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The Amazing Race International Versions => TAR Asia => Topic started by: apskip on June 04, 2007, 12:25:14 PM
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Since the concensus appears to be to adopt Amazing Race Asia as the gap-filler, I am proposing a one-episode-a-week schedule starting right now. puddin has provided wonderful downloads of the first 3 episodes on the "Future of TAR thread" for you to watch those episodes. If anyone wants to do a summary of each episode just like mswood does for regular TAR epsidoes, that will add value.
I propose to roll from episode to episode each Monday morning on this thread rather than starting new threads every week(but if are fortunate to have lengthy commentaries each week then we can always go to separate threads).
EPISODE 1
The first episode of all TAR races is usually jam-packed action because there is a lot of teams jockeying for position; ARA1 is no exception. The level of the tasks was, as noted by GeorgiaPeach in the "Future of TAR thread", superior to that of recent TAR races. Also, most of the tasks were highly physical. Although you might have expected that to put Mardy and Marsio, the least fit team, at a disadvantage they actually managed to finish first on this episode. Bad luck getting their first cab put Sandy and Francesca way behind and they never caught up, finishing last and getting a huge break when it turned out to be a non-elimination leg.
Some of my observations of things I did not like to see were:
1. Multiple teams used the "follow the hired taxi" routine, copied no doubt from AR9 or earlier since AR10 was being filmed at about the same time as ARA1.
2. It wouldn't be an Amazing Race if we didn't see at least one fender bender; Ernie caused this one.
3. Taxi stealing is a fine art and you saw Andy and Laura execute it to make sure Sandy and Francesca did not catch up with them. Remember that scene.
Doubtless you have some interesting on episode 1 of ARA1.
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Who out there:
would love to watch but doesn't have access to episodes except these first three?
already saw it thanks!
doesn't want to watch at all?
might be willing to stick the rest of the episodes up somewhere for us?
(Just trying to figure out if/how we can do this so everybody who wants can join in)
And would you believe I'm unspoiled except for the make-up of the winning team? Hard to believe, huh? :lol3:
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Hell Peach, I just downloaded (opps illegal, forget I mentioned that) this season. And I have no knowledge at all who wins.
Really the only real complaints I have about this season (up to about episode 7) is that no Phil. I mean sure the host is very nice eye candy (Yummmmmm, my god look at those arms, drool), but he almost sounds robotic on his delivery of dialogue. I really miss Phil.
The first episode reminded me just a little too much of an episode of the Family Edition.
And on a more personal level, it took me longer to remember names to faces than any other season (except for the 40 members in the Family Edition), and that while everyone speaks english, it took me a while to get used to accents.
But after the thrid episode all the issues (except Phil) were pretty much gone. issues.
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I just downloaded this season.....
Is it from bittorrents--or from somewhere we can all get to?
I just hate to have a thread that not everyone can join in on. Someone is making me a DVD but so far we only have the first 3 eps to share--any ideas how we can get this out there for everybody to see?
sure the host is very nice eye candy
And I luuuve his dimples! :luvu:
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Its a torrent.
And yeah, he is hot.
But I wish he would just relax a little.
I do wonder if this is perhaps just because he is trying to make sure his englih is is easily understood (doesn't seem to be a problem at all). And his deliver does get a little less wooden (I said wooden, he, he) as the episodes go.
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He sounded to me like someone had told him "Phil does it like this--and we want you to do it EXACTLY the same way".
Maybe his own personality will come out more in the new season.
Totally based on the first 3 episodes because that is all I have! :-\
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Hmm... Really? Heh, I thought TAR:A sucked when it came out and never took it seriously. Come on, rappelling down Berjaya Times Square has... nothing to do with Malaysia actually. Does it?
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The juxtaposition of the modern shopping tower with the ancient arts of batik and pottery making is what modern Malaysia is all about.
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For any of you who might be having difficulty playing the Veoh link provided by puddin in post #498 in the "Future of the Amazing Race" thread like I did(I only got a 5 minute 00 second segment instead of the listed 47 minutes and some seconds for ARA1 Ep.2), I found a way to solve this. If you want to know so thast you can view Episode 2, please send me a Private Message. Hopefully, this problem was unique to me, but you never know.
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EPISODE 2
The first thing you learn is that every one of these teams provided financial help to the #10 team, Sandy/Francesca, who were given no money as a result of last week's last place finish in non-elimination. Sandy/Francesca were later shown augmenting that with some begging in the airport.The drama of teams getting to the airport and jockeying for position in the line at Air Asia is somewhat undercut by the standard BUNCHING. I am going to speculate that the route for Amazing Race Asia 1 was primarily developed based on where Air Asia flies and that it doesn't go many places where Air Asia doesn't fly.
Arrival in Jakarta means a mad cab ride to Ragunan Zoo. It is obvious that there are none of the controls imposed on regular Amazing Race, as the taxi drivers as routinely driving on the shoulder as motivated by the teams. The first task is a ROADBLOCK where the selected individual has 2 minutes to navigate inside a python cage to get a clue from a clue box. There is no real danger here, as the keepers have fed the pythons before letting anyone in the cage and are not going to let anyone get hurt. The FAST FORWARD clue is now available to teams that want to try for it. Ernie/Jeena and Prasant/Sahil go for it. Ernie/Jeena have a poor taxi that lets them off somewhere in the neighborhood of the school that is their destination. By the time they reach the school, Sahil/Prasant have already tested about half of the 50 Walkmans that children have and have found the right one that generates the clue to thte pitstop. Ernie/Jeena are now trying to play catchup on the regular tasks.
The next task was the Sumatran Plate Dance. All teams seemed to breeze through this one, although it could have held them up for a long while. Next is a DETOUR, choice of PUSH or SELL. Everyone chooses PUSH except Jacqueline/Aubrey, who have to sell 15 bowls of baso(meatball) soup. They do a decent job and the onlookers seem eager to buy. PUSH means pushing a cart with all of the ingredients of the soup plus stacks of bowls plus a bowl of sloshing soy auce. Spilling the soy sauce means you have to repeat the path. You must sing the cart vendor's song in Indonesian while you are pushing. Slow and steady is the key to this. All teams seem to realize this. the one team that realizes it but is playing catchup and has to take major risks is Ernie/Jeena. They were speeding through it and were the only ones to have major soy sauce spills. They had to do it again, which basically cemented their last place finish(although I think they were going to be there no matter what they did on PUSH because of their late start).
The arrival at the MONAS International Monument pitstop was predictable. Sahil/Prasant finished first. Mardy/Marsio who are Indonesian and know the language and probably a lot about Jakarta finished second. The producers tried to simulate an exciting finish between Sandy/Francesca and Ernie/Jeena. However, the time lost on the Fast Forward was too significant to make up and Ernie/Jeena had to redo the pushcast path. I am guessing that they finished at least 30 minutes behind Sandy/Francesca in spite of what the editing was attempting to sell(a close finish).
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Thanks apskip! I'm really enjoying this --it reminds me of when our TAR was young and fresh.
Highlights for me this week:
Very full days--that looked exhausting. Having less travel time=more time for fun tasks.
I loved the option of selling soup and then if you don't sell it all you can eat what is left! Lets you choose how long to mess with the selling.
Loved how well the teams did with the plate dance--if that had been me there would have been piles of broken dishes all around my feet for sure. :rotf:
My episode hung up right at the end but was able to figure it out from next week's summary.
But now I'm sad cause I don't have more all ready--looks like bittorrents are in my future if i want to see the rest.
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PEACH, I think you are right about bit torrents in your future, but your future does not need to be next week as puddin has provided a link to episode 3 in Post #498 on "The Future of the Amazing Race" thread. Thanks again, puddin.
However, when I tried to play it I had the same problem as the prior week. Here is what you need to do to be able to get episodes 2 and 3:
1. Download the Veoh player from www.veoh.com.
2. Once downloaded, go back and browse www.veoh.com for files in the Advanced Search mode, which you find by clicking on the box in the upper right.
3. Enter the string "Amazing Race" in the top box and submit.
4. You will get many results, including the Amazing Race Asia 1 episodes 1, 2 and 3. Click on those that you want and download them (this took me about 1.5 hours each).
5. After they are downloaded, click on them to start playing. If you get audio but no video(this happened to me), your operating system should tell you what extra software needs to be downloaded. I had to download a free package from www.divx.com before I got the picture.
None of this will do you any good beyond episode 3 because there are no Veoh files for episodes 4 through 13 of Amazing Race Asia 1. You will have to go to torrents for that. I am downloading a torrent package right now. If successful, I will put instructions for it onto this thread.
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I already watched #3... :(
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EPISODE 3
Sahil/Prasant received only a 28 minute head start for their Fast Forward victory in episode 2. Second out of the pitsop was Mardy and Marsio. The following 6 teams were bunched within 19 minutes of each other. Finally, Sandyand Francesca were the last team to leave the pitstop. Of course it made absolutely no difference because the departure time for the first Air Asia flight was many hours later, so all teams had to wait at the Jakarta airport for their flight to Bali. On arrival, they are directed to the famous Kuta beach for digging in the sand. This is that proverbial "needle in the haystack roadblock".
Buried 18 inches down is something(it turns out to be a miniature surfboard) and the digging pit is quite large. A small spade is provided initially. All teams struggle. After about one hour Andy/Laura decide to take a 4 hour penalty similar to what Rob did avoiding eating meat in Mendoza Argentina in AR7. Mardy and Marsio go out with them. At some point between 2 and 3 hours, umbrellas are brought to shade the remaining diggers and drinks are allowed. Sahil/Prasant(I can't remember who was digging for most teams) find the surfboard first. Howard/Sahran find it second. There is only about half an hour left before the digging time limit. Aubrey/Jacqueline decide to take the penalty. So does Syeon, who should not have been doing this roadblock. With her hands getting bloody, she and Andrew pack it in and take the penalty. Shovels are now allowed. Sandy, who has moved a mountain of sand and makes good use of the shovel, finds it. Sharon/Melody get lucky just before the time limit expires and find it. Zabrina and Joe-Jer have to take the 4 hour penalty.
All teams have to go to an Internet cafe to find their next clue. It directs them to a DETOUR, Elephant Walk or WhiteWater Rafting.
Next is the Monkey Forest, where there are 200 clues on trees, at least before the monkeys stole some. 5%, meaning 10 (one more than the number of teams) have actual instructions. Coming out of the Monkey Forest, the team order and nationality(not including the penalties) is:
Andy/Laura Thailand(but really from the United Kingdom)
Sahil/Prasant India
Howard/Sahran Sri Lanka
Mardy/Marsio Indonesia
Andrew/Syeon Malaysia
Sandy/Francesca HongKong(but he is really from new Zealand)
Zabrina/JoeJer Malaysia
Sharon/Melody Singapore
Jacqueline/Aubrey Philippines (and so were Ernie/Jeena who were eliminated in episode 2)
It looks like with their penalties it will be a fight between Andrew/Syeon, Zabrina/JoeJer, and Jacqueline/Aubrey for elimination. Teams are now directed to Uuluwatu Caves, which only is a transfer point to send them on to the pitstop at Tanahlot Temple.
Zabrina/JoeJer manage to make up an incredible amount of ground and get their first, which guarantees them a 5th place finish. Howard/Sahran hustle and slide into second place arrival, getting first place and actual prizes(SONY videocams). Sandy/Francesca comes in next. Mardy/Marsio, Andy/Laura, and Andrew/Syeon take the next 3 spots and with their penalties get 6th, 7th and 8th. Sharon/Melody are next and finish 3rd. Sahil/Prasant allowed Andrew/Syeon to take their cab and avoid what might have been a last place finish. They finish next-to-last and place 4th. Jacqueline and Aubrey come in last and are eliminated. They had a constituency of Asian men rooting for them, but I think the race will be better off without them.
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Thank you apskip for another really excellent TARA episode summary!
I haven't felt so bad for a team since the whole Hay Bale thing--did you think any of them would ever find it? I thought Sandy might strike oil first! :lol:
I have no more episodes to see right now :'( but have some hope for maybe later!
I loved the first three episodes and I hear it just gets better so we have lots to look forward to!
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Let's suppose that someone had been hearing about torrents and wanted to know how to use them to see a certain season. How could they do it?
First, they should download www.utorrent.com to get version 1.6.1.
Next, they should take a look at http://www.poromenos.org/tutorials/bittorrent/download to learn what to do with it.
The trickiest part is configuring ports. I decided based on some article to try port 53517 for my DSL connection and that works for it, but it would be different for other connections. Experiment to find the right one for you! You may need help here from your ISP.
The next piece of the puzzle is to find the material to download. If you were to look in the upper right-hand box labeled <Search here> on uTorrent 1.6.1, click on the Looking Glass and the list box that opens will give you several choice. Try a few and use the name of your favorite season once you get as the search string. You should soon find at least one complete season in torrents.
Once you find the desired material, just click to start downloading it. The DHT (dynamic hash table) will show up the the bottom of the screen and download and upload statistics will appear there. Seeds and peers (different level of material providers) will start sending you segments, which will be pieced together into whole units. Once you having any whole units, then you will become a seed or peer for other people and uploading from your site will start. It took me 4 whole days to download a set of units slightly less than 4 Gigabytes.
Once your download has finished, your upload should by courtesy be allowed to continue but you can start to play your material. Go to the files tab lower left. Click on the line you want to open and it will start playing. When finished just click on another line and it will play. You can save this material under any folder and name you want.
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first time post ....
I have just successfully watched the full season from this below link
http://onlinetvshowsandmore.googlepages.com/theamazingraceasiaseasonone
from episode 4 onwards the site hosting it changes - and the download time is a lot slower than veoh, (the site that's hosting is in Taiwan) but if you're patient it works
enjoy!
p.s. hope its ok to post the link directly up here
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:welcome2: to patlini!
:hearts: Oh thank you! I am going to try that right out because I haven't tried bitty torrents yet--I'm letting apskip figure it out first! ;)
But I LOVED the first three episodes and wanted some more!
