Illustration: Sarah Kilcoyne
Our friends at Vulture describe Parvati Shallow as “more than a Survivor winner. She’s a legend,” a “schemer extraordinaire.” And she is also now an author, able to tell her own, complicated story with the memoir Nice Girls Don’t Win, writing in depth about the person behind Survivor’s Black Widow. In fact, she says, that show requires a shift in thinking before she’s able to compete: “It’s a boxer mentality, where you’re always protecting yourself with the jab to keep people at a safe distance, but also letting them feel like they can land a few punches every now and then,” she says, laughing. “I’m much softer and warmer in real life.” That real life this past week included a ton of press for the book and lots of time with her many passionate fans. “It hasn’t always been like that,” she explains. “I have worked very hard to be able to receive that amount of love, and to appreciate it. And it’s awesome.”
Friday, July 4
I was home in L.A. I had my daughter, and my dad was in town. He came in to support me because we were having a friends-and-family release party for my book. It was the Fourth of July, and I’d been really excited to go to the beach, but I was so run down. I’ve been doing so much press, just Zoom after Zoom, interview after interview. Every time I tried to get out of bed, I felt this force push me back down. I was like, You know what? I’m just going to let myself sleep. My dad’s here, he’s so good with my daughter.
I ordered a huge delivery from Kreation, which is like cold-pressed juices, bone broth — that sort of thing. I got tons of juice, tons of broth, and I just drowned myself in that. I did not want to get sick, and I really went for it. Turmeric, cayenne, oregano oil: I was taking the works. My daughter crawled into bed with me at like 8:30 p.m., and we fell asleep until the next morning. There were no fireworks on my Fourth, but there were a lot of ginger shots.
Saturday, July 5
My dad made pancakes. He’s from New Hampshire and he had gone to a market there to get some very fancy maple syrup. I guzzled it with my pancake. And I had coffee because I cannot function without coffee.
One of the most stressful parts of preparing for Survivor is knowing that I’m not going to have coffee for a month. I’m not worried about starving or sleeping on the dirt. I’m worried about caffeine withdrawal. I get sluggish and I’m like, Fuck, I have to get my strategy mind going. I get really nervous on the first few days of Survivor because I’m interdependent in my day to day life: I have a daughter and I’m a single mom, and I couldn’t do the work that I do without help. I’ve cultivated a very rich extended family of friends and aunties and fairy godmothers, people who love my kid and want to hang out. When I go on Survivor, it’s a very different mind-set: “This is a competition, lock it in — love people, but also beat them.”
After breakfast, the day really devolved food-wise. My dad was being amazing, cooking everything, but I was just grazing throughout the day, on grapes and carrots and scraps from my daughter’s leftovers.
My book event that night was at a bookstore that has a café. I’d been there signing a bunch of books beforehand and I’d ask whether I needed to get any food or drink, but they said they had it covered. I walked in thinking there would have been some wine or snacks on a table and there was literally nothing. Just empty, barren tables. Thank God my friends are really amazing. Tara Schuster — she wrote Buy Yourself the Fucking Lillies — got my books and threw them all over the table. People were getting drinks at the bar but I was like, Damn, I would have at least had a snack for people.
I was starving at my own book launch, but otherwise it felt like I was getting married. All of my friends and family were there to see me: Everyone from my L.A. life, mom friends from school, people from my gym, my dad — and Ama, my daughter, was the star of the show.
Sunday, July 6
I packed my bags and my dad and Ama drove me to LAX. I was early enough that I could go to the lounge and eat a full sit-down breakfast. I never do that. I had avocado toast, a cappuccino with oat milk, and some fruit. Highly recommended.
I was at the airport early because I was nervous about the book launch. I’d wanted to make sure everything would be smooth with the flight, that my bags would get where they needed to be — all of that. And then I left my freaking laptop on the plane! I’m still trying to get it back from Delta, if they’re reading this.
I lived in New York for a few years when I worked for CBS News but I still feel like a stranger in a strange land when I get here, just floating down the street. After I got to my hotel, which was in Times Square, in the middle of that insanity, I took a walk through Bryant Park down to Nomad and took myself out to dinner at KazuNori and had a phone call with a girlfriend who lives in Oregon. She also used to work at CBS News with me. I chatted with her while I drank my green tea and ate my sushi.
Monday, July 7
I woke up at 5 a.m. to meet my makeup artist and get ready for the CBS Mornings show. I had hot coffee and iced coffee going. I had to be ready for Gayle King. When we got to the studio, Gayle came into the green room and she had pages and pages of handwritten notes from my book. Everyone on the show had read it and wanted to make sure they got everything just right. That blew my mind. It’s not like they’re not busy.
It’s incredible that people have the book in their hands. For so long, people have assumed they know me on the deepest, most intimate level and now it feels better because if they’ve read the book, they actually do know me in a more real way.
I did another hit at CBS and then went to the Guys We F****d podcast. It was a deep interview, much deeper than I thought it would be with the name of the podcast.
At that point in the day, I’d eaten nothing but a jar of peanut M&Ms from the hotel. I was starving. I just Googled, like, “food” and went to Pret A Manger. I got soup, a salad, kombucha, and a bag of those Late July jalapeño chips. I called my dad to see how things were going — my daughter had started swim camp in the mornings — and ate my soup, drank a ginger shot, and had some chips.
I took my salad to eat in Central Park. I sat down on a rock, started to eat my salad, and then I saw the rats running around. It gave me Survivor flashbacks.
I do think playing Survivor so many times changed my relationship with food and hunger in a significant way. I’d always been someone who had a very disciplined mind-set and controlling tendencies around food because my stomach can be very finicky. It’s been like that since I was a kid. But when I played Survivor, being hungry on an island, there’s nothing you can do about it, so the hunger sensations aren’t enough of a cue. I try to move very fast through life, even during my regular day to day at home, trying to squeeze everything in. Now I have to slow down to really pay attention to my body.
Tuesday, July 8
My day started a little later. I got up and had some coffee, and then I went to NBC. After that, I went down to the Fashion District for the Just Us Girlies podcast. Throughout the day, I was eating these protein bars that are really good. They come in gold wrappers so it feels like Willy Wonka.
Driving back to the hotel, I saw a French café and just hopped out of the car. I got a croissant, I got a chicken Caesar salad, I got a kombucha and a chocolate bar and they gave me a baguette — they gave me a lot of carbs. I was hosting a drag show at 3 Dollar Bill in Brooklyn, so I changed into my drag outfit — sparkle books, a lingerie top, fishnets — and then ate in the car on the way to the show, and continued eating while I met with a journalist from Paper magazine. And then I had a Red Bull because the meet-and-greet line was 100 ravenous fans who all had books for me to sign. I couldn’t believe it. I was geeking out. It doesn’t stop, and the show keeps going.
It was my last night in the city, so I did go to Joe’s Pizza after the drag show. I had to get a New York slice.
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