S35.E02: You Don’t See That at Home

[Whimsy]

Quote

Teams dive deeper into the countryside of Thailand for the second leg of the race, encountering catfish-infested waters and pomelo-filled rivers.

Original airdate 10/4/23

[chicagofan]

Bringing this over from the Live Chat thread. Lantern7 - I posted about the TAR themed The Price Is Right At Night episode airing next Monday in the Media thread. The post is dated September 20.

Edited October 5, 2023 by chicagofan

[hendersonrocks]

Rob and Corey are one of my favorite teams in years. 
 

That first task was a grind but ultimately did very little to shake up the race. It’s time for some old fashioned bunching!

[Lantern7]

As much as I enjoy TAR, as much as I believe it is superior to the collapsed star that is Survivor, I have to say that the ninety-minute episodes are a bit of a slog. We don't have catfish nipping on our ankles, but the extra thirty minutes are tiring. The surplus of teams doesn't help much, since I don't really get to know them.

Looking at the leader board . . . only two teams changed positions from the first leg. I'm thinking bunching will be in full effect next episode.

Most of the teams seem chill . . .  or at least not as problematic as the folks of Survivor 45. Jocelyn & Victor seem to be the most delightful couple, and Rob has been hanging tough. I got a good laugh at one of the brothers/programmers going to the judge for a fist bump and coming up empty.

The leg was fun . . .  muddy and lotus-filled waters, food market, pamelo hunting, and a beautiful tree near the Pit Stop. Also, the good luck elephant with the canned trumpeting amused me ore than it should have.

[mertensia]

This was fun, though they should have had a translator at the lotuses for Rob (I think). She said something like 3 4 3 and he had no idea.

I was amused that the waiting teams were having a great time feeding the fish.

The shopping task had that nice twist of phonetic spelling to goof the teams up.

[Fukui San]

Rob and Corey: Team CODA

Victor and Jocelyn: Team Everything Everywhere All at Once

Two Best Picture Winners represented!

[Ancaster]

Rob cracks me up!

[Ancaster]

I am beyond happy that they finally seem to have initiated a "no physical contact with the locals" rule.  Or maybe the unrequited fist bump heard around the world was a one off?

[Ancaster]

31 minutes ago, Fukui San said:

Rob and Corey: Team CODA

Victor and Jocelyn: Team Everything Everywhere All at Once

Two Best Picture Winners represented!

 

Along those lines:

Liam and Yeremi - Team Band of Brothers (Emmy winner for Outstanding Limited Series)

Both couples who have been eliminated: Teams Replicas (a movie with Keanu Reeves that was apparently bad enough that it could have won a Golden Raspberry).

[Fukui San]

For anyone who's wondering, pomelos are pretty much like a cross between grapefruit and oranges. If a grapefruit is too sour for you, try a pomelo which is sweeter but still with some tartness. I've seen them at mainstream markets as well as Asian markets.

[Guest]

Iliana's gone, rats 😕

That floral arrangement task was kind of diabolical in that the later you got there, the further you had to trudge through the muck to get flowers. The pomelos seemed to always be obligingly floating just around the corner. Speaking of pomelos, how on earth did Robbin and Chelsea's boat not sink with all those pomelos in it? Seems like they had way more than Steve and Anna Leigh did when theirs sank. Must have been the distribution.

[Skooma]

8 hours ago, Lantern7 said:

As much as I enjoy TAR, as much as I believe it is superior to the collapsed star that is Survivor, I have to say that the ninety-minute episodes are a bit of a slog. We don't have catfish nipping on our ankles, but the extra thirty minutes are tiring. The surplus of teams doesn't help much, since I don't really get to know them.

Sorry but I have to disagree totally.  I love the 90 minutes though I could actually USE real 90 minute episodes without all the commercials of course. 

If it was a mere 60 minutes we'd be back to the damn over-the-top pounding music and cardboard cut-out action figure racers edit again and I never ever want to go back to that.

And I love the extra teams.  You learn more when the herd thins as middle teams have always gotten little airtime no matter the format or number early on.  They have to focus on the next new challenge and who wins the  leg and then the back teams scrambling to survive the leg obviously.