So if I'm up all night tonight--it will be all your fault! :lol:
We are very glad you joined us!
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Thanks!!! ;D
not sure if bitty torrents quality would be better, sound is in english but has Taiwanese? subtitles and i found the picture to be just OK. But I could live with it to watch the full series.
And like TAR it is addictive so if you start you can't finish...
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Well it loaded up really quickly, but it keeps hanging up (pausing) every few seconds--I'll give it another go tomorrow! Thanks again! :kuss:
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GeorgiaPeach - hope you have better luck today with the site, i checked today from work (oops) and it worked like a champ - how embarrassing to post a duff link on my first post. :-[
I am eager to discuss episodes 4 - 13 and don't want to spoil anything.
thoughts so far, Wow - they do a lot!!!
I like how Andy instigated a Boston Rob (a la meat eating) at the dig roadblock. Was it me or did that seem like a brutal roadblock compared to TAR. Also the penalty didn't start until they hit the mat in TAR7 it started at the roadblock here.
I also liked the fast forward, using a sponsors' products but not so in your face as they have been on TAR (grrr - gnomes).
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Oh don't worry--even some of the CBS ones give me trouble here and there!
And I'm really looking forward to watching--it is going to be my weekend treat so thank you again! Even if it is hangy uppy it will be better than none at all! :wohoo:
And for a spoiler queen--I'm really pretty unspoiled so don't y'all tell me till Monday who goes out next! :lol3:
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patlini, WELCOME. We are pleased to have more participants eager to discuss ARA1 and active in this dialogue.
The issue of when penalties are applied is a very contentious one in ARA1. In this episode 3, they actually get it right (watch out for later). You should take another look, patlini. The penalty is not applied until they get to the pitstop. At that time, since Jacqueline and Aubrey are the last of all the finshers and have the same penalty as 5 others, they automatically become team #9. with the penalty applied, the other teams with penalties become #5 through #8. If they had applied the penalty immediately, it would have washed out overnight with the hours of operation and been meaningless.
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Finally got to see Ep 4 :wohoo:
I think it took about 2 hours because of the tape pauses but still! Thanks patlini!
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The issue of when penalties are applied is a very contentious one in ARA1
Ain't that the truth. I downloaded the series and am now about 2/3 of the way through. I don't want to say too much and spoil it for Peach, but the way in which one penalty is applied (for speeding) is so suspicious ??? it stinks up the place.
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Peach, if you are still having problems and don't want to download the torrents. I could make a copy of the data files and mail them to you. YOu of course would still need a player (like VLC) to watch them and you would have to watch them on the computer.
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Oh thank you mswood! I MAY need to take you up on that but I'm hoping I have a copy in the works. I'm supposed to be getting a DVD made for me but I'm just hoping it arrives soon! And I do intend to learn to use torrents one of these days but there never seems to be enough time.
But I do appreciate the offer :kissy: and if all else fails, I'll take you up on it!
And what is VLC please? Would that be different from realone or Windows Media Player? I have lots of memory so don't mind installing stuff but I never know if i already have something that would work! :lol:
I'm just about to start a thread for new learning skills so maybe we can all help each other over there? (It is quite possible that this may turn out to be just an "educate the peach" thread though! :lol3:)
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VLC is a media player (like Windows Media Player or Quicktime), but it is far superior in both playback and options then Windows Media Player (which sucks **** in my opinion, and not the good way) or Quicktime (which at least for Mac, though I do here its more troublesome on Windows) is more stable and plays better on startup (but is less flexible on formats that it will play).
Yeah, I love torrents (don't tell). But I do try and use them only on shows that I will eventually purchase in some form (itunes, DVD, sometimes both).
But until the release TAR in some form that I can purchase (besides 1 and 7 which I do have), then torrents are what I am stuck with.
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Apskip, great write ups. Episode three is where I decidd hey, this is good AR. It may not be as polished as seasons 2-11, but it stil damn good. And I finaly am familiar enough with names and faces and their relationships to start to have real opinions about the teams.
I love it when the girls are told they are #9 (and they celebrate) before being told that means they are last and get eliminated.
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peach - sorry to hear you're still having probs, from what i can tell that site is notorious for slowness but it seems to be the only place (i've found) that's hosting it.
The penalty is not applied until they get to the pitstop. At that time, since Jacqueline and Aubrey are the last of all the finshers and have the same penalty as 5 others, they automatically become team #9. with the penalty applied, the other teams with penalties become #5 through #8. If they had applied the penalty immediately, it would have washed out overnight with the hours of operation and been meaningless.
gotcha, it really was just a race for the mat for all of those who'd taken the penalty. And i was surprised that the elephant task was quicker I would have thought the rafting would have been.
I love it when the girls are told they are #9 (and they celebrate) before being told that means they are last and get eliminated.
loved loved loved that too especially Aubrey's mouth falling open in disbelief like Alan is wrong.
teams I enjoyed (without spoiling)
Howard and Sahran - Sahran is a total wuss but Howard is so supportive of him and they are really enjoying being part of the race.
M&M's - constantly eating and getting those massages at the airport.
Andy and Laura are interesting also, i look forward to discussing them :js:
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Andy and Laura are indeed interesting. They will be at the center of the action.
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Patlini
What really surprised my about this season is that I really thought that I wouldn't get into the characters of the show. And while it did take a little longer then normal to figure names with faces (though Family Eidtion was the season from hell for this, I still can't tell the Bransen Women apart), I really, really like the cast with only one team that I actively disliked (a record for me).
Its actually one of my favorite overall casts, and that jsut really still surprises me.
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EPISODE 4
Teams are leaving Denpasar Bali to fly to Sydney Australia to get to Dawes Point in the the city for their next clue. Their times out of the pitstop are:
1231am Howard and Sahran
1255am Sandy and Franscesca
155am Sharon and Melody
206am Sahil and Prashant
430am Zabrina and JoeJer
511am Mardy and Marsio
553am Andy and Laura
555am Andrew and Syeon
It was interesting to see how much space there was among the first 4 teams and among the 4 penalty teams. In Bali,the elephant ride and white water rafting did not appear to separate them much. However, finding the clues in the Monkey Forest would have gotten increasing more difficult as there was going to be 10 clues out of 200 for the first team but only 2 clues out of 192 for the last team fo find it.
Teams were given the option of telephoning in airline reservations, doing them on the Internet, or going to a travel agent. All approaches were used, but it really didn't make any difference because as usual there was only one flight that made sense and all teams were able to get it. To get to Sydney, the long way around via Singapore was the quickest way, at 8000 km (almost twice what flying direct would be).
Once getting the clue at Dawes Point(which confused at least one taxi driver who took them elsewhere), there was a DETOUR to climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge(ELEVATION) or clean 44kg of prawns (CRUSTACEAN). Anyone who chose prawns wish they hadn't as the first 4 teams were all those who did the bridge climb:
Andy and Laura
Sharon and Melody
Howard and Sahran
Zabrina and JoeJer
Andrew and Syeon
Sandy and Francesca
Mardy and Marsio(of course they chose the food item)
Sahil and Prashant
The next task was to go on foot to Mrs. McQuairies's Chair, a rock formation(although they didn't know that) to get their next clue. Next they had to go to the SONY Central HQ store and get a Handycam to film any individual singing the song "Click Go the Shears", a famous Australian sheep shearing ballad. The catch was the tune had to be correct; if not it had to be done over. Sharon and Melody had that problem and so did Sandy/Fransesca and Mardy/Marsio.
The next was to take a ferry to Manly Wharf Ocean World and walk with animals(it turned out to be a Shark Dive into a 4 million gallon tank with about 50 sharks) to ge the next clue. The first ferry going over turned out to be slow, so Howard/Sahran and Andy/Laura were behind others when they landed. Sandy/Francesca screwed up by having their taxi driver go over the Harbour Bridge and back before getting to the ferry, but they lucked out by getting the fast ferry and getting into first place. Laura apparently had a pre-existing tendency to injure her left leg, because while walking from the Manly ferry terminal to Ocean World she had a relapse. They managed to continue on at a slow pace, but her ability to continue will be assessed by a physician. In Ocean World, Howard freaked out due to the scuba apparatus and he took the 4 hour penalty. Nobody else had any real problems, although it was quite a visual feast for viewers.
Coming out of Ocean World, teams had to return across the harbor by ferry to get to the downtown side and find the pitstopTall Ship Bounty. Although Sandy/Francesca left first they were on a slow ferry so Andrew/Syeon and sharon/Melody finished as #1 and #2 and S/F #3. Mardy/Marsio were #4. Sahil/Pashant came from last into Ocean World to #5 at the pitstop by lucking out with the fast ferry. Zabrina/JoeJer and Andy/Laura were next. Howard/Sahran were last due to their penalty, but it was non-elimination so they were lucky to stay in the race but lost all their cash.
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mswood
I totally agree re: "the cast". Just normal people, TAR casting could learn a lot from this.
I liked the shout out to TAR2 with the Sydney bridge challenge.
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I'm continuing to love this!
I like the teams--I like the tasks and I especially like how MUCH they are cramming into each episode. Is it that they are travelling shorter distances that seems to let us see so much more action than some TAR legs? Liked the trickiness of the sing a song task, thought Howard was incredibly lucky to get to stick around and that his partner was very supportive, and get more jealous everytime I see that Sydney bridge task--one day I am SO going to do that!
Will watch next week's soon...
Hope Lauren's leg is okay...
Thanks again for the recaps apskip! :happy:
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Peach
It really does fell like classic season one (and a bit of two) AR. Its less polished then the majority of seasons, but it seems like the episode are really filled. And the tasks just get better for the most part in my opinion.
I think its funny that in my opinion this cheaper regional version of AR has better tasks then 3 regular seasons of AR (not to mention of course the Family Edition).
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I really hate Andy & Laura because of what they did that they didn't get eliminated for it and also Howard & Sahran because they are sissys and scared of everything. The tasks also seem to get lamer as the season goes on. Especially when teams all choose the same detour, then it's not fun. The only reason I enjoyed it is because of who won. (:;) :kissy:
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You apparently have seen the remaining episodes(as I have although I am watching them again one a week for the purpsoes of this thread). By the end of episode 4 Andy and Laura have developed a reputation with their competition. The basis for this is not shown on camera, although it will be quite soon. This time I am trying to maintain a neutral attitude toward the teams in an effort to give unbiased recaps, but I have to admit that Andy and Laura are my least favorite team.
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See I actually kind of like them (in the cool someone to root agains't sort of way).
They are cocky and a bit arrogant, but they aren't so repulsve to make me want to hurl at the TV (which this season really doesn't have any teams that have that sort of effect on me).
I think for that type of team, they are one of the better behaved cocky arrogant teams.
Really the only team I actively dislike (and thats just mildly) is Sahil and Prashant. These guys make David & Jeff look exciting.
I also don't mind most of the tasks on this season (with a couple of exceptions). They show feats of fear (I love those), but even on the milder ones (or what appears to be milder ones), they really show how hard it is to do the tasks. I like that.
Next episode is one of my favorites of the season just on how a simply tasks confounds almost every team. I Love that.
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The next episode I totally love due to how many teams are totally confused by what should be the simplest of tasks. I am eager to digress further next week.
As to Sahil and Prahsant, i think they have caused me the most "stop and rewinds", usually to catch them striking a model pose or to replay what they are saying and giggle at it.
andy and laura they are amateurs as villains go, i guess they are what a British version with stiff upper lip would be :snicker:
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EPISODE 5
This one starts in Sydney at the Tall Ship Bounty. Laura's leg Xray is OK and she is cleared to continue. Teams leave as follows:
1230am Andrew and Syeon
1232 Sharon and Melody
1241 Sandy and Francesca
105 Mardy and Marsio
131 Sahil and Prashant
136 Zabrina and JoeJer
138 Andy and Laura
536 Howard and Sahran (due to 4 hour penalty). They receive money from all contestants except Andy and Laura. They beg for more.
They have to fly a direct 2150 km to Auckland New Zealand on Air New Zealand. One there they must take the ferry to Devonport and find a child on a swing near the ferry terminal. The flight is 5 hours 15 minutes.
On arrival, Andy and Laura steal the cab from Mardy and Marsio, who are pissed. Sahil and Prashant observe this and comment that Andy's whining is not appreciated by other teams. The first ferry departs at 1330.
The scene in Devonport(conincidentally the home of my sister and brother-in-law) is madcap. Teams are going in every direction and ignoring the fundamental direction "near the ferry terminal." They logically search out schools and playgrounds but miss the bigger picture. Andrew and Syeon turn left along the waterfront after stepping off the ferry and immediately find the girl on the swing. They then go back to the terminal to wait for the next ferry departure and psyche out Sahil and Prashant. It initially appears they are going the only ones on that first ferry back. Zabrina/JoeJer and Andy/Laura just make tha first ferry. Mardy/Marsio avoid getting penalized for taking a non-public transportation vehicle, find a taxi for getting around and eventually find the right place. Sharon and Melody join them. Howard and Sahran, Sandy and Francesca and Sahil and Prashant are the trailing teams. However, 3 times Sahil and Prashant got into private vehicles They were warned it was against the rules by another team as they were coming out of the third one.
Back in Auckland the DETOUR was RUGBY or RIGGING. RUGBY invovlevd kicking 3 goals from the 22 meter line at Victoria Park(easy for anyone who could lift the ball into the air and get it any reasonable distance). RIGGING was copy a set of lines and knots to rig a sail on a moored sailboat at the Westhaven Marina.
Zabrina and Joe/Jer do Rigging and make the first ferry back.
Andy and Laura do Rigging and make the first ferry. Andrew and Syeon gave up on Rigging and went to do Rugby. Eventually Andrew got all 3 goals. They got the second ferry.
Howard and Sahran did Riging and finished quickly. They go the second ferry.
Mardy and Marsio started with Rugby, but were pathetic so switched to Rigging.
