Without so much as a backpack, Cao Boi, has found himself in many places all over the world. This wandering spirit had brought him to Cook Islands in 2006 season of The Survivor, the CBS reality television show.

“For me to get onto Survivor, the stars aligned and I got lucky,” he said of his involvement in the show.

He was well-equipped for the life on the island, having been a Cub Scout in Vietnam as well as the Boy Scouts of America.

Being a hiker, he was used to living in the woods. “I would just take my dog and go,” he said, referring to Charly, a dog he brought home from Vietnam. “We would go in and out [of the forest] and keep hitting the trail,” he described. The hikes could last for months. “[Hikers] are the nicest people I have ever met.”

However, it was not merely his search for adventure that brought him to the Friendly Isle about two weeks ago.

“I found a human,” said Michael Helm, jokingly. He took Cao Boi home.

It was this friendly spirit of aloha and the spirituality of the island that has brought him here, a vision that entered his mind in April of last year.

Cao Boi said that a Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University student, Caitlin Hammaren, approached him in January of last year.

With a beaming smile, she claimed that Cao Boi was her favorite character on Survivor. He said that made her his number one fan.

However, she was one of the victims of the Virginia Tech school shooting April 16, 2007. Her death compelled him to cut out her photo from the paper, frame it and carry it with him until he found a suitable resting place.

“I carried her everywhere I traveled, and I wondered where she could rest.”

He said Molokai was revealed to him in a dream, because of the island’s spirituality.

“One day, I would like to call Molokai my home,” he said. Cao Boi put the photograph to rest by Kalaupapa Lookout. “I lit some incense, and hope she’s happy.”