Yes 90 minutes is something I can settle down and enjoy.  It feels like a delicious meal and not a fast food snack.  It still flies by too fast for me and I miss having the opening theme this week but never ever again the 60 minute shallow surface only episodes after these cool 90 minutes ones.

[KeithJ]

Did the later teams at the Lotus challenge receive a little extra help?  When the first teams were getting graded, I didn't think the locals were telling them what was wrong with their arrangements, they just said they didn't pass.  Eventually the locals started telling the contestants what was wrong with them.

[Lady Calypso]

So, barely any placement switch-ups, which was a bit surprising. 

I loved seeing the return of the spread out start times. Seeing that Elizbeth/Iliana were nearly three hours behind Jocelyn/Victor when they started actually showed how tough the roadblock was, especially when the second flight teams started arriving at the roadblock and several of them were still there.

I still really like all of the teams. I had a really good chuckle at someone from the roadblock commenting on how their partners must be wondering what's taking them so long, followed by a cut to the waiting partners tossing food to the fish. It actually also showed how close the teams may get this season, which is interesting. 

The top four teams are still my top four favourites. Rob/Corey are fantastic, but I really love Jocelyn/Victor, Greg/John (good on Greg for figuring out that he can learn from other teams' mess-ups at the roadblock to jump ahead) and Morgan/Lena. 

I also liked both detours. Both of them weren't necessarily easy (one was physically demanding, one required to be able to properly articulate the food to the locals) but they did seem to take about the same amount of time as, once you got going, you were likely good. I probably would have chosen the Scoop Up, because as much as it would have been physically harder and getting lucky with finding the right canal with the pomelos, it was less risky than having the locals direct you to the wrong item because you weren't able to pronounce it correctly (which happened twice with teams).

But we saw that Andrea/Malaina, despite being neck and neck with Elizabeth/Iliana, arrived at the pit stop when Joel/Garrett were still there, so it's good to know that Elizabeth/Iliana weren't SUPER far behind and they had a real chance to not get last. It's a shame that they're gone, though.

I grew really fond of Ashlie. Todd had me worried about her when he was going on about how she needs positivity because she can panic and mess up, but she was really, really calm at the roadblock, even when she slipped further and further behind, and she only broke down once she finished and was on her way back to meet up with Todd. I became a fan of her for keeping that calm (and if she had any kind of breakdown, they would have shown it). 

There are teams I'm definitely still lukewarm on. Steve/Anna Leigh, Robbin/Chelsea and Liam/Yeremi are mostly ok, and I still worry about Joe/Ian in the long run since they admitted communication issues last episode. But otherwise, really like this cast. 

[NaughtyKitty]

Is "Let's go!" the new catchphrase for 2023?  I think I heard it around 2 dozen times this episode and it started driving me crazy (kind of like the use of "vibe" on this season BIP).  They were using it even when it didn't make sense.

[Guest]

7 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

I grew really fond of Ashlie. Todd had me worried about her when he was going on about how she needs positivity because she can panic and mess up, but she was really, really calm at the roadblock, even when she slipped further and further behind, and she only broke down once she finished and was on her way back to meet up with Todd. I became a fan of her for keeping that calm (and if she had any kind of breakdown, they would have shown it). 

Yes, she kept it together well. Small props also to Todd for seeming to keep his cool as well. Other than a pretty calm "I'm getting a little nervous" when she got passed by someone, he wasn't shown to be freaking out (too busy feeding the fish!), and when she did pull up in the boat he was all "you crushed it!"

And I loved her "thank you" when he said she looked sexy as they were reading the next clue - there was a bit of a wry smile in there, like "that is a bald-faced lie and I certainly don't feel it right now, but I appreciate the sentiment nonetheless."

[PhD-Purgatory15]

For one episode (and hopefully just one), I didn't mind the lack of position switching.

It's kind of wild not immediately have a villain or villain team to loathe/root against. I thought maybe the Orange team (Todd & Ashlie) were going to be that but they've actually grown on me. The have what feels like a "real" dynamic between two married people who have navigated it's ups and downs. And their enjoyment & willingness to put themselves out there trying the Thai language at the market was cool to see.

As someone who has wrestled off and on w/ learning the Thai language, I'm super glad more than just the 1st place team gave that side of the detour a try. Although it was a bummer that the eliminated mother/daughter duo didn't really want that side and unfortunately got burned by a Taxi Driver following the taxi of the African American friends (who did want to try the Market shopping).