Sandy and Francseca and Sharon and Melody did Rigging in the last Group.
Sahil and Prashant blew through Rugby very fast, leaving S/F and S/M on the last ferry.
Next was the Vertigo Climb, a 44m climb of a 270 meter tower by both team members followed by a 192 meter controlled fall on the Sky Jump by one team member while the other takes a picture with a SONY (get the product placement) camera. What is significant there is that the order of arrival here was almost the order of finish. That order at the tower was:
Andy
Andrew(who is afraid of heights per Syeon)
Zabrina
Howard
Prashant
Francseca
Marsio
Melody
Prashant
Last was taxi to the nearby Auckland Museum. Arrival order was:
Andy/Laura
Andrew/Syeon
Zabrina/JoeJer
Howard/Sahran
Sahil/Prashant(who were fiven a 1 hour penalty for using a private vehicle and not allowed to check in)
Sandy/Francesca
Mardy/Marsio
Sharon/Melody
The penalthy put Sahil/Prahsant after Sharon/Melody and they were eliminated. They did not accept the validity of the penalty and were very upset about it.
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The penalthy put Sahil/Prahsant after Sharon/Melody and they were eliminated. They did not accept the validity of the penalty and were very upset about it
yep - those boys were not pleased, even though they were told it was against rules.
loved the confusion over what should have been the simplest of tasks in this episode. Seeing Sandy and Francesca in the library looking at books was hilarious
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I loved this episode. Absolutely loved it. THough I was disappointed in the penality that the guys got.
I think it was just a 30 minute penality.
And for taking improper transportation, previously it was always 30 minutes plus (or even minus) time gain or lost in reaching a destination.
I don't think they were hit hard enough with a penality (though of course theyw ere eliminated).
Since it wasn't a matter of taking alternate transportation to the correct location that just took longer (see Season 9's Greece leg). They were taking alternate transportation to specific places, that saved them tremendously over walking or even waiting for cabs and paying them. So I really felt that should have been hit harder. Or the very least 30 minutes per infraction.
This episode probably has the best example in race history of a very simple task confusing and confounding almost every single team.
I love it.
It was also the first exampe I had ever seen of that sort of tower jumping (which we also see in all stars). I liked this one even more because not only do you have the jump and a walk around (like All Stars), but you also have the physical climb.
For future tasks the should always put a physical aspect along with a gravity challenge or fear challenge (or even a climbing, fear and puzzle height challenge as tehy did in season 10).
My favorite epsiode to date of this season.
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THough I was disappointed in the penality that the guys got.
I think it was just a 30 minute penality.
mswood, I'm sorry but the episode 5 footage I have is unequivocal. It was a one hour penalty as stated by Allen Wu at the pitstop.
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Cool, that makes me happy. I always did wonder about that, especially since, it didn't seem like 30 minutes was enough to give the remaining teams a chance to check in.
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Well, somebody saw something (http://www.flickr.com/photos/bugtom/753296017/in/photostream/). There's a clue box on the left, and the Fountain of Wealth on the right (didn't TARA already go there?). It was uploaded today, but I've forgotten how to check the exif at Flickr to confirm the dates. TARA2 should still be in the interview process, anyway.
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Slowhatch! That's great! We are sure it is TARA right? Izad said they had till 7/6 to notify people if they were accepted and after that too bad so the dates fit...
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I'm not sure what it is. I've checked TARA1 video and the Suntec sequence for them was at night (also, the cluebox--kmz attached--was in a different location). Could it be US TAR? US racers like to wear matching outfits. Fwiw, here's the blog entry (http://www.thanachart.net/?p=85) (same photos).
[attachment deleted by admin]
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Hmmmm...could TAR have gotten way over there without us hearing one single thing? :lol3: But i think they may be out there...
Let's see if Izad will come help?
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Wow great find! The deadline for the TARA2 application ended in April, and the producers mentioned that if the applicants did not hear from them by 6th July, then the applicants are unsuccessful.
We can probably interpret that in two ways (1) full casting decision have been made by that date, or (2) the show will start shooting after that date. I can't tell. I'll try to find some more info on this. Either way, excellent find. I have a feeling that might be the shooting for TARA2. I have to be on my toes now! :lol:
And I hope you guys will continue watching TARA1. IMO the episodes just keeps getting better and better.
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Thanks Izad! (wow...that was quick! :lol:)
Let us know if you find anything! :kissy:
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Hell I was just so happy to find out they were doing another season. I think they did an excellent job for the first one. And I am still rewatching.
I am curious did they shelve their plans for a European version?
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i'm not sure what is going on with the european version, it would be another AXN program for central europe (roughly Czech republic eastwards).
I do know that the Brazilian version is set to start airing on Oct 13th
http://www.acorridamilionaria.com.br (http://www.acorridamilionaria.com.br)
though I can't read Portuguese so I don't know if this has already finished fliming. :-[
and i agree with Slowhatch, i looked over the Singapore episode, definitely at night, I thought for one moment in the previews that they were in a nightclub with a lot of dry ice - cool lighting effect on that fountain !!!
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Episode 6
Teams start from the Auckland Museum at these times:
Andy/Laura 430am
Andrew/Syeon around 445am (I wasn't quick enough to catch it, but this is close)
Zabrina/JoeJer 458am
Howard Sahran 513am
Sandy/Francesca 622am
Mardy/Marsio 633am
Sharon/Melody 640am
Note the over one hour gap there between the first 4 teams and the last 3 teams.
However, as always, the bunching moment occurs at the airport as all teams are forced onto the same 800am flight from Auckland to Dunedin. Dunedin is cited as the "2nd city of the South Island." I could not believe that it is larger than Queenstown, but population statistics don't lie and it is almost 100,000 larger than Queenstown, which is much smaller than I remember it to be. I think the producers play a hand in preventing the first few teams from getting on a 715am flight, as everyone is on a 800am flight. Unless it is a very slow prop jet, I have to believe that the flight actually stops en route in Queenstown as the distance factor does not warrant at 2 hour 45 minute flight with the 1045am arrival in Dunedin, but the magic Amazing Race chart shows it as nonstop.
All teams arrive and find marked 4 wheel drive cars to self-drive 5 hours to Queenstown. Once there, they must gas up at a Caltex gas station to get their next clue. The instructions at Dunedin specifically warn to obey local speed limits. Zabrina and Joe Jer admit to going 110 km/hr in a 100 zone, but Andy and Laura are pulled over for doing 146 in that same zone. Andy gets his license confiscated and a NZ$600 fine(I wonder how they had enough money to pay this?). Several other teams pass them whiole they are pulled over. Howard and Sahran comment on coming into the outskirts of Queenstown how spectacularly beautiful it is (they are not exaggerating; I have been there and the entire South Island of New Zealand has scenery to die for).
After the Caltex, the clue offers a Gondola Ride up Bob's Peak, then a DETOUR of Luge or Ledge. In Luge, teams may do a relay race up a chairlift then down a 430 meter summer luge course. It is clearly the option for those too scared to do Ledge. Ledge is a Bungy Swing from 400 meters above the surrounding landscape, swinging on a long tether but with a safety harness. The G forces on the drop are severe. It is the option for those who want to finish fast. The first 4 teams after this detour all choose Bungy Swing and finish in this order:
Mardy/Marsio
Andy/Laura
Sandy/Francesca
Andrew/Syeon
Sahran states his characteristic "I can't do this(the bungy swing)", so they go to Luge. The time to go up the chairlift for 8 cycles(4 for each teammate) adds up to putting all these teams behind:
Zabrina/JoeJer
Howard/Sahran
Sharon/Melody
The next task is to drive to Arrowtown and find the clue box. This remixes the order of teams to a new one, but the next clue sends all teams to Off Road Adventures of Quad Bikes. when they get there, the Hours of Operation force them to return the next morning when they will be bunched. The teams agree to start in the order they got to Off Road Adventures initially, but several do not trust Andy/Laura to play by those rules, which is verbalized by Marsio.
The Off Road Adventure is both teammates separately biking through very difficult terrain. Several individuals are stuck in mud and have to be assisted by course personnel to get out. This includes Syeon, Sahran, and Melody. They then go to Nevis Valley Bungy Jump, the 4th highest in the world. They will descend 134 meters down in 8.4 seconds. The order of arrival there proves to be the order of departure (there is no opportunity to change positions unless someone chickens out) and is also the order of arrival at the Chadd Farm Winery pitstop. Only Sharon appeared to be frightened out of her wits by the jump. That order is(first person listed is the bungy jumper):
Sandy/Francesca
Laura/Andy - note penalty discussion below
JoeJer/Zabrina
Andrew/Syeon
Mardy/Marsio
Howard/Sahran
Sharon/Melody
Andy/Laura were given a 92 minute penalty, 2 minutes for each of the 46 kh/hr over the speed limit. However, it is being enforced on the start of the following leg and not at the finish. Why this was the case is totally beyond my comprehension. They earned the penalty in this leg and it should have been enforced on this leg. If Sharon/Melody finished less than 92 minutes behind Andy/Laura, then Andy/Laura should have been eliminated. As it was presented, Sharon/Melody were eliminated and there was not debate over the enforcement policy. This is the most egregious example of bad in-race decision making by the producers that I have seen in any Amazing Race.
NOTE ADDED LATER - My research shows that the 0800 flight from Auckland goes to Wellington before arriving at Dunedin at 1045.
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This stuff probably needs a new thread, but here goes:
An Allan Wu sighting (http://suddenlove.blogspot.com/2007/07/my-outing.html) (blog w/photo dated 07 Jul 07) in a Singapore restaurant. Since he's based in Singapore it's unremarkable; it's the crew sighting (along with the suntec photos) that makes it interesting. We saw Allan Wu at IndoChine ...he was with his angmoh production crew...it's very hot outside when he's doing the filming...he's sweating like hell....me too....
(Ang moh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ang_mo) is common but not polite: roughly="whitey")
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Your such a great detective Slowhatch! I wouldn't be surprised at all if you didn't bring us our first TAR 12 spoiler :)
Also I meant to say thank you so much to Izad for the quick reply :kissy:
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Big thanks to Slowhatch!
I think it is going to be a little tricky keeping TARA2 and TAR 12 spoilers separate this time...
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Big thanks to Slowhatch!
I think it is going to be a little tricky keeping TARA2 and TAR 12 spoilers separate this time...
filiming permits wont make it trickey :lol:
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There is a new TARA 2 Spoiler thread to use...
So we can quit hijacking the video commentary of TARA 1 -- :lol3:
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I think (And I might be wrong and) that regular TAR had a couple of penalities enforced ont eh next leg, because the producers were unaware of them occuring until after all teams had check in.
But it is also possible that the team was simply later then the penality time. Unforunately we have no shadow analysis (and I don't recall any being done when it originally aired) to give some form of confirmation ont he time of teams arrival.
If they were that late then there are several cases of the penalities being served in the next episode (hell the 2cd episode of All Stars had that with Kevin & Drew suffering a penality for not attempting to fix their vehicle though it was enver aired and only clips and interviews afterwards informed us of it.
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Penalties being served on the next leg happened a lot in the earlier seasons. Some examples from the top of my head:
Dave/Margareta in the second leg for missing the roadblock clue(but completed it anyway) in the 2nd leg
Joe & Bill and Frank & Margartia in the 6th leg for taking a taxi instead of a train
Gary & Dave and Chris & Alex in leg 4, for driving at the speed limit instead of 15 miles below like they were instructed
Andre & Damon in leg 1 for taking the wrong course in the detour(a detour which they didn't even show any team finishing, so there is no way to know what that was all about)
Probably a few more, but I can't remember. I think they started serving all penalties in the same leg where they occured in Season 4.
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OK, but what relevance does that line of thinking have to ARA1 episode 6, where at the New Zealand South Island pitstop near Queenstown it was clearly known at pitstop checkin that Andy/Laura had a penalty and yet they chose to apply it when it made no sense, at the beginning of the next leg?
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I think it is going to be a little tricky keeping TARA2 and TAR 12 spoilers separate this time...
filiming permits wont make it trickey :lol:
I agree that it will be tricky knowing whether reports as they come in apply to ARA2 or to AR12. Sicne the Singapore report is about Allan Wu, that makes it easy, but some upcoming ones will probably be much more difficult.
Film permits are only useful for regular Amazing Races in the U.S. for the first and last leg! I have not heard that a technique has been perfected for getting foreign countires to require film permits and permit information to be public. This means that the rest of the regular Amazing Races and Amazing Race Asias will not benefit from the technique.
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I think it is going to be a little tricky keeping TARA2 and TAR 12 spoilers separate this time...
filiming permits wont make it trickey :lol:
I agree that it will be tricky knowing whether reports as they come in apply to ARA2 or to AR12. Sicne the Singapore report is about Allan Wu, that makes it easy, but some upcoming ones will probably be much more difficult.
Film permits are only useful for regular Amazing Races in the U.S. for the first and last leg! I have not heard that a technique has been perfected for getting foreign countires to require film permits and permit information to be public. This means that the rest of the regular Amazing Races and Amazing Race Asias will not benefit from the technique.
it worked for new zealand :lol:
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OK, but what relevance does that line of thinking have to ARA1 episode 6, where at the New Zealand South Island pitstop near Queenstown it was clearly known at pitstop checkin that Andy/Laura had a penalty and yet they chose to apply it when it made no sense, at the beginning of the next leg?
Yeah, its confusing and I really, really would like to know when that team arrived last.
And like regular TAR, I assume the producers are in contact all the time with the filming crew, where they absolutely would have plenty of warning about the speeding violation Andy & Laura (well Andy) received.
Again it really only makes sense is if Sharon & Melody were more then 92 minutes later (which it is possible I assume). But strange that they wouldn't milk it for a dramatic ending, unless they have some rule (that I am unaware of about driving penalities being applied at the start of the next leg.
