Watching Big Brother Australia from the comfort of your couch (or bed, if you’re watching the TikTok livestream!) is a completely different kettle of fish to being in the house. While it may look like the housemates are chilling in the sun, hanging out and arguing about missing instant coffee, any housemate will tell you that the reality of being within those camera-lined walls is much more intense, and far more strategic.
Just ask Harmon Singh, the first housemate of the 2026 season to be booted from the house. According to him, his early exit happened because he refused to be “fake” like the other housemates.
“It was quite easy to see that people were like choosing like easy answers and not really saying what they want to say,” Harmon tells TV WEEK.
“They were just being too diplomatic. We’re in there because we we’re all in there because we have strong opinions. We want to say what we’re thinking, but people just weren’t doing it.”
As the first housemate evicted, Harmon says that if he had his time again, he’d be much, much faker.
“I’d be a bit faker and start to chat to people on their level,” Harmon admits. “I describe it as when you’re on a dating app and you ask those little questions to break the ice. The house felt like that. Whereas what I like to do is jump off something big and make a cannonball and hope the ice breaks. Instead, I hurt my butt.”
Harmon admits that his love for deep, cannonball-esque chat wasn’t the only thing that held him back. Despite describing himself as an outgoing, loud person, the house environment saw him turn inwards.
“I internalised things more than I expected. In real life I care about what people think, but not on the level I did in the house,” he explained.
“For some reason, in there, kind of magnified that aspect of myself and it really challenged my sense of self. The first few days I was really under the radar, but I’m not an under the radar guy.”
After being “kept up at night” pondering why he was playing it so small in the house, the 29-year-old says the nomination was the kicker that made him live up to the phrase ‘go big or go home’. And it was this decision to make a splash that saw him decide to hide two of the house’s most precious items: the coffee and the salt.
“I was like, I’m up for nomination. I didn’t feel like I’d really been seen in the house so I decided to act out a little bit,” he says with a chuckle.
“Instead of easing into it, which is what I was doing, I thought, I’ve got to charge at this thing like a bull at a gate. And that’s what I did. I didn’t think it was that deep and I didn’t think it would get that big but it became all the rage in there.”
Outside of the salt and coffee debacle, there is a much bigger beef blossoming in the house: the drama between Kyrah and Ebony. While their clash in personalities seems to be all anyone can talk about online, Harmon says that beyond the differing of opinions are two really cool people.
“I’m not on any side,” he says. “I enjoy chatting to them both but if anything, the person who interests me the most is Ebony because she’s just an interesting person. She’s intelligent and switched on. She leans into the character of who she is and there’s a lot more to her than we’ve seen so far. I hope you guys get to see it.”
You can watch Big Brother on 10 or 10Play, or watch the housemates live on the Big Brother Livestream.
