Though he was voted out of Australian Survivor in the second-last episode, it’s pretty clear to everyone that Luke Toki is the rightful King of the Jungle anyway. Which is why upon his elimination, a delightful fan named Dave Skow started a GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign to raise money for Luke and his family — and it’s now clocked well over $500k in donations.
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That’s right, he’s now got MORE than the total Survivor prize money without even winning the damn thing. Both times he appeared on the show, Luke always said he was doing this for his family, because the money would change their lives — the WA-based FIFO worker has two young sons with autism, and a daughter who has been diagnosed with cystic fibrosis.
And now it looks like thanks to many kind-hearted fans (including me, I donated $50 so I am clearly a living saint), he finally gets his wish. I just can’t deal with how great this is for him.
Luke told PEDESTRIAN.TV during our interview yesterday:
I haven’t spoken to the person [who put it together] yet. I’ve been busy all day and to get told over the phone, far out.
When I went to bed last night I saw it and it was at $5,000 and I was like yiewwww you know? And now Australia’s really gotten behind it. It’s humbling as. It’s a TV show, I got voted off like any other contestant. It makes you speechless. You want to thank every one [the people who contributed] but that’ll take a year.
I’m very fortunate.
Organiser Dave Skow says on the GoFundMe page that they are hoping to smash the $500,000 mark.
The $500k target was simply to reflect the prize money on offer in Survivor, but if we can raise more than that then this thing will be open for as long as people want to keep donating… The Tokis have a challenging road ahead so limiting the amount we can raise is certainly not on the agenda. If we smash $500k, we will strive for $600k, then $700k and so on until this crazy ride comes to a natural end.
Honestly, it couldn’t have happened to a better guy.