I am thinking of the driving penalties that I can recall, Chris & Alex and Gary & Dave speeding in Season 2, Gretchen & Meredith taking the wrong vehicle in season 6, Kevin & Drew in All Stars. I think all of those penalities were applied to the start of the next leg (Maybe if I am not lazy I will try and confirm more).
If so, perhaps thats a rule (A stupid one in my opinion) that differs from some of the other penalties.
Apskip can you think of any driving violations that have applied to the same leg, before the official check in?
I can think of taking the wrong transportation, taking too many clues, not completeling tasks, ect all being applied on the same leg (especially in later seasons).
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OK, what am I missing? I went looking for shadow caps (the kmz is attached if anyone's interested; Chard Farm sits very close to 45 South lat.) but found these departure times more interesting. Subtract 92 minutes from the A/L departure time and it means they would have arrived 8 minutes after H/S, which was clearly not the case. ???
[attachment deleted by admin]
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EPISODE 7
This time I have done a bit of international flight schedules to provide information that is usually available on the show, but was not provided. I am also going to have more personal comments than usual.
We start at the Chard Farm Winery, where the teams leave the pitstop as follows for teh Queesntown airport:
Sandy/Francesca 254am
Zabrina/JoeJer 315
Andrew/Syeon 405
Mardy/Marsio 422
Howard/Sahran 425
Andy/Laura 605 (HUH?)
The penalty for Andy/Laura was supposed to be 92 minutes and they originally finished just after Sandy/Francesca. Regular math puts them no worse than 92 minutes after 315am, but apparently the Amazing Race Asia editors are uses a brand new form of math or ARE NOT TELLING US SOMETHING IMPORTANT, which is much more likely. I hate it when they show such little respect for the audience that this indicates.
Teams are headed for Singapore, but the best route is via Auckland. My analysis of airline flights shows that this is what they almost certainly flew:
Air New Zealand 642 ZQN to AKL departs 1100 arrive 1245
Singapore Airlines 286(oh, what a tough break) AKL nonstop to Singapore departs 1400 arrivwe 2035 (Note: besides being the first flight in to Singapore from Auckland each day, that time also corresponds to the dusk dky condition for July 5, 2006 when they arrived at the CALTEX station).
The stop in Singapore was the most criticized set of tasks in the entire history of the Amazing Race. As Sandy put it "all the way to Singapore just to wash a car." Not quite, Sandy. It was also to do product placement for CALTEX and FORD, something that only an infrequent Amazing Race task should be doing. The teams bunch again at Singapore airport and fly to Bangkok. That flight is not on Air Asia as indicated on the show but on Thai Airlines departing at 2205 as shown and arriving 2335 Banngkok time, 2.5 hours later.
Teams grab taxis and rush to a temple 85 km north of Bangkok, many changing from their original taxi once communication problems were too vast. However, Hours of Operation were 0630 to 1900, so all arrived before opening and most slept in the taxis. Zabrina and JoeJer, the first to arrive at 2am, were designated to enter first. This actually became important as the cable car for entry across the river only could tranport 2(plus the camera and soundmen) at a time. Teams received coins with the picture of the golden Mount Temple, back in Bangkok, for their next clue. Once there it was a Roadblock forcing choice of Who Can Ring a Bell to find among 560 dangling bells, out of the 100 containing capsules, one of the 6 containing a clue. They finish in the order: Andy, Syeon, Francesca, Marsio, Sahran, JoeJer. Next is a DETOUR, and this causes chaos not seen except for the "Child on Swing" in Devonport. BACON requries a taxi to Ha Long Latadong to get the clue, then another taxi to the Pig Monument. EGGS is a taxi to the Wholesale Market, difficult to find, and then a 3/4 mile walk with a stack of 20 egg cartons on a dolly to a merchant even more difficult to find. If any eggs are broken they have to be replaced. The chaos of BACON is in getting translation of the word PIG, which turns out to be the phonetic sound "Moo" in Thai. Getting directions from locals to the correct addresses is confusing, even for Andy and Laura, who theoretically have Thailand as their "home country"(and if you believe that I have a bridge to sell you; I must add that even though I dislike them as a team and do not believe their ties to thailand I think they are examples of genius casting by ARA).
Teams get a clue to Wat Pho as the pitstop as they complete the DETOUR. The finish order is:
Andy/Laura win a year's supply of CALTEX gasoline each.
Andrew and Syeon
Howard and Sahran do a magnificent turnaround and move up to 3rd by finding the PIG Monument quickly.
Sandy/Francesca
Mardy/Marsio
Zabrina/Joe Jer are extremely lucky and saved by non-elimination. They lose all their cash but appear like they were expecting this to be non-elim.
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OK, what am I missing? I went looking for shadow caps (the kmz is attached if anyone's interested; Chard Farm sits very close to 45 South lat.) but found these departure times more interesting. Subtract 92 minutes from the A/L departure time and it means they would have arrived 8 minutes after H/S, which was clearly not the case. ???
Slowhatch, I am now in a position to comment. With a 92 minute penalty, the latest that Andy/Laura could have started was 0447am, but more probably 0432am. They appear to have an additional 90 minutes added on to their penalty. That would make it really close between them and Sharon/Melody in the Chard Farm Winery pitstop finish if the 92 minute penalty were assessed at the finish of episode 6. I would love to know why the extra penalty.
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Oh thank you mswood! I MAY need to take you up on that but I'm hoping I have a copy in the works. I'm supposed to be getting a DVD made for me but I'm just hoping it arrives soon! And I do intend to learn to use torrents one of these days but there never seems to be enough time.
Yes, and that DVD has been sent out. I'm the one who was copying my entire TAR DVD collection (including TARA) for Peach and just sent it out today.
Peach sent me the link to this forum as she knows I'm a big TAR fan including TARA as you can tell. LOL.
Looking forward to TARA 2 and discussing the first season with you guys. :js: :js:
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My hero! :luvu:
Shoot! now WHAT do I call you?
:welcome2: :yourock:
We are really glad you made your way over here and look forward to sharing the season with you!
And I'll be back in this thread as soon as I catch up with the rest of you TARA fans! Just give me about 2 hours after my package arrives!
Oh happy days! :happy:
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:hithere: Welcome to the forum TARAsia Fan!!
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Thanks!
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:hearts: :cheer: :hearts:
Oh boy oh boy oh boy!
My DVD's arrived!
Thanks to TARA Fan, I'll be caught up with the rest of y'all in no time! :kissy:
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:yess: :yess: :yess: :yess: :yess:
Glad you got them in one piece, Peach! I'm sure you'll like them.
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EPISODE 8
The pitstop was in Bangkok Thailand. Teams leave at:
Andy/Laura 100am
Andrew/Syeon 105
Howard/Sahran 111
Sandy/Francesca 136
Mardy Marsio 155
Zabrina/JoeJer 327
The clue sends them to the Southern Bus Terminal, where they will catch a bus for Krabi 800 km south. Afficionados of the very first regular Amazing Race will remember that Krabi was the site of the pit stop where the critical time gap opened between Frank/ Margarita and Rob/Brennan and Kevin/Drew which quickly lengthened out to a full day.
Teams arrive long before the first express bus leaves at 7am. However, sometime in the early morning a local bus goes to Prachnop and Andrew/Syeon, Howard/Sahran, and Mardy/Marsio take a risk by taking that bus. That leads to them taking a long chain of buses, the next to Chumphnon, then Masto Mnang Masi. Their driver arranges a special bus to meet then on the way to Phuket and go straight to Krabi insstead of to Krabi via Phuket. That saved them one hour and they get to Krabi at about 730pm instead of 830pm. The express bus with Andy/Laura, Sandy/Francesca and Zabrina/JoeJer had 11 hours and arrived at 6pm. In order to get to the clue, all teams must go to a specific beach by local taxi. M/M had run out of money due to buying new lighter backpacks, so 100 Baht from Andrew and Syeon allowed them to continue.
If you can't have an airport bunching, what's the next best thing? An hours of operation bunching. When all 6 teams arrived at Hat Phi Phi National Marine Park on the beach at Hat Nopharrat Thara Bay, the hours of operation posted was 8am to 6pm. All teams had to find shelter for the night and M/M went begging and attempting to sell clothing.
The next morning's access to the clue box invited teams to go for the second Fast Forward. No team seemed interested in risking what happened to Ernie/Jeena in leg 2. All went to Kapota and had a DETOUR choice of SMASH or GRAB. SMASH was to use small hammers to open any of 75 coconuts up to reveal red dye inside one. GRAB was to swim to one of 100 buoys with clues; only 10 had real clues. As they were travelling in sight of the other boats, Mardy/Marsio could see that none were going for the Fast Forward. They decided on the spot to change course and go to Panang Bay to do the Fast Forward. It involved paddling a kayak along a series of coves until they found the clue hidden along one of them. They had never kayaked before and elected to have one do the paddling and the other the balancing. That technique worked and they eventually found the clue, which sent them directly to the pitstop at Ko Pak Bia.
Andrew/Syeon was the only team to start on GRAB and they found it quickly. This inspired several of the other teams to switch, as smashing coconuts proved difficult unless your name was Sandy. He and Francesca were the only ones to complete SMASH. He completed it after Andy/Laura had switched and completed GRAB, putting S/F in fourth place. That left Zabrina/JoeJer and Howard/Sahran to fight it out. H/S siwtched to GRAB slightly sooner, but Z/JJ completed it first and was on their way in 5th place. Next for all teams but M/M was the ROCK CLIMB with a professional anchoring the safety line and giving advice. The clue was maybe 20 yards up the rock wall. It did not appear to be that difficult. Even Sahran, who complained "oh my God" and "I can't do that" was able to complete it fairly quickly. Teams left this task in the exact order they arrived the same happened at Teah Hong Lagoon, which was only a "get a clue" station to send teams on to the pitstop. On the final approach to the pitstop, Andrwe/Syeon lost 2nd place when their boat captain took them to thet wrong island and Andy/Laura and Sandy/Francesca slipped ahead of them. Zabrina/Joe Jer made a joke about not having to give up their money this time as they finished. Howard/Sahran were last and eliminated. They complained that they were not ready to be out of the Amazing Race. Imagine how Rob and Amber felt!
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Count me in! I refused to look at this thread until I caught up.
Thailand was beautiful. My wife and I have been there, so it was fun to see some of the sights again. (The reclining Buddha, the Southern Bus Terminal, etc.)
There have been a couple comments that have been really interesting. You get to see how other people react to these places, rather than Americans. I thought it interesting when the Malaysian guy told his wife to just sh*t on the side of the road, because "It's Thailand, nobody cares." I find little stuff like that to be very interesting.
Sandy and Francesca have really grown on me. I'm rooting for them now. The only thing that creeps me out is how two people that look so much like brother and sister are "dating."
All in all, I've been very impressed with this show. I'm looking forward to the next season now.
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This is one of my favorite episodes of the race (along with Andy being caught for speeding in NZ :jumpy: :jumpy:).
The frustration of Andy/Syeon, Mardy/Marsio and Howard/Sahran is apparent as they realize they caught the wrong bus to Krabi. Syeon was cranky, but I kind of sympathize after spending many hours on a bus traveling in Taiwan (not the same as going to Krabi, but I can certainly empathize).
But thanks to the Hours of Operation, it saved those three after arriving many hours after Andy/Laura, Zab/Joe Jer and Sandy/Francesca.
The scenery in this episode was tremendous and seeing the National Marine Park makes me want to go there and spend ... oh, the rest of my life there. :lol: :lol:
This episode caused me some gallstones hearing Sandy yell "WHOO HOO HOO HOO!!!" for the millionth time in the series. But I also laughed at Mardy yelling "MARSIO! STOP EATING! Tickets first!" at one of the bus stops. You gotta know when you're out of money, buying food is not the way to go.
Great episode all around.
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TARAsia Fan, it's good to see somebody digging in and savoring these episodes. My analysis(see above) of episode 8 indicates that there was a game of smoke and mirrors being played by the editors. In spite of all the hullaballoo about how much of a disadavantage the teams taking the combination route were at, the reality of their arrival was only 1.5 hours behind the 3 nonstop bus teams.
On the question of buses in Taiwan vs. Thailand, I took one from Taipei to Kaohsiung about 30 years ago.That is about the longest city-to-city distance possible in Taiwan, slightly more than 350 km, which would be doable in 4 hours. There have been comparable(to the 11 to 12.5 hours in Thailand) bus trips and much longer train trips in regular Amazing Races.
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2 more episodes and I'll be all caught up with y'all and can play again! :happy:
And I'm still really loving this season!
And I know I'm way late to the party and all---but :meow: to that speeding penalty disaster! NOT fair to the other team for sure--wonder what the logic was behind that?? (Logic? There's logic?? :lol:)
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I was sad to see Howard go, i wished him and Sahran had changed detours earlier.
And as everyone else is stating Sandy is just a beast!
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Sandy is a physical trainer in peak condition; ARA1 got eactly what it should have expected when it cast him. He is fabulous for any pure strength or speed tasks. I find him very likable, enough so that Sandy/Francesca is my favorite team. I would root for any ARA1 teams having the planning or execution skills of a Colin/Christie, but none have shown that although it is difficult to really know if they have them since the extreme bunching does eliminate differentiation of teams through air travel.
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EPISODE 9 starts from the Krabi Thailand area.
The departures are bunched to only 22 minutes apart:
Mardy/Marsio at 437am
Andy/Laura at 441am
Sandy/Francesca at 442am
Andrew/Syeon at 444am
Zabrina/JoeJer at 459am
Teams fly to Kolkata India, 2300 km via Bagkok. Sandy says "we should eat before we get to India because we probably are not going to be eating in India." Prophetic words; as they ways on Top Chef, "Watch What Happens". Several teams were grousing about Andy and Laura hiding secret maps in their luggage, giving them an unfair advantage.