 

[iMonrey]

52 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

I loved seeing the return of the spread out start times. Seeing that Elizbeth/Iliana were nearly three hours behind Jocelyn/Victor when they started actually showed how tough the roadblock was, especially when the second flight teams started arriving at the roadblock and several of them were still there.

Are they showing the start times and how far back teams are at the start? Because I looked for it and didn't see it. I was thinking the show was just stacking them at even intervals to make it easier on themselves.

53 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

I had a really good chuckle at someone from the roadblock commenting on how their partners must be wondering what's taking them so long, followed by a cut to the waiting partners tossing food to the fish. I

Yes! I think it was Ashlie who said "I'd rather be doing this than waiting, it's so stressful to be waiting." Cut to the waiting teams having a blast feeding the fish. They even used the goofy Japanese Game Show music!

Jocelyn and Victor had a real advantage at the Detour between language and familiarity with the items. They own a grocery store back home. I thought this would have been the harder of the two Detours if you didn't know the language because even if the items are spelled phonetically you are still relying on locals to tell you what they heck they are. But Todd and Ashlie managed to get through it and make up the time she lost at the Roadblock.

I can't decide if this was a good leg or a bad one since almost all of the teams remained in the same place they were in at the end of the first leg. Joe and Ian were the only ones to move up, and only two spots. And Joel and Garrett fell two spots, only because they forgot their fanny pack.

[Gummo]

Todd and Ashlie are growing on me, too - I expected to dislike them.

But Todd's glee at doing the shopping detour was just so delightful & unexpected, he won me over.

[dizzyd]

1 hour ago, Skooma said:

Sorry but I have to disagree totally.  I love the 90 minutes though I could actually USE real 90 minute episodes without all the commercials of course. 

If it was a mere 60 minutes we'd be back to the damn over-the-top pounding music and cardboard cut-out action figure racers edit again and I never ever want to go back to that.

I agree. I liked the pace. And I love how Phil is taking the time to talk to each team on the mat so you can relate to them even if they get eliminated early. 
 

5 minutes ago, Gummo said:

But Todd's glee at doing the shopping detour was just so delightful & unexpected, he won me over.

I loved how well they did in stock up without the language advantage Joc and Vic had. 

Edited October 5, 2023 by dizzyd

[Lady Calypso]

7 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

Are they showing the start times and how far back teams are at the start? Because I looked for it and didn't see it. I was thinking the show was just stacking them at even intervals to make it easier on themselves.

Yeah. When Jocelyn/Victor left the starting line, it was 8:26am or something. When Elizabeth/Iliana left, it was 11:09am or something.

 

[dizzyd]

12 minutes ago, Gummo said:

 

Edited October 5, 2023 by dizzyd

[Tango64]

Phil was wearing waders when he described the lotus task. And when Jocelyn was first to arrive, they showed her looking at a display of waders to find the one with her name. 

But then she and everyone else just jumped in with their street clothes and some lost a shoe. What's up with that?

Maybe they all decided not to bother with the time it would take to put on waders? Odd that not even one would decide that's better than jumping into muddy catfish water with your street clothes, especially since some were really icked out by that.

[Tango64]

2 hours ago, KeithJ said:

Did the later teams at the Lotus challenge receive a little extra help?  When the first teams were getting graded, I didn't think the locals were telling them what was wrong with their arrangements, they just said they didn't pass.  Eventually the locals started telling the contestants what was wrong with them.

I've always gotten the impression that the local judges ease up on contestants after they've tried for a long time. One of my favorite things to spot is when they have a dance task or something like that, with lots of people in local dress being so cheery and enthusiastic at first. Then after some team is trying it for the 18th time you see those folks bored out of their minds and just sitting around waiting to be dismissed.

And maybe if you're a latecomer but haven't tried all that long yet, the judges have just gotten tired of it all and help them out a bit. All unofficial, I'm sure, but I can imagine the little old lady at the lotus task deciding she just wants to call it a day and have some tea.

[Ancaster]

1 hour ago, PhD-Purgatory15 said:

For one episode (and hopefully just one), I didn't mind the lack of position switching.

