Poh Ling Yeow’s time in the I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! jungle may have come to an end right before the grand finale, but she couldn’t be more satisfied with her experience.
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When New Idea caught up with the former MasterChef star today, she expressed that while she was sad to leave it all behind, she was glad to have made it as far as she did.
“I went out on the last bit, we already did everything, and I keep telling everyone that I’m really happy,” she says of her exit.
“I love that I got to challenge myself with the mystery box with the snakes and then got hurled into the swamp. I love that I got to experience all that.”
Making it into the jungle was also a challenge in itself as Poh admits it took eight years of being asked to join the show for her to finally say yes.
“It was a timing thing, and then it’s also because I never really understood what the show was about,” she says of why she initially said no.
Eventually, after never having watched the show before, Poh tuned in to last year’s season and found herself loving it.
“Only then did I go, oh my gosh, this is an amazing show I love it,” she laughs.
Her decision to head into the so-called jungle was not without reservations, namely letting her guard down on national television in a way she’d never done before.
“Going without makeup – working in the media, there’s a decent amount of expectation for you to look good all the time,” she reveals. “And that was quite a big fear.”
“But what’s really cool that’s come out of it is I actually don’t wear any eye makeup anymore… It’s really boosted my confidence in that way,” she admits.
She adds: “I felt loved no matter how I looked in there. So it was pretty life-changing like that.”
While she was in the jungle, Poh shared her time with 12 other celebrities, something she found rather difficult in the early stages.
“I found, as an introvert, being around extroverts difficult sometimes because I need a lot of quiet time to think and I need a lot of alone time,” Poh admits.
Another thing Poh had to come to terms with was carrying out all her most intimate and daily tasks in front of everyone.
“I found at the beginning it’s quite confronting to have to shower in such a public way and there are cameras on the toilet. Everyone knows when you’re doing number one and number two.”
Luckily for Poh, those moments didn’t make it to air, and instead, viewers were treated to several personal and honest conversations from the celebs.
Opening up to one another, as well as sharing the entire experience as a whole, Poh says she formed genuine and long-lasting friendships as a result.
“The jungle forces you to really just accept people for who they are like you would in a family,” she says. “And the fact that we’re not playing against each other, we’re playing for each other.”
“It’s also for such a positive cause with the charities and also all the trials are there for us to help feed each other. That part of it was just really, really cool.”
The Grand Finale of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! airs Sunday, January 30 at 7.30 on Network 10 and on demand on 10 play.
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