Skye and Priya Let Us in on Some Big Brother Secrets
by
Jessica Chandra 05/12/14
2 Reactions 10 Shares
Print
0 7 3 0 0
View in slideshow
Big Brother 2014 housemates Skye Wheatley and Priya Malik, two of more popular personalities this year — they came third and fourth respectively — have only been out of the house for just over a week, but the emotions flooded back when they returned to the place they called home for three months on Wednesday night for a promo event with Ambi Pur. Skye and Priya were joined by Lawson Reeves, smitten couple Travis Lunardi and Aisha McKinnon, and Ambi Pur ambassador Ben Zabel aka Ben From Brisbane at the event, where they shared memories and gave an intimate group of media a tour around Australia's most famous house share. POPSUGAR Australia caught up with Skye and Priya to chat about
things the series doesn't really show, like what lockdown is like and how they really felt about using the bathroom with cameras watching.
POPSUGAR Australia: What did you guys do in lockdown?
Priya: Though we can’t reveal much about it as per our contracts, it was pretty much a time where we were pretty much devoid of all technology, no contact with the outside world. I remember spending my time cooking and watching movies, and speaking with my chaperone — everyone gets a chaperone. That’s pretty much it! That’s what I did.
Skye: I had bought coffee grind into lockdown, so I made my own coffee scrub, like a Frank scrub, so I scrubbed my body with that — it was great, because I’m like, ‘This isn’t my shower! My mum’s not going to come in here and be like, “Oh my God, clean the walls!” It’s messy stuff, right? So I did that. I read books. I took a medicine ball in, and did little exercises. I would sunbake every morning on the balcony when the sun would come up. I was so paranoid about losing my tan. I would watch movies. When I got bored during the night-time I would cut up fruit and vegetables and freeze them, and then blend them the next morning and have them in healthy juices. What else? I pretty much just ate. I was constantly eating, because I was so bored.
Priya: There’s pretty much nothing to do. On the subject of tan, I got, for the first time in my life — I mean I’m legally brown — but for the first time in my life I had actually gotten a spray tan, coming into lockdown. And I hated it. And my husband loved it, my friends loved it; they were like, “You’ve just come from a Spanish beach,” because there was that glow and that shine. But I hated it. Every evening I ran a bath, sat in it, exfoliated like crazy, trying to get rid of that tan. So I was getting rid of it, you [Skye] were getting one.
Skye: Also, we had the questionnaires to fill out, and one of them said, ‘Draw your perfect, ideal guy.’ So I filled the whole page up with my perfect guy, my perfect girl, I drew a monkey on there, I drew a mermaid.
Priya: I drew a cat.
Skye: I drew everything I could think of because I was that bored. I’d just be in the kitchen. You’d pack the dishwasher, and then you’d unpack it. You’d eat, you’d do anything you could to occupy yourself.
Priya: And we mean anything.
Skye: I would brush my hair in the mirror.
Priya: I was also paranoid that that room could be rigged by cameras. Did you feel that way?
Skye: Oh, kind of it.
Priya: It did sweep through my mind, but I knew it wasn’t.
PS: How many days?
Priya: Eight days to be precise. Or nine, depending on when you went in.
PS: Did the show give you a list of things you should bring?
Priya: They did. We got a massive list of things that we will need. We also got specific instruction like, because it’s Summer, try and get a lot of colour in your wardrobe. You will definitely need sneakers, workout clothing. There was also a list of things we cannot bring into the house, like hair straighteners and curling irons. So they were pretty detailed about what we should and shouldn’t get. Did we do it? No. We all pretty much did not pack right. I felt I hadn’t packed right, and most of us felt that way. But the good thing is that in the house we can share each other’s clothing, so if you haven’t got many workout clothes you can always borrow from another person. It worked out eventually, but we had specific packing instructions.
PS: Why can’t you bring straighteners or curlers?
Priya: We get them from Big Brother, so they are supplied. So we can’t bring our own. And obviously no phones and no cameras.
PS: How did you cope with the no-technology thing in the first few days?
Priya: I’m very technology-savvy — I’m on social media constantly, and I feel like I have to have my phone, and I feel like handicap if I don’t have my phone. So going into lockdown was a good thing because it conditioned us for this. Being in the house, a few times I’d be like, ‘Oh, where’s my phone?’ You know how you have that feeling? So I had that for a few days. But because I was pretty involved with the show from day dot, I was thinking about why I’m here, what I’m doing. That feeling got eliminated quite quickly, within a day or two.
PS: Did you feel weird going to the toilet as there is a camera in there?
Priya: I used to.
Skye: I never did, full stop. I always pee with the door open at home, so . . .
Priya: I used to look up the camera and be like, “Hi!”
Skye: I’d look in the mirror. I’d lean back and go, “How’s my hair going?”
Priya: So we were pretty unabashed about it. And as per our contract as well, it’s clearly written that they will not film us in the toilet unless there is conversation in the toilet. There was obviously none on my behalf; I never took anyone into the toilet and talked to them.
Skye: She vomits so much.
Priya: I threw up a lot in this house. My stomach used to get upset every few days, and whenever I’m super stressed and anxious, my body reacts in that way.
PS: What happened if anyone felt unwell?
Priya: There would be a doctor on call. Initially they will try and sort it out themselves, and there’s a first aid, and there is a medicine box as well. But all the drugs are administered in the presence of a doctor, and everything is tracked — everything you’ve been taking, what are you taking now. And in case of an emergency, there’s always a doctor. We are very well taken care of.
PS: Say, for example, you bring in your makeup, if you run out, can you get extra supplies?
Priya: A few things, yes, mainly necessities. So if you run out of moisturiser, yes you will get some. I pretty much had enough makeup, so to speak. I did not have enough lipsticks, but then Skye and Aisha did, so I just borrowed from them. But in terms of foundation and eyeliner, I never ran out of it. I did run out of individual eyelash extensions, but then Big Brother gave us full sets. He wants us to keep looking pretty.
Skye: If you asked him for a specific brand, you wouldn’t get it, but if you said, “I just need foundation,” he would give you anything. He’d try pick your colour. He would do the best he could. He did give us what we needed.
Priya: Body wash, scrubs.
Skye: Nail polish remover. Makeup wipes.
Sandra Nixon @SandyJaneNixon now
POPSUGAR Australia @popsugarau 8h
Studio 10 @Studio10au 12m