 

It's way too early for my old brain to differentiate between all the teams so I don't really care if there's not much position changing.  The only places I notice at this stage are the first two or three and the last two or three.

[illdoc]

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

Are they showing the start times and how far back teams are at the start? Because I looked for it and didn't see it.

It's there under the team names. But you have to look carefully---the font seems much smaller this time. For the record the first group were within a half hour of each other (1st team 8:26, 6th team 9:01). The second group were about 90 minutes behind, also a half hour of each other (7th team 10:23, 11th team 10:55 ish, 12th team 11: 15 or so).

[eel2178]

On 10/5/2023 at 1:21 AM, Fukui San said:

For anyone who's wondering, pomelos are pretty much like a cross between grapefruit and oranges. If a grapefruit is too sour for you, try a pomelo which is sweeter but still with some tartness. I've seen them at mainstream markets as well as Asian markets.

Why were they all in the water? Do they fall off the trees into the canal when they're ripe or are they transported to the collection spot to take them to market by throwing them into the water and letting them float downstream or were they just thrown in there for this challenge?

Edited October 6, 2023 by eel2178

[Fukui San]

32 minutes ago, eel2178 said:

Why were they all in the water? Do they fall off the trees into the canal

when they're ripe or are they transported to the collection spot to take them to market by throwing them into the water and letting them float downstream or were they just thrown in there for this challenge?

This I do not know, lol. Could be a race thing, could be an actual harvesting practice.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, dizzyd said:

4 hours ago, Gummo said:

But Todd's glee at doing the shopping detour was just so delightful & unexpected, he won me over.

I loved how well they did in stock up without the language advantage Joc and Vic had. 

"Bro...co...li..........broccoli? Is it just regular ol' broccoli? It can't be that easy, right? Oh it is! 😄"

[aghst]

6 hours ago, KeithJ said:

Did the later teams at the Lotus challenge receive a little extra help?  When the first teams were getting graded, I didn't think the locals were telling them what was wrong with their arrangements, they just said they didn't pass.  Eventually the locals started telling the contestants what was wrong with them.

That judge was strict.

One of the racers said that if you waited too long, the leaves became limp and couldn't be used to wrap around the buds and get approve by the judge.

So it appears most or all of them had to go into the bog more than once.

 

I don't think the racers understood that the market task involved phonetically spelled Thai word in English.

Oh and the team that got eliminated, they meant to do the pomelo task but the taxi took them to the market and they felt they had to do that rather than take more time to go to the canals.  Kind of a bad deal, like the taxi dropped them right about the same time as the other team, as if their taxi was following the other taxi.

[Hera]

5 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

I loved seeing the return of the spread out start times.

Me too. I don't think I would have minded bunched starts if they reflected arrival times (teams who arrive within X minutes of each other start together), but because the size of groups was pre-determined, you'd sometimes get the situation where teams who arrived at roughly the same time got separated by 15 minutes, just because one arrived in third and the other in fourth.

5 hours ago, tracyscott76 said:

Small props also to Todd for seeming to keep his cool as well. Other than a pretty calm "I'm getting a little nervous" when she got passed by someone, he wasn't shown to be freaking out (too busy feeding the fish!), and when she did pull up in the boat he was all "you crushed it!"

I also liked what he said about her needing confidence: "She'll be the best in the room, and she doesn't see it." It struck me as a really nice way of phrasing it. I felt for Ashlie (really, everyone) on that roadblock. I think I could have worked out the need for bulbs, the way they needed to be arranged, and the bamboo ties. Even after watching everyone get through the task, I don't think I understood what the judge was looking for when it came to leaves.

4 hours ago, Gummo said:

But Todd's glee at doing the shopping detour was just so delightful & unexpected, he won me over.

Same. He and Andrea/Malaina understood the assignment: do your best with the language (and accept that you're going to look a bit silly in the process) and rely on the kindness of strangers. Victor's language skills meant he and Jocelyn had a much more straightforward (and honestly, slightly less fun) time with the task.

I'm curious about which side of the detour took longer on average. It seemed like the teams who did the market one were able to make up time (provided they didn't mess up) on the ones who did the pomelo one but the pomelo task was also busier and more direct competition (taking pomelos means that other teams can't use them). It also would have been like the lotus task in that later teams would have had to go further afield to find the stuff they needed.

