Ryan Palk - Bachelorette Australia - Season 2 - *Sleuthing Spoilers*

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see2love wrote:
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Ryan Palk from 'The Bachelorette', the sailing coach who reminded everyone of Heath Ledger, did not receive a rose from Georgia Love on last night's episode. He chatted to ELLE about his mate Courtney being a "legend wingman" and who was different in real life to how they're portrayed on the show. He also sang his line from that hilarious Georgia song at the cocktail party.

A lot of people wanted you to get more screen time in general—you had fans!
Yeah, I got some very nice messages from some very random people (laughs). It was nice to see that people wanted to see more of me, but that’s just the way it is, I guess.

Were you disappointed to leave when you did?
I probably was feeling more friends with Georgia at that time. I didn’t want to write it off until we’d had a single date, so it was disappointing to not get that chance, because I wanted to show her who I was—that situation in the house there, I was very fish-out-of-water. I suppose we’ll never know!

Is Georgia the kind of girl you’d normally go for in real life?
Certainly in terms of physical appearance—I probably have a thing for brunette girls and that sort of stuff. Without having a chance to go on a single date and see what she’s like in that sort of setting, it was a bit hard to tell. It’s interesting now watching the show back, I can see her in those situations. She’s definitely a very likeable girl—super smart, super funny, and I really like her just as a person. But I’ve probably got very different interests in terms of what we liked to do just for fun. I’m always around the water and I’m not sure she’s so much into that stuff.

You would have seen her “skurfing” date with Courtney.
And it was great to see her throw herself into it. I think at the end of the day, if she just gives things a go like that, that’s all you can ask for.

How much time do you think you spent chatting to Georgia in total?
I definitely chatted to her at every cocktail party, and at a lot of the group dates we had plenty of chances to talk and catch up. I certainly talked to her a lot more than the show leads on. We were the first ones to chat, actually, at the first cocktail party—we had a really good foundation and a really good friendship. But then it probably solidified itself over the course of the series as just a friendship.

That Georgia song, I’m assuming everyone got a line but we didn’t see the whole thing. What was your line?
(Laughs) One second, I’ll throw myself back to it, because it’s easier to sing it. I’ve just got to remember it again. (Sings) “If you were a sail, I’d be your mast. When handing out roses, nice guys finish last.” There you go, that was my line.

Whose idea was it?
I think it was Cam and Courtney who were bumbling around with the idea, and then we all got on board with it, like this would be cool if everyone did it. About half the guys were keen and the other half were like, “No, that’s stupid,” and then we just worked on them and eventually got them to do it. And no one wanted to be the only guy not doing it. It was fun. I thought it was really good.

RELATED: GEORGIA LOVE PULLS UP COURTNEY DOBER FOR HUMILIATING HER ON 'THE BACHELORETTE'

Georgia was unimpressed with Courtney’s efforts to get you more time with her on the medieval group date. What was that situation like from your perspective, as a guy and as his mate?
Court’s a great bloke and just a legend wingman in that way. All the guys at some stage in the show were trying to help each other out—if someone hadn’t had that much time, or we felt she might have a connection with someone and wasn’t seeing it, we were trying to help each other out. We wanted her to find the best rson for her, at the end of the day. So Courtney was really trying to help me out in that way, just for a moment, and it really backfired, because the last thing he wanted to do was actually hurt her feelings, and unfortunately that’s what happened. So I suppose after that we all had a chat, especially Court and I, like in the future we just need to make sure that we’re here for her, we’re trying to fight for her—if it’s a situation where we’ve all got to go up against each other again, let’s just fight every man for himself. We don’t want her to get the wrong idea.

When Courtney said in his interview, “I didn’t see it from her perspective,” the Twitter reaction was like, “Courtney’s representing every man.”
(Laughs) Yeah, that’s right, he was. But at the same time, I think there’s other ways of communicating that he likes her. It doesn’t just have to be that. And there was plenty of that too. You can choose to just look at that, or you can choose to look at the other things he’s trying to do for her as well.

From what you know, who is genuinely there for Georgia and the same reason as her?
That’s a loaded question, that’s for sure. At the end of the day, it’s my opinion of why all those guys were there. I think to a lot of the different guys, Georgia means a lot of different things to them. For some of them, she’s like true love; to others, she’s getting over an ex; to others, there’s maybe a bit of it for fame. I certainly think the ones there looking for true love are Courtney and Cam, I think Lee as well, and Clancy. Probably Matty J too—I think he really did get quite smitten with her on that last date. I’m not sure about all of the other guys, in terms of what their motivations are, but certainly watching them on the dates they’ve been forming connections. I think over the series we might see a change in some people from when they first came in, to when they leave, a change in themselves as to why they’re actually there.