On arrival they ask taxi driver's to take them to Mother Teresa's Church. They all except M/M went to the wrong church, not St. Teresa of Avila Church, so they have to go to a second place. The chaos of India's large city road traffic chaos is clear. Kolkata's metropolitan area is the 9th largest in the world. The M/M taxi gets a flat, but the driver is adept and fixes it quickly. Some teams light a candle in memory of Mother Teresa and some do not. The clue box is a Roadblock asking them "Who Wants to Shine?" and sends them to a railway station where shoeshine men are waiting to instruct them. Them must sell 7 shoeshines at 5 rupees each(which they get to keep) to get the next clue. The selectees and their order of finish are:
Laura
Francesca
Syeon
Zabrina
Mardy
The clue sends them on to a traditional Bengali meal for each member of the team at Hakeli Restaurant at the Parak Lee Inn Hotel. Francesca said on the way that "she was hoping to not eat anything in India that didn't come in a packet." She did not get her wish, not remotely close. Everything has to be eaten. It includes lentils, dal, sheep's eyes, trays of vegetable and meat dishes to go with rice, a large mound of rice (Mardy/Marsio even asked for more) and dessert. It is a huge meal, but not as gross as caviar in Moscow or meat in Mendoza. Everyone was able to finish it, although what was surprising is that Mardy/Marsio did not gain any ground from their last position coming out of the shoeshine Roadblock; their statement was "it was too much for us". There was a lot of barfing off-camera and some loud farts on-camera. The finishing order was S/F, Z/JJ, A/L, A/S, and M/M. However, it was made meaningless by the Hours of Operation at the next task, Kamiskar's Sari Boutique, which were 9am to 7pm. Teams came back there in the morning and had to find their next clue among the saris. Sandy and Francesca had hired the same driver from the prior day This is the classic luck-based task. A/S finished first. A/L finished second and stole the taxi driver from S/F, who were upset when they finished 3rd and found out. This was classic Andy/Laura behavior that endeared them to the other teams to the extent that all wished them a quick opportunity to spend maximum time in Sequesterville.
Z/JJ finished 4th and M/M 5th.
Next was the DETOUR CARRY or COUNT. CARRY involved using top-of-the headpiece to stabilize jugs filled with milk to carry them a distance and empty them into a huge urn. When a line was reached, then the clue was released by a monitor. COUNT was devilish. More than 1000 betel nuts were in a basket. Teams had to successfully count them. If they missed the accurate number, then they had to recount as many times as it took. CARRY was the easy choice. Andy/Laura breezed through this. All the other teams COUNTed and, except for Andrew/Syeon, who finished fast, regretted it. It took the other 3 teams many laborious tries.
A/L got a clue to the B.P Gangooli St. Kolay Market on the Bank rooftop across from the Schiava train station. When they arrived there, Alan was alone and handed them a clue to CONTINUE. S/F and Z/JJ were on their way there, but M/M had not finished. Episode 10 will be the classic TBC.
This was a typical fascinating India leg. I loved it except for the bunching.
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We debated about this episode on TARFlies. Great ep as you got to see the heart of India. A true Bengali dinner has to be savored. There's no way to gorge or eat fast. If you read the clue, you know that this is a meal not to be taken lightly. Sandy blew through his meal. Joe Jer ate hers without too much of a problem. Then there was Syeon who is just so tiny. I felt bad for her.
The shoe shining task showed that that attractive women got to do the tasks quicker (might have to do with editing as well). If you notice, Sandy and Francesca are slowly moving up the ranks. After a horrible start, they've been doing better and better and now are becoming a massive threat to win the whole thing. If the task if physical, they'll finish in the top three for sure. For mental tasks, they aren't as strong and we see that with the Betelnut challenge.
The team I'm impressed with is Zab/Joe Jer. They keep plugging along and don't allow things to bother them. They may get a little flustered, but they'll keep at a task until they finish it. I like them. :)
And Andy/Laura just continue to make enemies. The Dreaded Yield hasn't appeared yet, but you know they have to be a target when it finally does show up.
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EPISODE 9 CONTINUED or EPISODE 10 (take your pick)
Andy/Laura are on their way to the Sealdah train station in Kolkata for a 19 hour trip to New Delhi in a 2nd class compartment(I know that well from 3 weeks of riding trains in 2nd class throughout India; there is minimal comfort but you get to know everyone around you who speaks English if you wish). Andrew/Syeon, Mardy/Marasio and Zabrina/JoeJer are on their way to the Bank roof top, the to the station. M/M remark that it is the Rajastani Express trian leaving Kolkata at 1635, which puts it into New Delhi at about 1130 the next morning. Sandy/Francesca finally finish a correct count; they are not the brightest bulbs around. There will be a YIELD once the Red Fort is reached.
M/M and A/S discuss a pact to YIELD A/L. S/F say that A/L had some merit in their their discussion to steal their taxi driver. Nevertheless, after a madcap race to the Red Fort S/F do YIELD A/L because A/L represent the greatest threat to win ARA1. They are then presented with the DETOUR of DONKEY or DELIVER. DONKEY is locating donkeys at Cycle Market Chandi Chowk back in Old Delhi, the delivering a load of onions to the onion vendor at Lahori Gate Crossing. DELIVER is locating by means of a SONY Cybershot camera only Sunny International at the Gadodia Maket back in Old Delhi and delvering bags of chili powder to a spice shop. Both of these were difficult and fraught with many perils. Finding the way involved many twists and turns, asking locals for help. The onions were bouncing out of the basket on the donkey. The bags of chili powder were bulky and heavy. S/F and Z/JJ chose DONKEY; after their YIELD expired so did A/L. M/M and A/S chose DELIVER. Due to what must have been major mistakes by S/F, A/L managed to overcome the entire yield period and catch up to them just before the finish. Andy made the mistke of trying muscle Sandy out of the way; Sandy retaliated and maneuvered his donkey to cut him off. Poor little Syeon was struggling with this big bag of chilli powder, but the biggest negative was the chili dust on Mardy. Marsio, Andrew and Syeon. Teams finished S/F, M/M, A/S, A/L and Z/JJ.
Next is a Roadblock to the Tibetan Monastery Market, where a number of dung cakes needed to be made and put on the walls. The arrival here is in a different order than expected, as S/F have great difficulty and arrive 4th after A/L, A/S and M/M. Z/JJ are in last and in trouble. This task is laborious. It is ideal for Sandy, who slaps those dung cakes up. Marsio and Andy are doing OK. Laura is struggling and JoeJer does not seem to be making up any time. Teams finish in this order and head to the pitstop at Jain Mandir Dada Bari (crossing incredibly hot tiles in bare feet to get there):
A/S
S/F
A/L
M/M
Z/JJ
However, Andy/Laura cannot find a taxi and Zabrina/JoeJer arrive and take the one that A/L are about to get.
S/F manage to take the lead and finish first. For their victory, they were awarded one of the few prizes, a resort holiday for 2 courtesy of
Air Asia. Andy/Laura are last and eliminated. Many will be glad to see them out, but now there are no villains left. The final order was:
S/F
M/M
A/S
Z/JJ
A/L
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I really enjoyed these 2 India episodes, lots of frantic racing and confusion. Nice to see that its not just TAR contestants that experience this.
The Bengali meal didn't seem that bad to me, but then again I love Indian food. I would have preferred it to 2lbs of Caviar! Did Sandy eat both his and Francesca's it seemed that way to me. Plus their inability to count the nuts correctly really added to the "all brawn" label for Sandy (he does seem like a nice guy though).
When A/L were yielded Laura gave a shout out to Catherine Tate "am i bothered" which I thought was funny, and the fact that they caught up with S/F shows that they were certainly competitors to be reckoned with.
So on that note I was sad to see them go, not the worse villains the race has seen but good players.
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I was more than happy to see Andy, but not Laura, go. He wasn't my cup of tea, but having read interviews since TARA aired, I will say he seems to be a nice guy. Perhaps Michael McKay edited him more to be a villain, but it appears during the show, Andy was doing nicely all by himself.
Again, it appears in the physical tasks, SanFran, especially Sandy will blow through them without too many problems. Zab and Joe Jer will do well in the mental challenges. Mardy/Marsio are a smarter team than I have given them credit for. I certainly thought they would have been eliminated by now. Andrew/Syeon are certainly physically fit, but her foot may hinder them if they have to run. Interesting contrasts here. Two physically fit teams and two mentally fit teams. Should make for some interesting viewing especially in the next leg.
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EPISODE 11 starting at DELHI, INDIA Buddhist temple
Sandy/Francesca depart at 147am
Andrew/Syeon depart at 154am but Syeon has a bad injury to her foot and can't run.
Mardy/Marsio depart at 155am.
Zabrina/JoeJer depart at 215am
Teams fly 200km to Dubai, united Arab Emirates where they taxi to the Berg Dubai water taxi station and get an Abra water taxi. There is a YIELD ahead.
Andrwe/Syeon claim a money-only alliance with Zabrina/Joe/Jer and an everything-but-money alliance with Mardy/Marsio.
S/F have no confidence in their original taxi driver, so ditch her and get another one.
The view of the skyscrapers along the route to Berg Dubai is imressive.
The arrival at Berg Dubai is Z/JJ, S/F, M/M, A/S but nobody uses the YIELD.
The Roadblock is "Who Wants to Play Around?" One member of a team has one ball, a putter and one club at the golf Academy 9 hole Par 3 course to finish and get the next clue. If they lose the ball they must go back to the beginning to get a new one.
Zabrina arrives first and completes the course first, as solid round.
Francesca arrives second and complete the course second, another solid round.
Despite her foot problem, Syeon gets around the course and maintains third position.
On the way to the course, the water taxi of Mardy and Marsio borke down eliminating their lead over Andrew/Syeon, who were willing to help before the engine came back to life. Marsio was not a good choice to play golf. On the 6th hole, he lost his ball and had to go back for a new one. He finished about 3 holes after Syeon, abotu 30 minutes behind.
The next clue sends teams on a useless trip to Dubai International Marine Club to find a clue at the boat Leopard of Dubai to go to Ski Dubai at the Emirates Mall. The DETOUR there is HACK or HIKE. HACK is use a small hammer and chisel for each team member to break through a 150 pound block of ice. HIKE is for each team member to be outfitted to carry a 25kg backpack plus rope us the slope to the top of the ski lift, get the clue and then walk down. S/F and A/S chose HACK and both finished quickly. Z/JJ and M/M, who arrived well behind, had major problems getting up the slope.
The next clue sent teams to GOLD SOUK to find a specific MODERN JEWELRY shop matching a photo. There are 500 gold shops in the Gold Souk area. S/F used trial and error and eventually found the right one. A/S got lucky and seemed to find it more quickly. Z/JJ phoned ahead, but this did not really help them and they had difficulty. M/M seemed to find it fairly quickly and make up time.
The final clue sent teams to locate a marked car to take them to Margham Desert Camp. Teams reached the pitstop in exactly the same order. M/M were fortunate to find a non-elimination point, so they lost their money but stayed alive in the race.
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I absolutely loved this episode. To see the buildings and architecture of a city that literally grew from the desert. Marsio playing the golf roadblock really cost the team as Zab, Syeon and Francesca seemed to breeze through the course.
Climbing up the ski slope with 50 pounds of equipment was not easy, especially for Zab and Joe Jer. But Mardy and Marsio were huffing and puffing up the slope as well.
I thought this would be the end of Mardy/Marsio, but the dreaded non-elimination leg came into play. We'll see if they can recover in the next leg.
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I totally agree with you. I think Dubai is quite an interesting place. I noted the skyscrapers that line the major transit routes. The Abra water taxis were reminiscent of Old Dubai. The golf course's irrigated greenery provided an amazing contrast with the surrounding desert. Ski Dubai is the most fascinating, with the decadence of a ski slope inside and temperatures above 100 degrees most of the time outside. The Gold Souk concept is ancient, but the stores themselves are selling very expensive merchandise to the wealthy. Margham Desert Camp, although we did not see much of it, is a traditional Bedouin habitation.
Dubai is showing up in the news a lot. I saw the beginning of a program this weekend on National Geographic Channel about new islands being created offshore to form a world map with continents and the major islands. The Burj al Arab Hotel is known to be one of the most luxurious in the world. The 3 Palm Island complexes are in various stages: one complete; one to finish next year; one under development and not started construction yet.
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I'm sure going from the searing sun to the indoor ski slope must have messed with them.
And yet another fine physical performance from Sandy
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Let's give credit to Zabrina. That pack she had to carry up the ski slope weighed almost as much as she did!
I just noticed that she is a TV Producer in Malaysia. She obviously isn't Malaysian. My guess is Philippino, since her last name is Fernandez. Does anyone know where she is from and how long she has been in Malaysia? I wonder if she was born there.
Here's a nice little bio she put up:
http://www.graduates.com/vg.asp?i=2424614 (http://www.graduates.com/vg.asp?i=2424614)
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By the way... am I the only one that thinks that Sahran & Howard are probably more than just "friends"?
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She obviously isn't Malaysian
Both are Malaysian citizens. As far as ethnicity, some people on the boards are saying Pinay, some are speculating mixed Portuguese/Indian descent. I like the fact that her Moslem faith (wedding photo here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/shutupyourface/179707/in/set-72157600001357795/)) was never an issue, while Bilal/Saeed on the other hand were edited like they were some sort of museum exhibit.
By the way... am I the only one that thinks that Sahran & Howard are probably more than just "friends"?
Sahran is a spokesman for some LGBT group (http://www.equal-ground.org/archives/2005/05/book_launch_a_s.php) in Sri Lanka. Although not necessarily a couple, I'm guessing AXN packaged them as friends so people in local viewing markets might not be offended.
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By the way... am I the only one that thinks that Sahran & Howard are probably more than just "friends"?
Kilarney - that's what I thought initially too and I kept watching them for giveaway signs. But i'm thinking they more like Oswald and Danny.
