Alumni pair are sole survivors

It all boiled down to self-motivation and endurance for two UCT alumni who finished the gruelling Life 2 The Limit challenge, an adventure that cut them off from the world for 30 days. Dr Jonathan Starke (MBChB, 2001) and Saul Kornik (BBusSc, 1999) were the only two of the 10 starters to complete the survival challenge, held on a deserted island in the South Pacific. Fellow alumnus Nick Bennett (BA, 2005) also took part in the challenge, but threw in the towel a few days before it ended. Life 2 The Limit challenged the adventurers to spend a month in total isolation, armed with only a camera, a journal and whatever essentials they could cram into a five-litre bag - all to raise money for charity.

Starke said the group had expected the physical challenges and a degree of weakness due to lack of nutrition, but never imagined that getting food - fish, for instance - would be as difficult as it turned out to be.

But he stuck it out, and was grateful at the end.

"I was finding the time away from the world - to think, to write and just to sit and watch the nature - so valuable that I wanted to take full advantage of it, and not cut it short," he explains.