Fun fact I learned at a pub quiz (and which Wikipedia backs up): grapefruit was created as a cross between sweet orange and a pomelo. My team got it right only because we had someone on it who knew what pomelos were.

[Bluesky]

I always wonder why they don’t worry about unfairness when a foreign language is part of a challenge and one couple speaks that language.  

[iMonrey]

4 hours ago, Tango64 said:

I've always gotten the impression that the local judges ease up on contestants after they've tried for a long time. One of my favorite things to spot is when they have a dance task or something like that, with lots of people in local dress being so cheery and enthusiastic at first. Then after some team is trying it for the 18th time you see those folks bored out of their minds and just sitting around waiting to be dismissed.

Yeah I'm not convinced Steve ever really got it right and the judge just got sick of him and gave him a pass. He never really seemed to understand what was going on. That's the thing about these sorts of challenges where there's a local who is making a judgment call on whether or not it's been done correctly. It's very subjective and potentially inconsistent.

[dancingdreamer]

A very fun episode,  I'm just glad my two favorite  teams  made 1st and 2nd.

[sinycalone]

I'm so glad that the teams -- so far -- are all pretty likable.  I have favorites, but I don't actively want any of them to fail.

The teams that were eliminated were good sports...and genuinely seemed to be thrilled just to compete.

Of course, when killer fatigue starts to hit them, I'm sue some negativity will surface.

 

 

 

[Ancaster]

8 hours ago, eel2178 said:

Why were they all in the water? Do they fall off the trees into the canal

when they're ripe or are they transported to the collection spot to take them to market by throwing them into the water and letting them float downstream or were they just thrown in there for this challenge?

8 hours ago, Fukui San said:

This I do not know, lol. Could be a race thing, could be an actual harvesting practice.

I have a vague memory of a brief shot of a long stick maybe being used to dislodge the pomelos into the water?

6 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I always wonder why they don’t worry about unfairness when a foreign language is part of a challenge and one couple speaks that language.  

It's the luck of the draw, the same way some competitors have been dancers so slay those challenges, or others are very strong physically.  In other seasons we've seen contestants benefiting from speaking Spanish.

Edited October 6, 2023 by Ancaster

[Grizzly]

20 hours ago, mertensia said:

I was amused that the waiting teams were having a great time feeding the fish.

This! And the Amazing editors spliced a clip of the lotus gatherers saying how anxious their partners must be waiting for them before showing more fun with fish.

[Fake Jan Brady]

5 hours ago, iMonrey said:

That's the thing about these sorts of challenges where there's a local who is making a judgment call on whether or not it's been done correctly. It's very subjective and potentially inconsistent.

I always assumed there was a producer off camera making the decision.

[shura]

Yeah, I am not sure 90 minutes is working for me. I understand the point that it allows us to get to know the teams better and enjoy more details of a challenge instead of just being given an short summary of things, but I felt like watching the teams do the same thing at the lotus task for a good 40 minutes was a little extreme. And that’s when we have 12 different teams. Now imagine that we are spending 40 minutes to watch a task when only four teams remain. Followed by a 15-minute coverage of a taxi ride.

I have never heard the word “pomelo” stressed on the second syllable, only the first. The teams pronounced it both ways though. Cool task, I liked the imagery of all those pomelos bobbing around in canals.

[tinkerbell]

6 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I always wonder why they don’t worry about unfairness when a foreign language is part of a challenge and one couple speaks that language.  

Same as when a challenge is athletic and one team is athletes, or dancers having an advantage when the task contains dancing. Or music, puzzles, art, and so on. Some couples are fast runners, or good navigators, or good at memorizing. It's all the same thing. They have an advantage when the task taps into their skills. But it's not an unfair advantage. 

[Mediocre Gatsby]

22 hours ago, mertensia said:

This was fun, though they should have had a translator at the lotuses for Rob (I think). She said something like 3 4 3 and he had no idea.

Yeah it seemed like there were none at first, then some of the middle teams had help, then none at the end. I don't know many of the racers yet, but that one guy made a smart decision to listen to everyone talking about what they'd done wrong. 