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Two more questions (spoiler free):
1) Does anyone know what Laura & Andy do for work? The official webpage merely states that they are "entrepreneurs." They live on Koh Samui, an island in Thailand. My wife and I have been there, and it's a beautiful place. It's definitely on the beaten path, but it's not nearly as crazy as Phukett. I'm just wondering how they figured out to live there! I'm jealous! The only catch is that a LOT of expats had was that it's very difficult to get the Thai government to allow you to live there full time. Most people had to make "visa runs" every 90 days, IIRC. That meant that you had to leave the country for a short period of time. Living on Koh Samui, that sounds like a pain. It involves an airplane flight or a ferry ride at the least.
2) What's Joe Jer up to? Is she still friends with Zabrina? I noticed that she was not interviewed in the recap episode, whereas almost every other team members who ran the race were.
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There's not much new info on Joe Jer; as far as I know she's still producing for Channel V. Zabrina spent the month following the TARA2 tent around the world.
Andy/Laura lived on Koh Samui but moved to Bangkok about a year ago (see here (http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/printfriendly/0,4139,121449,00.html) and the last paragraph here (http://star-ecentral.com/news/story.asp?file=/2007/2/5/tvnradio/16772674&sec=tvnradio)).
The UK-born couple, who run several businesses in Bangkok, including IT consultancy and aerial photography, have been together for seven years.
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What's Joe Jer up to? Is she still friends with Zabrina? I noticed that she was not interviewed in the recap episode, whereas almost every other team members who ran the race were.
Joe Jer was traveling at the time of the taping of the recap thus, she was only seen from an interview during a pit stop. In fact, the racers were allowed to blog during the series and Joe Jer explained that she was in Colombia. You can find that blog here (http://here).
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EPISODE 12 starts from Margham Desert Camp outside Dubai
Sandy/Francesca leave at 745am
Andrew/Syeon leave at 751am(even though there is a typo on the AXN screen saying it is 806am; that could not be be true based on what happens later)
Zabrina/Joe/Jer leave at 806am
Mardy/Marsio leave at 820am(they claim it is 45 minutes behind, but is is only 14 minutes after the #3 team)
The clue sends all teams by SUV to desert area 53. Andrew says that Sandy/Francesca are "better than us."
Teams arrive to find a DETOUR of RIDE or SEEK. RIDE involves both team members getting onto the same camel and navigating it through a course to grab 5 poles out of the sand. If you are fortunate to have a cooperative camel, this one can be done quickly. SEEK involves using a metal detector to sweep a large area of sand and find a metal souvenir camel under the sand.
S/F get a balky camel, so they switch from RIDE to SEEK. They find that SEEK is difficult and go back to RIDE, where a much more cooperative camel makes it easy for them.
A/S have a good camel and get the lead.
Z/JJ also have a good camel.
Everyone else is gone by the time M/M get there, but they do well on a good camel.
The next clue takes teams to a luck-based task on Eye of the Emirates ferris wheel with cabins. 42 cabins each have a number and can be selected. 5 of the 42 cabins have the next clue in them. If you miss you go around to select the next number of the cabin you want to try. Careful notation of the cabins you have been in is important.
A/S lost time when their driver got lost and they hit the roof when an unexpected bump occurred an they did not have their seat belts on. They get lucky and hit it on #19 with their first try.
Z/JJ don't have very good luck but they eventually get it right with #26.
M/M arrive after S/F have missed on many tries, which gives S/F a big advantage of knowing which ones not to go in. S/F hit just before M/M do with #38.
The clue takes teams on to a Roadblock "Who's got the Brains on the Team?" It's a trick question. Syeon is elected and finds out that it is eating a plate of brains at a local restaurant. She has a lot of trouble getting through it.
Joe Jer is a real eating machine. She plows right through the brains and is just behind Syeon.
Francesca had correctly guessed that this would be a challenge eating brains, so she had Sandy elect it. He demolishes the plate.
Mardy indicates that they do not eat organ meats. The brothers are reupted to be great eaters, but they started last and fall further behind on this task.
There is an unnecessary task to find a clue at Sheikh Said al-Maktoon's house. That clue directs them to the Wild Wadi Water Park, where they will ride the Jumeirah Sceirah giant water slide. all teams stay in the same order:
A/S
Z/JJ
S/F
M/M
The final clue send teams on to the Mirna A Sclomo Beach near the Berj Al Arab Hotel. The final order is the same even though the ARA1 editors play tricks to make you think that M/M have caught up their greater than half hour deficit. It wasn't going to happen and Maardy and Marsio are eliminated.
Andrew and Syeon win an earned vacation for 2 at the Gold Coast of Queensland courtesy of Caltex.
The final three are a good mix of brains and brawn. It should be interesting.
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What really hurt SanFran here was not keeping track of the numbers on the ride. And Zab and Joe Jer knowing full well SanFran had gotten into the same car twice. Luckily, Sandy was able to blow through the eating challenge. That's where they managed to get in the Final Three while the M&M boys kept arguing at the restaurant.
Good episode. Finale should be quite interesting.
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Sandy eating tremendously quickly was crucial. It allowed Sandy/Francesca to leave the restaurant before Mardy/Marsio even arrived there. The fact that Mardy took a very long time there was not critical because at that point they were beaten anyway. None of the remaining tasks took long enough for any team to make up much time on an other team.
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moved here (http://forum.realityfanforum.com/index.php/topic,12553.msg219098.html#msg219098) :)
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Great find! :yess: :jumpy: I can't get any date off the metadata, but I'd put this one in with the TARA2 spoilers because I can't remember any "my ox is broken" task from season 1. The only odd thing is the racers getting a waiver from Jubani; I thought that sort of thing was handled exclusively by the crew (speaking of which: there's a couple in the background holding a clue card that could be racers waiting their turn or just crewmembers). I'd skip the rest of the album, some adult stuff.
[attachment deleted by admin]
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Slowhatch, I looked through the TARA1 contestants and the one f/f team was close but wasn't sure :jumpy:, I willl move it :yess:
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puddin, the three female/female teams in ARA1 were Zabrina/Joe Jer, Sharon/Melody and Jacqueline/Aubrey. Your video shows none of those teams, so it must be ARA2.
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That's most definitely from TARA2. Great find! :jumpy:
And it looked like that guy signed off one of those release forms that I signed when I helped Mirna in TARAS :lol:
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Thank you for the info Izad :bow: :crown :yess:
:-*
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EPISODE 13, THE FINALE of ARA1
Teams leave from Dubai. It does not say whether Amazing Race Asia put them up in the fabulously expensive rooms at the Burj Al Arab Hotel, but probably not.
Andrew/Syeon leave at 323am
Zabrina/Joe Jer leave at 340am
Sandy/Francesca leave at 426am
All teams go to Dubai International Airport to get flights 6100 km to Kuala Lumpur. A/S and Z/JJ are there early enough to connect through Singapore. S/F connect through Bangkok. It's supposed to result in a one hour advantage for the first two, but all three teams arrive at the same time in KL. All teams go to get the next clue at the base of the Menara Towers and it sends them to Kuching, Sarawak by air. Once landed, they take a marked car to find the clue at a Cat Statue (what the clue does not say is that there are 5 such statues). So, we have another BUNCHING moment at the KL airport, but this is the last for ARA1.
On arrival in Kuching, S/F decide to find it themselves and do so third. Z/JJ hire a taxi for the entire day to follow and this works out well for them. In finding the correct Cat Statue, they are 2nd. A/S believe that their Lonely Planet guide can get them everywhere they need to go. In downtown Kuching, they are right and it gets them 1st to find the cluebox by a Cat Statue.
Next is one of those useless tasks where they go to the Old Courthouse at 20 Gambia Road to find the next clue only. That puts teams within walking distance of one of the next tasks. Some teams drive and some walk.
Next is the DETOUR BRAWN (carry 30kg of fruit from a boat to a wet market) or BRAIN (assemble a bench using only tools, parts and a SONY Cybershot picture). All teams choose BRAIN.
First to finish is Andrew/Syeon. Next is Sandy/Francesca who were making up time from arriving last. Zabrina/JoeJer finished about 15 minutes later.
Next task is to self-drive 35 km to Sarawak Cultural Village. The main challenge is to get out of Kuching and onto the correct road to the hinterlands.
Here A/S are totally lost. They were following the do-it-yourself spirit that should be the way that all Amazing Races are conducted, but it cost them dearly becasue their Lonely Planet guide or their interpretation of it were not up to this task. They go to Sarawak Cultual Village at least 15 minutes behind and are effectively out of the race for the final 2 spots as a result.
Sandy/Francesca used a taxi to follow for part of the day and they did so here. They arrived at the same time as Zabrina/JoeJer.
The first task at the Village was to find a valid clue. Long houses were searched until you found the correct one. Then a team went to using a Blowpipe for each team member to shoot a dart into a colored pineapple hanging down from a rope. They had to alternate colors hit and shots by the team members.
S/F finished this slightly ahead of Z/JJ. However, coming out of that area they chose a path back to the parking lot that was longer while Z/JJ took the shorter path. As a result, Z/JJ got a slight lead for the trip to the next task, "Who Can Swing?" Roadblock.
Teams drove themselves(behind taxis) to a Permas Rainforest Resort 32 km. There one member did the Treetop High Ropewalk and Balance Beam Challenge. Zabrina had elected to do it against Francesca. However, since numbers were drawn and there was only one apparatus and no way of passing, teams would finish in the order they started unless one competitor fell off. Zabrina and Francesca were both quick and finished about the same 2 minutes apart that they started.
The final clue sent teams to the adjacent Damai Beach, where they take a boat across open water to Baku National Park, where you walk across a small strip of sand to a mangrove boardwalk. There was no place except on the sand for any team to pass another and I'm sure the boat captains were strictly regulated in their speed. The result was that Zabrina and JoeJer found themselves on the mat in first place, winning $100,000. About 2 minutes later Sandy and Francesca finished. Approximately 15 minutes later Andrew and Syeon finished. All teams were worthy competitors and any one of them could have won a justified winner of this race.
I felt it was a bit sappy of ARA1 producers to eliminate any competition for the final part of the race, but there was ample competition in Kuching and Sarawak Cultural Village. Overall, I felt that ARA1 was as exciting as any regular Amazing Race. The finish was as close as any except AR2 and except what AR6 would have been except for the train in Ping Tom Park. The casting was absolutely top-notch. These were real people. Andy and Laura were right up there as villains with Joe and Bill in AR1(but not AR11 where they were much nicer), Chip and Reichen in AR4, and Jonathan and Victoria in AR6. We did not get to know Ernie and Jeena and what we did get to know of Jacqueline and Aubrey I did not like, but all the rest of the ARA1 teams were sparkling in their personalities. I particularly liked Mardy and Marsio. Bertram van Munster and Elise Doganieri, who were executive consultants for ARA1, could learn some huge lessons from ARA1 casting in comparison to what we have seen in U.S. Amazing Race casting for the past several seasons
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This is one of the few TAR's in which I had the winner pegged from Ep. 1. I felt Zab and Joe Jer were as strong competitors we have seen. After the first two episodes which were a bit choppy, the show hit its stride and I thought the episodes in Australia and New Zealand were as good as the TAR US versions.
apskip, I feel your assessment of the teams were right on especially Aubrey and Jacqueline. I didn't like them at all!
I'm looking forward to TARA 2 and watching this on the uh... satellite! Yeah, satellite. :lol
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thanks APSKIP - I've enjoyed your reviews each week :tup:
Agreed this really was a good (after the slow start for the first episode)
TAR really could learn a thing or two about casting from these guys.
Whats interesting is that this worked with contestants with different nationalities i.e. different passports. So why is TAR so stuck on the fact contestants must have a US passport?
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Given all the different ethnic and cultural and religious groups represented in the United States, I feel that the Amazing Race producers COULD have wonderful diversity in TAR without needing to go to other parts of North America or overseas for contestants. The problem, often voiced on other forums and maybe even here on RFF, is that casting decisions have favored the photogenic and minimized the diverse.
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I've always thought an international version would work well - they could call it battle of the nations or something. I would probably rate well in all the countries competing. I'm sure they could get a team from 11 English speaking countries. The only problem for America is I don't think they would be too happy if their team was one of the first eliminated.
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I watched TARA2's "Racers Revealed" tonight off the *ahem* satellite and here are my first impressions:
1. Too many mactors.
2. I like the "real" teams like the Dancing Mums or the Gym Buddies.
3. I like Sophie's ex-housemate, Aurelia. *ducking*
4. I've already developed a deep dislike for Marc & Rovilson.
5. Terri and Henry are going to be a very funny team as long as they're on.
6. Edwin of Edwin & Monica is really arrogant.
The premiere episode is in three weeks. Can't wait.
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Ok, after finishing this episode (thanks for uploading it to YouTube!), I have some thoughts.
1. Excellent premiere episode. Not choppy like TARA1. And they got to travel this time. I liked the fact that they didn't use the Fountain of Wealth and used a tower. Actually two to be precise.
2. The all-girl teams finished strong. They definitely have learned something from Zabrina and Joe Jer.
3. Marc & Rovilson mug too much for the camera. While they'll be strong in the physical legs, I'm glad they did not win this leg. I hate them already.
4. Sophie & Aurelia are so funny! Aurelia just kept talking and eating at the Roadblock. I could not stop laughing.
5. Same for Terri & Henry. Give them their own one hour reality show.
6. Daichi & Sawaka have the potential to be the Asian Team Who.
7. Nice to see some weather issues right off the bat. We really didn't see that in TARA1.
8. My opinion of Edwin hasn't changed. Really, really arrogant. I hope he and Monica get eliminated.
9. Watch out for Adrian & Collin. If it weren't for a wrong turn by their taxi, they would have been 2nd or 3rd.
10. I look forward to Episode 2. :yess: :yess: :yess: :yess:
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I watched this on Youtube. Unfortunately, there is no torrent yet. Let's cross our fingers that the torrents will come!
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Oh yes there is. I found it. It's how I was able to do my recap last night.
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There is a torrent out finally for the first episode.
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Episode 2 is available via bittorrent.
