Enrique De Witte

***Enrique*** was the Runner-Up of Essential Survivor: Japan. He later returned for Essential Survivor: All-Stars

## Japan

From the peak social position to complete social pariah. Enrique went through a multitude of situations in Japan, some for the better, and some for the very worst. But if there’s one thing for sure about his game, it’s that he’s a total fighter. And even though he was one shy away from winning the whole game, you can’t say he didn't play his heart out.

Like his young counterpart Zent, this was Enrique’s fourth time applying for the ORG. And once he got in, he didn't go spiral out unlike Zent. He made his social connections which got him into a 5-person alliance, and just generally got the tribe’s morale up. And with his help in the second challenge, he also got included in an alliance named ‘Challenge Beasts’, rightfully so. At the first Tribal Council, Enrique was in on the split vote plan, much to Deca’s worry. But all was well and Richard went home. A solid yet under the radar phase for Enrique. Well, except for Jack.

At the swap portion, we really got to see Enrique’s perception shine during one Tribal. But let’s start from the beginning. In the 4-4 split on NuFurui, obviously the goal is to get someone to flip onto your own side. But Zent taking action, decided that it’d be best for Enrique to flip over to the Wakai. He made an alliance with himself, Tommy, Enrique and Travis. And being the good ally he is, he reported all of that info back to the OG Furui. But to make things even weirder, they were willing to take out one of their own in Vincent! But unfortunately, due to an advantage Geo had gotten, Enrique was transported to the Wakai camp for 24 hours. Giving his allies a disadvantage unintentionally. But when he came back, he was met with a pleasant surprise of Zent’s unexpected departure.

At the next challenge, here is where Enrique started to show his physical capabilities. He got the highest score and carried his Furui tribe to victory. Some would even say it was fraud (Geo). But sadly, a OG Furui member by the name of Deca was voted out, lowering their numbers to 7. At the next Tribal Council Furui had attended, Vincent had asked the whole tribe to do him a favor and vote him out of the game. Since they knew his struggles in his personal life, Travis and Tommy abided by his wishes. But OG Furui wasn’t too convinced. In case they were being sneaky and they didn't wanna get idoled out, they put their votes on Travis. Hoping that if Travis left, Vincent would quit alongside him. Well before they could even trot to Tribal, Vincent striked out, leaving the game regardless. After another round of throwing the challenge, Furui was headed back to Tribal Council, but this time they needed a plan.

On the off-chance one of the Wakai beared an idol. The Furui were going to split their votes 3-1 Travis, so if an idol was played on Travis, they could idol Wakai’s target and still control the vote (which they thought was Ace when in reality it was Enrique himself). But before the blindside of them being wrong could occur, Tommy played an idol on himself, letting Travis go home in a 3-2 vote. Enrique was very proud of his perception here, not letting his allies hear the rest of it.

Now we’ve reached the long-awaited merge. Before reaching the merge, the four NuFurui made an agreement to not tell the others about the events that occurred over there. But within mere minutes of arriving, Enrique had already spilled the deets about what happened to both Jack and Josiah. A mistake that certainly cost him in the near future. When Theodore won a close battle for immunity, it appeared to be a simple tribal lines vote with Jay being voted out 7-4. But when Jack and Josiah realized that Cheren having an idol could be a detriment to their own games, they decided to flip, taking out one of Enrique’s closest allies due to a mistake he made.

Unlike his other two allies, Enrique wasn’t mad at the Double J’s. Most likely because he knew it was because of him they did what they did. But before Jack and Josiah had the chance to potentially boot Enrique, he won immunity (the first of many). So as he should, he took a backseat for this Tribal. Voting with his OG Tribe and booting Theodore. At the Final 9, Enrique was set up to win his second immunity in a row. But Jay presented him with a deal to vote whoever he wanted for the next 2 Tribals. Surprisingly, Enrique and the rest of Furui that was still up there took the deal, giving Jay immunity. So trying to play it safe, he voted Geo with his allies due to his defeated nature. But wham! Geo pulled out an idol, idoling out Jack, which felt Enrique somewhat satisfied as he knew Jack had to go sooner or later. And due to another immunity win next round, Geo was the target of Furui, and his execution was quick and easy.

At the Final 7, things weren’t going as easy as they were before for Enrique. Tribal lines began to disappear and threats were starting to emerge. Mainly himself and Josiah, so when Josiah won immunity this round, Enrique was oblivious to his threat level as people lied to him left and right… or was he oblivious? Because Enrique used his wits and perception to play his idol, nullifying all 6 votes against him. And in an underrated move, he took out Luke, who was clearly the biggest goat left in the game.