1 hour ago, shura said:

Yeah, I am not sure 90 minutes is working for me. I understand the point that it allows us to get to know the teams better and enjoy more details of a challenge instead of just being given an short summary of things, but I felt like watching the teams do the same thing at the lotus task for a good 40 minutes was a little extreme.

This is how I feel. I FFd through a lot of it. 

Boy, Steve looked like he was going to have a heart attack or heatstroke or something during the scoop task. Good thing his daughter could do most of the work. 

[Skooma]

8 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I always wonder why they don’t worry about unfairness when a foreign language is part of a challenge and one couple speaks that language.  

It's a race around the world, not a high school level track.  Nothing in the world is entirely even steven nor should it be.  Other teams might have bigger advantages in Spanish-speaking countries or know French or Hindi or German or whatever.

3 hours ago, Ancaster said:

It's the luck of the draw, the same way some competitors have been dancers so slay those challenges, or others are very strong physically.  In other seasons we've seen contestants benefiting from speaking Spanish.

And better said here.

[SVNBob]

On 10/4/2023 at 10:43 PM, hendersonrocks said:

Rob and Corey are one of my favorite teams in years. 
 

That first task was a grind but ultimately did very little to shake up the race. It’s time for some old fashioned bunching!

Little?  Try practically nothing.  Other than two teams swapping positions, the rankings at the end of this Leg are the same as the previous.

16 hours ago, iMonrey said:

And Joel and Garrett fell two spots, only because they forgot their fanny pack.

If it hadn't been for this, the first 7 teams would have been identical to the previous leg instead of "just" the top 6.  The change would instead be the gay couple moving up one place to 8th, bumping the military brothers down to 9th.

 

 

19 hours ago, tracyscott76 said:

Iliana's gone, rats 😕

That floral arrangement task was kind of diabolical in that the later you got there, the further you had to trudge through the muck to get flowers. The pomelos seemed to always be obligingly floating just around the corner. Speaking of pomelos, how on earth did Robbin and Chelsea's boat not sink with all those pomelos in it? Seems like they had way more than Steve and Anna Leigh did when theirs sank. Must have been the distribution.

Distribution is probably one factor.  Another I would wager on there being is that Steve and Anna Leigh combined probably outweigh Robbin and Chelsea combined.  (Since she's such a petite thing, Anna Leigh has to weigh less than either Robbin or Chelsea, but Steve's a big dude who would more than make up the difference.)

17 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

I also liked both detours. Both of them weren't necessarily easy (one was physically demanding, one required to be able to properly articulate the food to the locals) but they did seem to take about the same amount of time as, once you got going, you were likely good. I probably would have chosen the Scoop Up, because as much as it would have been physically harder and getting lucky with finding the right canal with the pomelos, it was less risky than having the locals direct you to the wrong item because you weren't able to pronounce it correctly (which happened twice with teams).

As someone mentioned in the Live thread, I also think they were recycling the pomelos.  Too many of the later teams found mother-lode canals for that not to be happening.  Also, I don't think we never saw more than 5 or 10 full baskets at the checkpoint. 

TPTB had to be dumping the filled baskets in between one group of teams leaving and another arriving.  However, I think they made it "fair" by taking the pomelos to further away canals.  Meaning that the later teams may have had quick gathering times, but they had to spend more time finding the full canals.

 

11 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I always wonder why they don’t worry about unfairness when a foreign language is part of a challenge and one couple speaks that language.  

Technically, they don't.  Victor said his family is from Laos, not Thailand.  The languages are similar, but not the same.  As noted, it's akin to knowing Spanish in countries that speak other romance languages like Portuguese or Italian.  It's not precisely the same, but there's enough overlap to get you a lot of the way there.

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

I like all of the teams this season, which means every week I’ll see a team I like eliminated. That said, I’m happy the casting seems to be biased toward love of the Race than toward drama for the sake of drama. I didn’t even notice the rank order didn’t shift much because the tasks seemed to provide plenty of potential to jump ahead based on skill. I wonder how long they actually took.

I would have noped on out of the lotus task. I live near the Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens in DC, and I love the annual lotus and water lily festival. But I refuse to go if the lotuses have peaked and empty seed pods await. Trypophobia, anyone? I don’t go into water if I can’t see the bottom, and fish and mosquitos and spiders and NOPE. The fact that there were so many new buds among the wilted blossoms and empty pods was very distracting. A plant plant for the show?