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Excellent! I'll grab it when I get home tonight.
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Here is some commentary on epsiode 3:
1. The one racer most on my mind in ep.3 was Sophie. I have to say that the individual watching AXN's ARA2 episode 3 without any prior knowledge would get the idea that Sophie is a brutal bitchy mindless twit. Those who know the background of her situation can empathize with the pressure of a very fast-paced and difficult race and the way in which Sophie had no alternative but to take Aurelie as a partner at the last minute or drop out of ARA2. If there is no positive team chemsitry, there is an excellent reason. With those factors in mind, I would rate her actions as severely immature. I would guess that she would love to the opportunity to handle this episode in a different manner.
2. The use of Hong Kong merely as a money counting point is a tiny improvement over the Caltex Singapore car washing episode from ARA1.
3. Auckland New Zealand is one of my favorite cities and for good reason. This episode showcases a diversity of activities there, with the obligatory bungy jump. I was not really happy with the Spooky Mansion, but it was barely tolerable. Ep. 3 of ARA2 was almost as good as the Devonport/Auckland episode 5 of ARA1 which I think is the finest Amazing Race episode ever.
4. Collin and Adrian were like monkeys on the rock climbing wall. If a task emphasizes upper body strength, their low body weight and high strength gives them a big edge.
5. I was desolated to see Bret and Kinar bite the dust. They lost it on navigation to the first New Zealand task.
6. Isn't it depressing to see Marc and Rovilson finish first time after time? That's what the producers get for having one genuine alpha male team in the race. When will they learn?
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My latest TIMELINE for ARA2:
July 5 - ARA2 begins in Singapore
July 6 - Manila
July 7 Hong Kong; Auckland
July 8 Auckland
July 9 drive to Rotorua
July 10 - Rotorua
July 11 - fly Rotorua to Seoul
July 12/13 - Korea
July 14 - fly Seoul to Frankfurt
July 15 Frankfurt
July 17 - Prague
July 19 - Budapest
July 21 - fly Budapest to Tokyo
July 22 - Tokyo
July 23 - fly Tokyo to Bangkok
July 24 - FINISH LINE in greater Bangkok area
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My latest TIMELINE for ARA2:
July 17 - Prague
I bet the crossings of "the TARs" was Ron/Christina on their way to Lithuania via Prague
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patlini, I expect that ARA2 would come out of Prague on July 19 to reach Budapest, although it may have happened the evening before. The logical flights leave at 0715 or 1015.
The AR12 flight into PRG would have arrived after 0715 due to the delay, so no overlap on the first ARA2 flight. Teams stranded there until the noon flight to ZAG would have had ample opportunity to meet up with ARA2 teams arriving at the airport for their 1015 flight.
The cross could definitely have happened. Someone will have to ask TK and Rachel about this at TARCON(and I will put it on the list).
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I now that we are not supposed to spoil the outcome of a leg before Saturday and I will wait until tonight to do so. However, I have a few comments on the overall performance of some of the teams in the first 4 legs:
Marc and Rovilson - as expected the alpha male team is dominating
Collin and Adrian - a surprise for me; these guys are quick, have huge upper body strength, communicate as well as they told us before the race that they would, and yet have the skills to do the best in the stick dance
Henry and Terri - one of my top 3 picks, they are now headed for elimination in the near future with Terri acting like a 4 year old and not willing to do much for the team
Brett and Kinar - I was shocked to see them gone so soon and by so much; somebody screwed up on navigating
Ann and Diane - another team doing much better than I predicted, but I can't see them lasting much longer
Pamela and Vanessa - this is the multiple comeback team; they seem to put themselves in trouble but fight their way back out of it
Paula and Natasha - this has been a consistent middle of the pack team; I can't see them lasting much longer
Sophie and Aurelia - what can I say; they are starting leg 4, which we believe to be land only, 6.5 hours behind the next closest team
Edwin and Monica - I called it as them being overconfident; two last place finishes in a row finished them off
Sawaka and Daichi - I was very impressed the by the speed of their money counting; I now believe that they will take one of the Final 3 places I had reserved for others who aren't going to make it
I see the Final 3 as being something like the following:
Marc and Rovilson
Collin and Adrian
Sawaka and Daichi
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I put it in spoilers, but it really should be here. The Episode 5 recap is now up (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2007/12/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-5-recap.html).
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:pull :pull (:;) (:;) (:;) :groan: :groan:
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I thought Paula and Natasha's taxi driver looked a bit like Jackie Chan...I kept expecting him to do some wild taxi stunt or something. :lol:
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I was very snarky towards Rovilson & Marc in my recap and will be again this week. I know their fans came out in force to attack my blog over the week, but their behavior again this week really pissed me off.
Wearing those stupid fake mustaches was very annoying and also their luck in the lock task was down right amazing. Sorry to see Daichi & Sawaka go.
Terri & Henry wasted the Yield and you know that when Daichi & Sawaka said they would have Yielded the Moms if they had known they were behind them, the siblings were not long for the race.
Just like Japan, South Korea was quite confusing for the teams.
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Since it looks like open season for leg 6, here are my comments:
1. the Marc/Rovilson mugging with the mustaches was totally obnoxious; let their fans support them; there is no defense for their behavior short of jail time for bad comedy routines
2. Marc/Rovilson appear to be thet luckiest team ever, with every break in the book going their way
3. The designers of ARA2, Michael McKay and company, deserve to be shot for two things:
a. the huge time disparity between the Slimy DETOUR(many one to two minutes) and the Deliver DETOUR(not clear but at least 20 minutes)
b. the lock Roadblock had too little disparity, with a range from 10 seconds to 2 minutes; the result was no change in position doing it
4. Sawaka and Daichi deserved their elimination by chosing the wrong DETOUR and then failing to find a way to get to the clue box behind the fence efficiently as the other teams did. I was sad to see it, but they were clueless compared to the other teams. Also, why didn't they just put Ann and Diane up on the Yield board? If they were ahead of them, it would have been moot but in the actual situation it would have changed who was eliminated.
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It seemed to me, apskip that the teams were all confused over their placing after leaving the airport. Because the cab drivers either didn't speak English or did not understand the address on the clue, many were taken in circles, especially Ann & Diane whom I thought would not be able to recover, but did after Daichi & Sawaka made some bad decisions at the market.
But still, digging for coins in an octupi-filled tank is much easier than delivering food in the confusing streets of that market. So what if a tentacle clings to your arm, there's a person right there to help, unlike trying to go through the market and trying to find another store.
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The Japanese siblings deserved to be out because they are a bad team that makes bad decision and don't have the drive to win this thing. the only reason they applied for the race is two advance Sawaka nonexistent singing career (and the song at the end was really lame).
I think that the editing is toward a face up in the final three with Ann&Diane against Mark&Rovilson and a third trailing team with Mark&Rovilson wining.
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I am hoping for the elimination of an overconfident Marc/Rovilson before the Final 3. However, that is not probable so I will make my fearless prediction for who they will face in F3:
2. Adrian/Collin - this team is the other male/male team and they are surprisingly competitive
3. Take Your Pick from Vanessa/Pamela and Natasha/Paula
I see Ann/Diane and Henry/Terri getting eliminated, although I would love it if Henry/Terri got their act together enough to make F3 in place of one of those two F/F teams.
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when I watch the race I try to stay focused more on the editing then on the teams performance.
mostly because in the race anything can happen and even strong teams can be eliminated for one stupid mistake.
In most cased the editors want u to like the winners , in almost all cased(except Chris&Jon) the editors try to make u dislike the runners-up and make u u think that they are unworthy although in the finale leg a lot of luck is involved.
Mark&Rovilson could easily gotten a villain edit, but the editors try to make them look like the new BJ&Tyler forcing u to like them, Ann&Dian on the other hand is a strong and smart team that get a villain edit- a perfect profile of a runner up.
Henry and Terry need to be really Lucky to win this thing (I c them leave right before the final) and the other team don't seem to have any screen time so I don't relay on them.
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retard boi, if the editors are trying to make me like Marc/Rovilson, then I must on another planet since I have missed it. The editors are trying to make them look like what they are - total jerks who are great athletes, smart and the luckiest team I have ever seen in any Amazing Race. The editorial portrayal of Henry and Terri is similarly brutal but honest. I can't say what the editors are doing with Ann and Diane since we haven't been given sufficient opportunity to get to know them.
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There's no way I could like Rovilson & Marc based on their edits. If I could be forced to like them, then feed me broken glass.
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There's no way I could like Rovilson & Marc based on their edits. If I could be forced to like them, then feed me broken glass.
retard boi, if the editors are trying to make me like Marc/Rovilson, then I must on another planet since I have missed it. The editors are trying to make them look like what they are - total jerks who are great athletes, smart and the luckiest team I have ever seen in any Amazing Race. The editorial portrayal of Henry and Terri is similarly brutal but honest. I can't say what the editors are doing with Ann and Diane since we haven't been given sufficient opportunity to get to know them.
if u like them or not is not the issue. the issue is that they get a generally appositive editing, unlike most alpha male teams they where not shown patronizing over other teams (while it's rather feet their profile and they probably do), they seem to be aware that most of their strikes are based on luck and they generally have a positive spirit and a sense of humor. they are obviously jerks, but there is no major emphases on that.
and Ann and Diane have plenty of screen time, as apposed to Colin&Adrien who for a strong handicap team doesn't seem to get any screen time at all...
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Even though I am from Philippines, I don't really like M/R that much. They are overrated as much as Rob and Amber. I see Marc and Rovilson in Final Four.
My Top 3 Predictions:
1. Adrian and Collin
2. Marc and Rovilson
3. Paula and Natasha / Pamela and Vanessa
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I did a semi recap of Episode 6 (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2008/01/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-6-recap.html). It's actually like "The Readers Strike Back".
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My thoughts in Episode 7:
1. The roadblock is mostly based on luck.
2. I am tired of seeing Marc and Rovilson in first again and again and again. (5 times in a row) (<-- (Highlight) [SPOILER on those who didn't watch Episode 7)
3. The fights and accidents really made this episode better.
4. Terri, two words "anger management".
My thoughts in remaining teams (not in order in Ep. 7):
Adrian and Collin: Very strong team. Hopefully, they beat Marc and Rovilson in the finale (if they are in).
Marc and Rovilson: Meh. Strong team but too confident and overrated.
Terri and Henry: Stop fighting already. It's getting annoying already.
Paula and Natasha: The new, more competitive Aubrey and Jacqueline.
Pamela and Vanessa: Strong team and they can be the second all-female team to win.
Ann and Diane: I don't like them that much but they are an okay team. <-- (Highlight) [SPOILER on remaining teams after Episode 7]
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After Marc & Rovilson, I really want Terri & Henry to go. Her incessant yelling has worn me down. I can totally understand why Henry looks so beaten when she starts her yelling fits. And what appeared to be a very lovable team at first now looks like Jonathan & Victoria II. Yes, I can see that Killer Fatigue has hit this team in the worst way and it has not helped, but when she yells, I truly feel for Henry. And by her saying that Henry treats her badly, well, we have yet to see that in this race.
I'm just sick of Marc & Rovilson winning every leg. Five legs in a row. I hope the Racing Gods kick in soon because this has become a runaway thus far.
Perhaps it comes next week as the promo makes it look like Marc is a beaten man.
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Does anybody sense a Fast Forward next leg? I think also that Marc and Rovilson might be doomed next leg. :yess:
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I am not quite finished seeing episode 7, with one more segment to go. However, I have several obvservations:
1. Terri is back to her old tricks. Her passive-aggressive behavior while she was doing the Roadblock was particularly destructive.
2. Ann complained about her team's navigation skills. That applies to every team still in this competition. Don't they ever try to read maps and use their own navigational skills? The use of ferns and leading taxis is now prevelant for at least the last part of the trip from Busan to Seoul.
3. Why was everyone doing the Roadblock trying to keep papers and the Roadblock card in their hand? Couldn't they see that this was only going to show down their ability to grasp both sides of the lids and lift up?
4. Ultimately, it looks like every team gets the final placement they deserve. Marc and Rovilson get lucky once again with a fern to lead them to Olympic Park after they are already in the vicinity of Olympic Stadium, supposedly a few kilometers away.
5. The destructive behavior of Pamela after Vanessa made a driving mistake was ridiculous. However, Vanessa was not listening to her and would not get a U-turn ASAP, which clearly cost them major in arriving at the Folk Village and lost them at least one position from the 3rd they were in when this incident started.
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That last segment is now up, apskip.
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Right you are, TARAsia Fan. Now that I have seen what I had heard about with Henry and Terri far behind the other teams, it looks to me that they are about 1.5 to 2 hours behind Pamela/Vanessa, Ann/Diane and Natasha/Paula. It looked like there was an element of unfairness in them not getting the Marked for Elmination 30 minute penalty on the next leg. If Monica/Edwin got it, why not Henry/Terri?The money is easy to replace by begging in a modern relatively rich city like Seoul. I think Michael McKay just decided to help kept Henry/Terri in the race as long as possible because they are easily the most colorful team. The sisters, Ann/Diane, and Natasha/Paula are all vanilla. The only team remotely as interesting as Henry/Terri is Collin/Adrian who don't seem to get much air time.
The next leg to Frankfurt is certain to have long flights so that there will be a bunching on arrival. If the luck of Marc/Rovilson turns sour, which is long overdue, we could be rid of them in the string of tasks after the Frankfurt airport.
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The next leg to Frankfurt is certain to have long flights so that there will be a bunching on arrival. If the luck of Marc/Rovilson turns sour, which is long overdue, we could be rid of them in the string of tasks after the Frankfurt airport.
Unless there's a task that involves luck, :res: we will most likely see Marc and Rovilson get eliminated.
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I can't get into this show! :(
I tried watching it today but it just seems so ... student made (that's a crappy way of describing it)? It doesn't have the quality of the American TAR -- I like a lot of the teams though.