During the next round, it became clear to both Enrique and Josiah that they were the biggest threats left, so they obviously teamed up. But before they could get traction with this new alliance, the other two duos solidified their own alliance to combat them. So at Tribal Council, while the 4 took out Josiah, Enrique found his rehidden idol and wasted it in fear. At 5, Enrique won his now third individual immunity. And knowing he was in the middle of two duos, he sided with Aceemn, due to knowing about Ace wanting to blindside Kamen at 4, so Jay was idoled out with 2 votes.

At this point in the game, it was anyone’s guess who could be voted out. X could be voted out for having friends on the jury, Kamen could be voted out for being a strategic threat, and Enrique could be voted out for being a physical threat. If one thing was for sure, it was that Ace was making the FTC due to having no real threat in terms of the jury. And due to Enrique barely winning Final immunity, he was also confirmed to be in the FTC, which left X and Kamen. This made for an obvious choice as everyone had taken out Kamen due to his strategic gameplay, leaving X, Enrique and Ace in the Final 3.

At the Final Tribal Council, the Jurors knew that Enrique and X had convincing games to vote for. But due to his below average FTC performance, the jury gave X the win in a very close 5-3-0 vote.

## All-Stars

Enrique, while he was most definitely an All-Star, was perceived as one of the biggest question marks cast. After Season 4 ended, the community was conflicted on whether or not he should’ve beat X. So with that in mind, it was all up to Enrique to prove whether he was a good enough player to beat X, or he was gonna make the same mistakes that cost him the win in Season 4.

On the Andaman tribe, Enrique linked up quickly with the Season 4 alumni in Jay and Theodore, while making bonds with Tyler and Adam. At the first Tribal Council, it was an easy first boot for everyone as Calvin was the main name getting thrown around. Jump forward to the third Immunity Challenge and things began to go south really fast. On the section Enrique was supposed to do, he messed up (allegedly), and (allegedly) cost their tribe the win. So with his target sticking out like a sore thumb, Enrique was obviously brought up as a name to boot. But not because of his challenge performance, but because of his social positioning in the tribe. He was near, if not, at the complete bottom of the tribe.

So with a little push from Payton and Tyler, Enrique began to finally throw out a name; Gabe. His pitch was Gabe was the safest person to vote out as he was the only Season 3 contestant on their tribe. But since Gabe was in the majority alliance, that pitch didn't really go anywhere and it seemed like lights out for Enrique… until the Theodore blindside happened all behind his back. So now heading into another Tribal Council after losing a third Immunity Challenge, all eyes were on Jay and Enrique. Luckily for him, the main target landed on Jay and he was informed on that. Whether it be by a person, or the random blowup Jay had at Kim and Tyler. Regardless, Jay was out and Enrique was an unknown entity heading into the swap.

Swaps are almost never fun, but with the position Enrique was in, he obviously needed one to survive. So coming out of this shuffle, Enrique wasn’t in too bad of a spot. He was in the majority by tribal lines 5-3, was swapped with Tyler and Paul, people he felt connected to. And as for the three new Nicobar in Aidan, Ben and Logic, he bonded well with them too. When they lost their first challenge as a new tribe, the OG Andaman all clicked up, and while deciding who to vote off, they agreed that they needed to throw Logic a bone and integrate him with themselves. But it ended up making sense as Gabe began to try and save his Season 3 brethren in Ben and Aidan, but it unfortunately didn't work as Aidan was completely blindsided.

At the next vote, the tribe collectively agreed that Ben was a HUGE liability to them in challenges. Even Ben knew this himself, so in retaliation, he made an alliance chat with Logic, Paul and Gabe with the goal in mind to take out Enrique. But of course, Logic reported it back to the majority alliance. But oddly enough, he began to push the agenda that Gabe had created the alliance. And since the Andamans trusted Gabe and Paul more than Logic, they compared notes and found out that Logic was lying. So in response, they blindside him right out of making the merge.

Now we’re at the merge and all gloves have come off. This was the moment everybody was waiting for, the moment where the game would kick into overdrive. There were two sides right off the bat but with lines of communication coming in from both. Tyler, Kim, Enrique, Brandon, Paul and Adam were one. While Josiah, Jacob, Zach, Kamen, Gabe (who flipped right off the bat), and Jayden were the other. Ben, had both sides thinking he was on their own while he was a flipper. For Enrique’s side, the immediate target was Josiah as he was a big name in the ORG and seemed to be the mastermind behind everything on that side of the alliance. But since it’d be too obvious of a vote, they immediately switched over to someone who wouldn’t be too much of a target; Zach. But there were only two problems. One, Ben had flipped to the other side, and 2. Gabe used his Steal-a-Vote on Kim. So when the votes came in, it was no surprise that Adam was a goner.

At the second merged Tribal, things weren’t looking too hot. As Josiah won immunity, Enrique’s side needed to find another target, but after that vote, they were really cracked and didn't trust each other. But after a bunch of miscommunication and advantage speculation happened in the downtime before tribal, Enrique’s side was completely split 3-2-1, while Josiah’s side were united in taking out Enrique.