Jean-Robert Bellande

Jean-Robert Bellande, widely known as JRB and “BrokeLivingJRB,” is an American professional poker player and a familiar face on High Stakes Poker and Poker After Dark. His career is primarily associated with live high-stakes cash games. Beyond playing, he has helped assemble games at ARIA, giving him a behind-the-scenes role as a host and organizer.

Born in New York to french-speaking Haitian immigrant parents, Bellande moved to Taiwan as a child and grew up with an unusually international background. He speaks english, french, and mandarin. He later earned a Bachelor of Science in Marketing from Azusa Pacific University.

Before becoming widely known through poker, Bellande worked in Los Angeles nightlife, promoting clubs including the Roxbury, Tatou of Beverly Hills, and the Gate. He subsequently opened Sky Sushi in Hollywood, which he operated for five years. Source His earlier adventures also included playing pool for money and organizing poker games in Prague.

Outside poker, Bellande is best known for competing on CBS’s Survivor: China in 2007. His contestant biography captured his poker-centered sense of humor: asked which three non-survival items he would bring, he chose a deck of cards, poker chips, and a dealer. Away from the tables, he is married to Veronica Llamas and is a father of three.