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You are right Michael D. Many of its devotees would say that Amazing Race Asia does not have the same quality as regular Amazing Race because it's better. Right now both AR12 and ARA2 suffer from too many mactors, but that's old news. The tasks themselves, the density of tasks in an episode and the selection of routes all, in my opinion, favor ARA2. The only edge that AR12 has is that Phil is a more entertaining host than Allan Wu; however, Allan has improved a lot in ARA2 vs. ARA1 and I expect him to continue to do so.
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Allan is a great host for the Asian version and is showing a bit more of his personality when greeting the racers at the pit stop.
However, the casting of this season was something to be desired. We can go into it again, but I would be belaboring the point. Suffice to say that I am hoping Executive Producer Michael McKay will learn a few lessons from this season and go back to the formula that worked in TARA1.
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Just got this word from Michael McKay, Executive Producer of TARA from my blog:
"You spend a lot of time on your recaps, top stuff. I found them highly amusing especially the number of different Team Names you were able to come up with for Marc and Rovilson - LOL
Thank you for taking such a strong interest in the series. Regards Michael McKay, Executive Producer "
The venom towards Marc & Rovilson will continue! HA! HA! :yess: :yess: :yess: :yess:
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Wonderful news Ken :yess: :jumpy:
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American AR verses Asian AR ( and sorry for the spelling errors and the bad grammer)
I don't think that the cast is that great, first when the same team come in first 5 times in a row there is something seriously worn with the casting process. second as the American version suffer from too many bunching points the Asian version actually lack those crucial points making a lot of teams eliminated for being far behind on a former leg or not making the operation hours ,especially when some of the tasks as the rock climbing are extremely sexist and seem to favor M/M teams.
in both version there seem 2 be too many mactors or people that related to the entertainment industry in oneway or an other, a huge difference between the American and the Asian version is the fact the the Asian version seem to take some pride in that (I have no idea why) while the American version and trying to hide it, witch makes wonder why they cast those people anyway.it's really easy to check and tell the Julia isn't a "production assistant",Jason,Shana and Lorena have an acting career ,that Jenn use to be a model,the other Jenn is Dallas cheerleader and that Don and Nick are the father in law and son of a famous singer.
I don't really get it, if u don't want people to think the u are only casting mactors just don't cast them - don't be hypocrites about it.
an other problem I c in the American version is the same gender teams type casting - all the good looking M/M teams are also super strong and smart and most the F/F teams are there to be an eye candy or to be considered someone too be pitted and not as a serious competition - I find it really hard to understand how in the same format the F/F teams in the Asian version are descent and in the American version are completely incopetent.
sadly the Asian version the casted a very balance M/M teams in the first seasin (like the strong,good looking but really dumb male model team) in the secind season the M/M team seem to be too perfect like the American version. I hope they don't repeat that misteke in the following season.
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haha ken, get him to cast you on the show! I'll be your partner!
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We need to live in Asia to get on the show, Michael. Unless you want to move.... ;D ;D
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Just got this word from Michael McKay, Executive Producer of TARA from my blog:
"You spend a lot of time on your recaps, top stuff. I found them highly amusing especially the number of different Team Names you were able to come up with for Marc and Rovilson - LOL
Thank you for taking such a strong interest in the series. Regards Michael McKay, Executive Producer "
The venom towards Marc & Rovilson will continue! HA! HA! :yess: :yess: :yess: :yess:
Very cool! Congratulations. :tup:
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We need to live in Asia to get on the show, Michael. Unless you want to move.... ;D ;D
Does NZ count?
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lets go Ken!
I say we move to Japan.
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We need to live in Asia to get on the show, Michael. Unless you want to move.... ;D ;D
Does NZ count?
Not sure. I know the show has visited there twice, but I don't know if people from the ANZAC region are eligible.
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Just got this word from Michael McKay, Executive Producer of TARA from my blog:
"You spend a lot of time on your recaps, top stuff. I found them highly amusing especially the number of different Team Names you were able to come up with for Marc and Rovilson - LOL
Thank you for taking such a strong interest in the series. Regards Michael McKay, Executive Producer "
The venom towards Marc & Rovilson will continue! HA! HA! :yess: :yess: :yess: :yess:
I have been avoiding this thread since I am STILL two whole episodes behind, so I missed this exciting news!
Big congrats to you--that is a fitting reward for all of your dedicated hard work on these! Very flattering and well deserved! :congrats: :yourock:
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Thanks, Peach! :kuss:
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Hehe, I like your comments...Great work! :lol: :tup:
Anyway, dont worry about those fools asking why you hate them, you will find many more who dont really like them.
Im pretty much in the hate train too, but only because of their bizzare comment in ep 6 that Colin & Adrian stole their cab when they it was clearly shown they did not....Yet in the axn forums, those fools of those matcorwats kept insisting Team Singapore stole their cab and they were so guilty that they did not yield matcorwats.What rubbish! :jam:
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The Episode 7 recap (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2008/01/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-7-recap.html) is up. Thank goodness. It's almost time for Episode 8 to air in Singapore.
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Can't wait!!! It's 4 hours till TARA2 premieres Episode 8 here.
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I will choose to comment on episodes of ARA2 here, the traditional place for recaps and comments. I found Marc and Rovilson not only civil but actually quite funny in the Frankfurt/Prague episode (sorry, Ken but I call them like I see them). They were not obnoxious at all and I enjoyed watching them for the first episode of the entire race!
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I haven't seen it yet, apskip so I can't judge. I'll take your word for it. Usually you and I agree on most assessments.
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I want to close the loop on flights actually flown by the ARA2 teams. Marc/Rovilson were the only ones who got OZ541 1300 1635 ICN FRA. I think only one team got the next one KE905 1315 1705 ICN FRA. Adrian/Collin and 2 other teams got the final nonstop LH0713 1425 1825 ICN FRA. Henry and Terry were so far behind that their best option was to wait for CZ370 1845 1955 connecting in Beijing with MU219 2350 0505 after a 4 hour wait, a 12 1/4 flight. However, what they actualy did was take CX411 1515 1810 to HKG, connecting there to CX285 2305 0515.
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Since we know by visual proof that the next leg will be in Budapest Hungary, here are the flight options PRG BUD:
July 19
OK786 0715 0820
MA821 1010 1115
OK790 1155 1315
TP522 1410 1515
OK722 1700 1805
MA823 1915 2020
I believe Marc/Rovilson and Adrian/Collin and Ann and Diane and Pamela and Vanessa will have access to the first flight above. Paula and Natasha will be on the second flight as I believe their pitstop release will be too late to catch the 0715.
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I will choose to comment on episodes of ARA2 here, the traditional place for recaps and comments. I found Marc and Rovilson not only civil but actually quite funny in the Frankfurt/Prague episode (sorry, Ken but I call them like I see them). They were not obnoxious at all and I enjoyed watching them for the first episode of the entire race!
Having finally watched this episode last night, I have to respectfully disagree about M&R's behavior. I still found them to be obnoxious and scripted. Maybe you're getting used to them, but I was rolling my eyes at every comment they made including going into that strip club to get money. Very stupid IMO.
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Episode 8 recap (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2008/01/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-8-recap.html) is up at my blog.
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Henry and Terry were so far behind that their best option was to wait for CZ370 1845 1955 connecting in Beijing with MU219 2350 0505 after a 4 hour wait, a 12 1/4 flight.
damn ! That's why Henry & Terrie can't caught night train up to Prague :groan:
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Episode 8 recap (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2008/01/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-8-recap.html) is up at my blog.
Yes good recap again as usual, I wonder how you can recap an episode in such detail. It's cool. :tup:
Anyway, all I can say for Ep 9 was that the intersection was really useless because Henry/Terri would have been eliminated anyways, and it now put Paula/Natasha at the back of the pack, unless they bunch up again.
It seemed that Karma bit Paula/Natasha in the ass after they revealed a plan with The Annoying Team That Thinks It's Funny, But Is Not And Shall Never Be Named :lol:, not to intersect with Ann/Diane.
edited for spoilers, puddin :groan:
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A thought on leg 9 are that poetic justice was achieved when the race for 5th place was decided by a taxi driver's preference on passengers.
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Episode 8 recap (http://fangsbites.blogspot.com/2008/01/amazing-race-asia-2-ep-8-recap.html) is up at my blog.
Yes good recap again as usual, I wonder how you can recap an episode in such detail. It's cool. :tup:
I put each episode on DVD and I write as if I'm watching it for the first time. It also allows me to get decent screencaps to accompany the recap. Sometimes it can take a long time, especially if there's a lot of silly airport drama but other episodes are fast-paced and they can practically write themselves.
I have fun doing them.
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I always look forward to your recap and see which nickname you'll give Marc and Rovilson. It's very funny.
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Thanks. Apparently, Marc & Rovilson's fans aren't happy with me, but I don't care.
Now that it's Saturday on the East Coast of the US, I can officially talk about the episode. It's getting boring to see the idiots win for the 7th straight time. It's as if Executive Producer Michael McKay fell in love with their audition tape and decided to pre-determine the outcome by casting them and a weak surrounding cast.
I do hope that Adrian & Collin can finally win a leg next week, because seeing Marc & Rovilson win again will just make me throw up my hands.
As for Henry calling Paula & Natasha "scatterbrains", he didn't realize they had been waiting for five hours while he and his wife were lollygagging (I'm just being facetious here, I know they weren't really lollygagging) around Prague. Plus Henry's comments that the girls probably showed their t**s to the taxi driver after the dive was not right.
However, I was getting concerned with Vanessa after she dove off of the 10 meter platform. She appeared to hit the water awkwardly and seemed to have a concussion. Both she and Natasha had cuts on their faces after their dives. She couldn't remember what happened and that's classic case of a concussion. I would not have allowed her to continue after that.
Anyway, I hope the Jerks don't get first again next week, but they probably will.
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Good for you TARAsia Fan. The Mactor fans will always chew off anyone who DARES "attack their idols. Some of them are now also on CBS' TAR12 website where there is a thread called "Asia," and they just started their barrage attacks on one or two posters who were not impressed with Marc and Rovilson. That's not good. :knuckles:
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I noted that during ARA2, episode 11 one of the DETOUR choices at the Liberation Monument was the Rubik's cube. Having teams solve the puzzle separately for each of the 6 colors without keeping what they had previously done constant made this task absolutely trivial. Anyone trying to find 13 separate individuals to act as coachs for the names to be pronounced for the other DETOUR was asking for a longer stay there.
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Thanks. Apparently, Marc & Rovilson's fans aren't happy with me
I'm a fan of M&R and I hope they win. That being said, TARAsia Fan, you're entitled to hate them and express your opinion about them as much as I'm entitled to like them and express your opinion of them.
Free expression rules! :tup:
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:welcome2: to the forum, zippo! :waves:
And Ken will love you for this:
That being said, TARAsia Fan, you're entitled to hate them and express your opinion about them as much as I'm entitled to like them and express your opinion of them.
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I thought it would be appropriate to record my prediction of flights taken from Capetown to Bangkok, assuming that that is the metorpolitan area for the ARA2 Finish Line of this race. This could have been on July 22 if normal rest stop or on July 23 if the Aquila Game Reserve as an extended 36 hour rest stop. It doesn't matter as these flights are the same either way:
Teams will release from pitstop in the early morning and drive about 2 hours to the CPT airport, then
Capetown to Johannesburg Air Mango 122 0545 0750 or any of 13 other flights that arrive by 1230 in JNB
Johannesburg to Singapore South African Airways 479 1330 0555
Singapore Bangkok Jet Asia 511 0705 0825
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My final TIMELINE for ARA2:
July 5 - ARA2 begins in Singapore
July 6 - Manila
July 7 Hong Kong; Auckland
July 8 Auckland
July 9 drive to Rotorua
July 10 - Rotorua
July 11 - fly Rotorua to Tokyo; train to Fukuoka; TBC
July 12 - hydrofoil Fukuoka to Busan,Korea
July 13 - drive Busan, Korea to Seoul
July 14 - fly Seoul to Frankfurt
15 Frankfurt; Frankfurt to Prague by train
July 17 - Prague
July 18 - Prague to Budapest by train
Budapest
July 20 - fly Budapest to CapeTown
21 CapeTown area
July 22 - CapeTown area;
23 fly to Singapore
24 Tanjong Beach, Sentosa Island Singapore for Flag ROADBLOCK; FINISH LINE at nearby Chinese Gardens
TOTAL DURATION of AMAZING RACE ASIA - 20 Days
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Here is some information that I consider important about the episode 13 flight:
1. The entire episode was built around it, because SQ481 only flies on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. In order for the race to get this nonstop flight(highly desirable because the race designers hate connecting flight for going to the Finish Line) they had to assure that the tasks would occupy the teams until after 1030, which is when the last flight to Johannesburg that could catch a connection to Singapore on Sunday July 22 would leave.
2. All that frenetic activity around CapeTown was merely to make sure no team could get to the airport too early. Marc and Rovilson got to the first task at the District Six Museum presumably just after it opened at 8am. Sunset was 6pm at CapeTown on July 22 and I think Pamela and Vanessa arrived at the airport after completing all those tasks at about 6pm judging from the clouds.
3. All teams would have gotten a hotel near the airport.
4. SQ481 departed at noon on July 23 and arrived Singapore at 0525 July 24. This had the benefit of getting the teams to Sentosa Island Jantong Beach long before the public would have wanted to be there.
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Adrian and Collin were fortunate to avoid the home-town hex. It nearly got them, as their unfortunate and unthinking decision to not retain their taxicab at the Raffles Statue might have been extremely costly. They were lucky for these reasons:
1. The Roadblock was tailor made to fit Adrian's extraordinary knowledge of world flags. It could have been anything, although a knowledge-based roadblock was a good bet.
2. The decision of Marc and Rovilson to alternate roadblocks and the fact that Marc had already used up his 6th one left it to Rovilson to do that task. Had Marc been able to do it, they probably would have finished before Adrian and Collin even arrived at the roadblock.