You lived with the boys for a while and know them quite well. Who has surprised you with their behaviour on TV?
Like the way I saw them in the interviews, and the stuff I didn’t see? Maybe Rhys, a little bit. Generally around the house he would stay to himself a bit. I don’t think he’s really hung out with guys that much, so he doesn’t really know how to act with them in a group, so he was very quiet and kind of oblivious to most things. But then in a lot of the interviews he’s obviously taking sides, and making remarks about certain people in the house that he was pretending to be oblivious to when we were in the house, but then he’s calling them out on film. So that’s been interesting. Everyone was pretty much you see what you get. There’s maybe a little bit of… They act a bit differently on a single date to how they act in a group situation, but I guess for some guys that’s quite normal.

Well it’s different being around 15 guys compared to one girl.
Yeah, you’re right. I think all the guys changed a bit when Georgia was around. Everyone was a bit on guard a little bit, or something.

Did you all have the time of your lives on those group dates?
It was super fun. A lot of the times on the group date we had these challenges, and when the challenges were done we wanted to keep playing. Like the archery one, that was in the backyard, and we wanted to keep playing all afternoon, but of course they needed to move us along for other things, like the cocktail party and ceremony. There were heaps of situations where we were like, “Can we just have another hour to play on this stuff?” It was a lot of fun for the time we had.

RELATED: GEORGIA TALKS ABOUT THE CONNECTIONS SHE'S FORMED ON 'THE BACHELORETTE'

What’s your dating history been like and why did it lead you to The Bachelorette?
I’ve had two girlfriends—both great relationships, but ended for various reasons. I haven’t been in a relationship for about a year-and-a-half now. It was actually my sister who nominated me to go on the show—she did it behind my back. She was trying to shake things up, I guess. She knows that maybe I am missing a relationship in my life, and I do want to get that again, so she thought maybe this would be a cool way to shake things up for me. Then I got the call to go on the show and I was a bit surprised, but it sounded kind of fun, so I thought I’d give it a go. And then I ended up on it!

How comfortable were you in front of the cameras?
Oh, look, I wasn’t… I think because I hadn’t watched the show before, and I didn’t really nominate myself, I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. You can probably tell in the first episode when I’m there, I’m really… It’s almost like I’m watching and participating at the same time. I’m trying to take it all in and understand what’s happening, and it was a really steep learning curve, those first few weeks. It was pretty full-on having five cameras in your face while you’re trying to talk to a girl, and potentially make a great first impression and turn it into a relationship—it was very uncomfortable in the beginning. But it very quickly became comfortable, and Georgia was very good at being sympathetic to all the guys in that situation, because it was tricky.

Was it easy to forget they were there the more time went on?
Yeah, over time it just became part of the furniture and it became semi-normal. And I think the camera crew were very good at blending in, and not trying to be too in-your-face, just allowing things to happen a little more organically.

Are you dating now or have you dated since the show?
Oh no, not since the show. I’ve been laying low, and I suppose I will start again soon, I’m just waiting for my private life to be private again. It’s interesting how in a situation like that you’re more or less forced to be in a relationship, and how once you get out of that you’re happy to be by yourself and not be forced to do that.

Who do you think will win?
It’s interesting watching the show, and the dates and how they’re going, after living with some of the guys. I think the frontrunners are probably Cam, Lee or Courtney. Obviously all catches, top blokes, she’d be lucky to have any of them. But from watching the show so far, I think one of those three.

see2love wrote:Ryan's interview
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Sadly Ryan, our favourite Heath Ledger look-a-like in The Bachelorette mansion, did not receive a rose from Georgia tonight.

The 28-year-old sailing coach from WA thinks he may have got the boot due to a very honest conversation he had with Georgia.

“Some stuff went down that night,” Ryan tells TV WEEK. “I wasn’t very happy with the situation she put me in.”

“I think maybe Rhys had stirred up some stuff with what he said to her about who is here for the right and wrong reasons,” he elaborates. “She came to me for advice on that and I didn’t want to give it to her because I didn’t want to bethatperson.”

Although Ryan didn’t get a single date, he did have plenty of one-on-one time with Georgia throughout the show.

“She’d often come to me to talk about things like that,” Ryan says. “I felt like I was getting into a situation where I was just her mate who you come to for advice on guys.”

Sounds like Ryan became yet another victim of the dreaded ‘friend-zone’. While not getting a rose didn’t come as a huge shock, he wasn’t expecting to go so soon.

“I thought there were going to be some other guys she was going to let go off first,” he admits.

Especially when a few of the guys were creating a lot of tension in the mansion.

“Sam wasn’t the biggest fan of Rhys,” says Ryan.

Ryan also seemed to feel that Rhys was oblivious to a lot of the friction he was causing.

“He was sort of unaware of it,” Ryan explains. “It was only when the producers told him, ‘Maybe you (Rhys) and Sam should try and make amends because there is a bit of friction here’.”

Ryan feels that perhaps the root of the beef between Rhys and Sam is due to their similarities.

“Rhys and Sam are essentially the same person,” Ryan says. “I think there’s a lot of things that Sam sees in Rhys that maybe he doesn’t like in himself and that’s why he has a go at him so much and vice versa.”

Despite not winning Georgia’s heart, Ryan has no regrets about appearing on the show.

“It’s all been fun,” he says. “I learnt a lot about myself, made great mates and Georgia’s a really cool chick too.”