With his hunger and thirst no longer his top priority, he began to think about his options for shelter. Maybe he could find a cave if he explored the island, but maybe he would simply waste time and find himself watching the sunset without being any closer to having shelter. Instead, searched for a large indent in the rock outcroppings that he could use as two walls of a basic hut. Eventually, he found just such a place. Next, he dragged driftwood logs from the beach and laid them across the top of the V shaped indent in the rocks. They made a decent roof. Then he collected fallen palm leaves and laid them across the logs.This would do for a basic shelter. At this point, the sun was setting on the horizon,a strong wind start blowing, and Robert shivered. He went into his new home, propped up some smaller logs and some palm leaves as a windscreen, and then he curled up on a pile of dry sand and closed his eyes. 
The next morning, he woke up to the sound of his stomach growling. How odd it was to begin the day with worry about basic needs such as food and water. He decided that he should try to find some food and water sources other than coconuts. The rising sun warmed him up and felt almost like a greeting. As he stood near the ocean, while taking in the sun’s heat, he noticed movement in the water. Something was swaying back and forth with the movement of the water. He waded carefully into the ocean and discovered an underwater plant that looked a lot like the seaweed served as part of his favorite rolls at the sushi restaurant in his hometown. Excited, he tore off a piece, examined it, and then he licked it. It was salty, a slippery, but it looked too much like a wet version of the dry seaweed he knew so he shoved some into his mouth, chewed quickly, made a sour face, and spit it out. This was not the seaweed he’d had before. Maybe it just needed to be dried out.
He waded back to the beach, and gathered some twigs, some dry grass, and some small driftwood branches. He had once watched a documentary about the “old days” when people had to do things for themselves. He vaguely remembered a demonstration on how to build a fire. He had already gathered the grass and twigs and branches, but he couldn’t remember the rest. What was it? It had something to do with turning a pointy stick real fast into a small hole in another piece of wood. After much searching he found a straight stick that sort of had a point. He rubbed that end on a large rock until he had finally made a nice sharp point. He was strangely proud of himself, just for figuring out to use a rock to make a sharp point on the stick. It didn’t take long to find a piece of driftwood with lots of holes in it, so now he had everything he needed to start a fire, except how to make the stick spin fast enough to somehow start a fire. After many, many minutes of trial and error. He figured out two things: One, that by placing the stick upright in between the palms of his hands, with his fingers extended, he could quickly move his hands back and forth and make the stick turn quickly. Two, that doing so when the pointed end of the stick was jabbed in a hole in a piece of driftwood made the wood around that hole very hot. Guessing that the heat from turning the stick might start a fire, he place a bunch of dry grass around the hole and began to turn the pointed stick furiously. Just as he was about to stop from exhaustion, he noticed a little curl of smoke rise up from the grass. A moment later, flames appeared. In his excitement, he almost knocked the grass over. Quickly, he start putting the smallest, driest twigs on the grass. More flames! Then he added small branches and finally, some small logs. He had built a fire!
Once he felt sure that the fire was not going out, Robert waded back into the ocean, gathered some seaweed, and brought it back to the fire, setting it on a nearby rock, carefully keeping it out of the sand. He found two long sticks, laid some seaweed across the sticks, and attempted to dry the seaweed out by holding it over the fire. After accidently over drying some seaweed and setting it on fire, he finally managed to make some dry seaweed. He tried once again to eat it. This time, it was much easier to eat. It was still nothing like the seaweed he remembered from the restaurant back home, but at least it was edible. He ate until he was full, and then felt a great thirst. Using his trials from the day before as a teacher, he gathered more coconuts, opened them, and drank their juice. After carefully setting aside the remaining parts to eat later, he wandered into the trees, hoping to find some fresh water.

Robert moved towards what he thought was the center of the island. As he rose higher and higher up the side of the small mountain, he occasionally looked back over his shoulder at the beach below. It was beautiful. In fact, it was so beautiful he momentarily forgot that he was alone in the wilderness on an island in the middle of the ocean. After some more climbing, he heard a new sound. It sounded like water falling onto something hard. Moving more quickly, he soon found a small waterfall shooting off a rock ledge above. The pool of water at its base caused Robert to feel an overwhelming sense of joy. He knelt at the edge of the pool, scooped up a handful of water, and gave it a taste. It was fresh, not salty like the ocean. Just as he had done with his cooked seaweed dinner, Robert drank and drank and drank until he could drink no more. Then he took a nap in the sunlight near the edge of the pool.
After exploring the area around the pool for what seemed like hours, Robert returned to his beach. Encouraged by his successes with food and shelter, he decided to try to catch one of the fish he had noticed in the tide pools earlier that day, when he first discovered the seaweed. He found a very straight stick, about six feet long, and sharpened one end just has he done earlier in his attempt to start a fire. Then a walked down to the tide pools and searched for the smallest pool he could find that still had fish in it. He knew enough about the ocean to understand that the fish were only temporarily trapped in the pools, and that once the tide came back in, he would no longer have a chance to spear one of the fish. He tried hold still in the water and waiting for a fish to swim near him so he could spear it. Just as he was about to give up waiting for a fish to swim near, one finally swam within his reach. He held his breath for a moment, and then he stabbed at the fish with the spear. Before the tip of the spear had even entered the water, the fish sped away, alerted by Robert’s action. Robert quickly realized that this plan probably wouldn’t work. Instead, of being sad, he felt surprisingly calm as his mind was already moving on to figuring out some other way to catch the fish. Maybe he could weave a net out of something he could find on the island. He considered this and other ideas as he left the tide pool and returned to the beach.

His fire had gone out, but he quickly gathered the necessary materials and started a new fire. This time he piled on big logs, thinking that this would help keep him warm until the sun went down and he returned to his new home in the rocks. As he sat calmly by the fire, staring out into the ocean, he noticed a small shape that slowly moving across the water. It grew larger and larger until Robert realized it was a ship. He jumped up, waved his arms, and yelled “HELP!” over and over again. He screamed while jumping up and down like a rabbit. He soon realized his behavior was pointless. The ship was too far away to see him. Looking around, he realized that his fire was his only chance. He gathered driftwood as quickly as he could, and kept adding it to the fire. Soon the fire was enormous, and Robert could barely get close enough to add more wood because the of the heat.  Finally, he stopped adding wood to the fire and turned around to scan the water. At first he saw nothing, except the ship in the distance. But then he saw something that made him hold his breath. There was a smaller boat, heading for his beach! After several more anxious minutes of watching and waiting, Robert heard a voice from the approaching boat.
“Hello!” What are you doing HERE?

As the ship sailed away and the island that had been his home for two days disappeared in the distance and the darkness of night, Robert thought what had happened on the island. He had been terrified, he had been resourceful, and most importantly, he had done things for himself. In many ways, he had never felt more alive.