relationships because people liked him, and he was a very present player who made decisions and had the freedom to make decisions based on just his intuition. And I feel like that's a way that I will also play. And both of his placements are awesome.
Definitely! What's your biggest superpower and biggest piece of kryptonite? Does it tap into, as you just mentioned, being less numbers-oriented and more "soul-oriented"?
Perfectly put, yeah. So I think that my biggest superpower will be my social relationships and my ability to make people feel comfortable, my ability to hopefully bring a sense of home to people around camp. And also just to be this sort of bumbling "little sibling" type character energy for people in a Tai, but I also think in an Elaine Stott way [that] I think disarm people about me. But I think my kryptonite would definitely be that I just am not very left-brain. You could give me 24 hours with a puzzle, and it's just not gonna go too well. [ Laughs .] I've practiced a lot, and I've improved. And just the very technical vote-splitting type things, I'm going to need help with. So I'm sure hopefully, working with people and kind of being a yin and yang situation is what I'm looking for.
Related: Everything to Know About Survivor 47
You talk about being a student of the game, and at least trying to improve your puzzle skills. What has your prep process been like to get out here?
So I did CrossFit five days a week for three months. But then my shoulder and my back started to hurt, and I was like, "I don't really need to keep increasing my deadlift weight. That's not necessarily gonna help me so much." So once I got, like, that sort of foundational athleticism, I just took it back to the judgment free zone, Planet Fitness, and was working out there. I also live very close to a beach. So I would go to the beach and do some sprints and run there to get used to the sand and things like that.
I did do puzzles. I have three or four Survivor puzzles that I would sit down and do every single day, just to get my brain used to how a puzzle works. Because that's just not something in my wheel of tricks. Also, I practiced fire every single day. Got pretty good at doing that. And I would also try to, every weekend, put myself in a situation with entirely new people, just so I could gauge how new people responded to me. [With] different types of people, how quickly I could get somebody to like me, what types of people I felt like were harder. So I'd just try to put myself either on a bar stool next to a stranger and talk to them, or just ask my friends to bring me along to different situations.
Talk to me about the competition you've been scoping out during your time in the preseason. Who are you picking up good vibes from?
So I'm gonna start with someone who I think you and I both know. And that is AW, who I recognize to be an RHAP podcaster. So I saw her, and I was like, "I think it's her." I got a little closer; I was like, "I'm 99% sure." I heard the smallest snippet of her voice. I was like, "I'm 100% sure that is an RHAP podcaster." I would love to work with her. I have no intentions of telling anybody that she's an RHAP podcaster, because that would also reveal that I know who a really niche commentator of Survivor is. And I think, if I'm trying to blow up her spot for being a super fan in that way, I'd be simultaneously taking myself down too. But would love to work with her, obviously. I'm a huge fan of RHAP. I think she's amazing, and that would be great.
Also, almond mom! I don't even know if she is a mother. I don't know if she has children. But she is mother to me. I'm obsessed with her. I love her vibes, the woman who's a little bit older than the rest of us with blonde hair. She seems like one of my friends' moms who I'd sit around the counter and drink wine with and talk shit with, and I would love to be with her. Yesterday, she was wearing head-to-toe blue, and I'm like, "I don't know if this is like an overt signal to all of us that you're on the blue tribe." I'm on the red tribe, so I kind of mourned, just in preparation, that she will not be with me. But I would love to eventually get to play with her.
There's a guy who's tall who has some facial hair. He's skinny, and he just kind of reminds me of New Jersey. He looks like sort of an amalgamation of all the cross-country boys from my high school and every line cook from every restaurant I've worked in, which is really comforting to me. There's a Hawaiian girl who has a really nice smile. She's charming the pants off of everybody. I saw her at the airport chatting up the guy at the ticket line. She's made me feel good. I'm sure she's made everybody feel good. So I think she'll do really well. I could go on and on, dude!
Well, how about on the other side of things? Anybody you're not picking up good vibes from?
Yeah, so there's two. So one of them has the haircut that I had all throughout high school, which is pinched straight down to my shoulders. It's a dude. He parts it at his ear. I think his initials are AR. I've seen him every step of this process. When I was at my finals, I saw him, and he's just giving me nothing, absolutely nothing. I've convinced myself he hates me. Anything I've gotten for him has just been dead eyes. And then there's also the other guy with shoulder-length hair. Both of them have been putting it up in man buns, which is questionable. I've also just convinced myself that they will be on my starting tribe, and have just started to try and mentally prepare myself for that. But both of them have not been playing the eye contact game, have not been playing the wink game. And I'm like, "I don't get that." So obviously, they could be very different, but that's where I'm at.
What's your hottest Survivor take?
My hot take is that I believe every season of Survivor should have a handful of people who do not know a single thing about the show, who have not really seen it, who have maybe [only] seen a season that was shown to them.
Are you just trying to manifest that's the case with your season?
Okay, listen, here's the thing. Of course, I would like that, because then it would work well for me. But in general, even on Nicaragua , Na'Onka was plucked off of a boardwalk. I'm pretty sure Courtney Yates was taken from a restaurant in New York City. Some of the most captivating, entertaining people who play just unpredictably and who are kind of learning the ropes as it goes, are people who aren't me, who literally have a picture with you, and knows every little intricate detail of this game. Of course, it would be beneficial to us "gamebots," because we can kind of take advantage of their cluelessness. But I also just think it would just add a level of entertainment and unpredictability to a game where, even [with] as many twists as you can make, the people who really know their shit just know that they have to adapt to those kinds of things. Adding people who don't know any of that would just be super cool.
Finally, if you could bring a celebrity or a fictional character out for a Loved Ones visit, who are you picking and why?
So it's so tough because I have so many parasocial relationships with all sorts of celebrities and fictional characters. My fictional characters are probably the most unreliable narrators. I love Girls , so I wouldn't pick Hannah Horvath to give me any advice. And I probably wouldn't pick Nancy Botwin from Weeds , which is my other favorite show.
But I think that I would honestly bring Trisha Paytas out here. I don't know if that'll be controversial; I think some people would eat that up. But it's because I feel like there's only so much strategic conferencing I could do to really help me. Trisha would be someone to gossip with. She would make me laugh. It would be a lifelong dream to meet her, on behalf of me and all my friends who are obsessed with her. And I just feel like she would really bring me joy and a light and laughter that I need. And she'd probably also bring tons of fast food to eat, which would be really helpful, too. So that's who I'm gonna pick. Maybe I'll regret it later and come up with someone else, but that's my pick right now.
Next, check out our interview with Survivor 47 contestant Solomon "Sol" Yi .
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