The shopping task was made for Victor and Jocelyn. “I speak the language and own a grocery store that sells these things,” LOL. I thought the other teams that tried this would have been really hung up, but editing magic made it look like everyone blew through, and any mistakes were quickly correctable.

Jackfruit is my favorite meat substitute for party dishes like buffalo chicken dip and barbecue pulled pork. I realized this episode that I would not recognize a jackfruit in the wild, because I only know it out of a can. Same for a lot of the other tropical and exotic fruits I know by name but not by pre-deconstructed appearance.

[Haleth]

Right now the top three teams are head and shoulders above the rest in competence.  Victor's ability to speak the language was an advantage, Rob does really well with focused tasks, and Greg was smart to listen to the judging of others' bouquets so he could perfect his own.  I love it when teams approach challenges by how best to use their strengths instead of panicking and flailing around.

The judges were pretty tough on the racers.  The amount of time it took for everyone to do it well enough was brutal.

Didn't Todd say they were not allowed to show the folks at the market the list?  They had to try to pronounce the items on their own?  The last two teams did show people the list.  Maybe they couldn't show it to the vendors but could ask other patrons what the items were?

20 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I think it was Ashlie who said "I'd rather be doing this than waiting, it's so stressful to be waiting." Cut to the waiting teams having a blast feeding the fish.

That was pretty hilarious.

9 hours ago, Mediocre Gatsby said:

Boy, Steve looked like he was going to have a heart attack or heatstroke or something during the scoop task. Good thing his daughter could do most of the work. 

Yeah, he didn't look good.  Maybe just dehydrated?

I've always been curious about what durian tastes like.  And jackfruit.

[katalizt]

39 minutes ago, Haleth said:

Didn't Todd say they were not allowed to show the folks at the market the list?  They had to try to pronounce the items on their own?  The last two teams did show people the list.  Maybe they couldn't show it to the vendors but could ask other patrons what the items were?

I think Todd meant showing the locals the list didn't help because it wasn't written in Thai, it was written phonetically for English speakers. It looked like it took the later two teams a few tries to find someone who could figure out what the words on the list were actually trying to say.

I didn't like the unbalanced detour last week, but this week the tasks were much better. Really liking the teams overall. I enjoy the 90 minute episodes but I was hoping they would use the extra time to add an extra route marker task here and there. Maybe when there's less teams so we don't have to watch 2 people doing a task for an hour. 

[illdoc]

8 minutes ago, katalizt said:

I enjoy the 90 minute episodes but I was hoping they would use the extra time to add an extra route marker task here and there.

I don't believe they knew it would be a 90 min episode when they filmed it, so they couldn't have added anything during the race to fill up the "extra" 30 minutes--the "padding" is during editing.

[QuantumMechanic]

On 10/5/2023 at 3:21 AM, Fukui San said:

For anyone who's wondering, pomelos are pretty much like a cross between grapefruit and oranges. If a grapefruit is too sour for you, try a pomelo which is sweeter but still with some tartness. I've seen them at mainstream markets as well as Asian markets.

And, interestingly, pomelos are one of the “original citruses” (along with mandarins and citrons).

Regular oranges are a natural hybrid of the pomelo and a variety of mandarin.

Grapefruits are a back-cross of pomelo and a different pomelo-mandarin hybrid.

And pomelos (not surprisingly) have some of the same nasty drug interactions that grapefruits do.

[katalizt]

1 hour ago, illdoc said:

I don't believe they knew it would be a 90 min episode when they filmed it, so they couldn't have added anything during the race to fill up the "extra" 30 minutes--the "padding" is during editing.

They did know, they had already filmed and edited a full season with 60 minute episodes and they didn't want to re-edit it, so they decided to film a whole new one specifically with 90 minute episodes in mind. There is a whole season already filmed that has not aired. 

[eel2178]

On 10/6/2023 at 4:38 AM, Sheikh Yerbouti said:

 I realized this episode that I would not recognize a jackfruit in the wild, because I only know it out of a can.

Those jackfruit were gigantic! The ones I saw growing on the trees in Brazil were much smaller. I don't know if it was a different breed or if the ones I saw weren't ripe yet, so they weren't done growing.

Edited October 11, 2023 by eel2178