That’s exactly what I was wondering. One of them mentioned stopping the car to pray, if it was time to pray, and I thought, “Not if it’s a dead heat to a Pit Stop, you won’t!”
While watching Team Muslim at the fish eyeball detour, I wondered: do the producers go to any lengths to ensure that the Gross Food Challenge, while gross, doesn’t violate any muslim/hindu/jewish food restrictions? For example, what if there had been a Hindu team at the “eat 10 lbs of beef” detour in Argentina, a few seasons back?
The teams are all a vague blur right now. Lots of special couples, the one “normal” m/f-no-extenuating-circumstances couple never even made an impression. (I dimly remember brown hair - that’s about it.)
Does anyone know what happens to the philiminated teams? Is it like Survivor where everyone is sequestered in some remote resort all shiny clean and well-coiffed or are they sent home?
Philiminated teams are sent to Sequesterville, which has been in various locations – last season they were in Portugal, TAR5 was in Thailand, etc. – but someplace nice where they’re babysat till it’s time to go to the finish line and cheer in the winners.
My gripe with anyone spouting their religion-noise on these shows is the arrogance in assuming that their deity of choice cares at all about whether they win the contest. Summed up nicely in the TWoP recaps by the phrase “God is in the tub.” The Jesus-speak is the most common so it gets the most hate. Based on Team Allah’s behaviour I have a feeling that if they’d lasted the constant “if it’s the will of Allah” business would have gotten annoying but not as bad as the Jesus people’s constant begging for favors.
The Philiminated teams are sequestered until the end of the Race.
Let’s break it down…
Married: Kentucky Coalminers, Team Karma (philliminated)
Siblings: Cho Bros (as it says on there shirts)
Parent/Child: Duke & Lauren;
BFF: Cheerleaders; Beauty Queens, Single Moms, Male Models; Team Moslem (philliminated)
Dating (and/or working through their relationship issues): Peter & Sarah (Ironleg); Gay Team; Rob & Kimberley
Oh … so just being a reality TV contestant doesn’t qualify? 
It’s funny how opinions and perceptions can differ. I missed the cabbie thing, but that kind of manipulation I don’t find as offensive as taking advantage of the airline’s special accomodations. My reasoning is, anyone in this race can play all kinds of manipulative games wrt getting people to give up taxis; paying them off, claiming the woman’s pregnant, feigning injury, etc. And lots of teams have pulled lots of similar stunts throughout the series. So, given that it’s a tactic that can be used by any and every team, while I still find it scummy, it’s not quite the same as taking advantage of special privileges that no other team could possibly finagle.
Also, I may be a little prejudiced against her because she annoyed the hell out of me with her whining about how she “couldn’t” do the wall. Thomas said he felt so sorry for her when she was struggling, but cold-hearted me said, “Poppycock. She’s perfectly capable, she just needs to calm down, take a breath and focus. She’s exhausted from climbing those stairs, which is their own damn fault for not following the instructions. She’ll make it up there, just watch.” Sure enough, she did, so the whiney pity party she threw was just more icing on the Annoying Cake (for me).
I had an initial fondness for them and started out rooting for them to win, though. And I do like him, so if she can knock off the “poor me” attitude for the rest of the race, I could find myself back in their corner. For now, for some inexplicable reason, Team Beauty Queens are my favs. Time will tell.
I am definitely liking this season, though. It was a great premier episode!
That team, Rob & Kimberly, are the ones who are working on their relationship, which is always good for the “You don’t really love me!” shouting matches as Killer Fatigue sets in.
They must have been told in the clues to park the cars at the Thrifty Car rental return lot, because all the other teams did that with no problems, but Rob said to look for the Thrifty Car signs, and Kimberly was completely clueless as to what Thrifty Car rental was. I don’t think she’s the sharpest crayon in the box, but beyond that, I don’t think they really like each other all that much - there seemed to be a lot of sniping back and forth between the two of them, and she rolled her eyes at him a lot.
As I recall, the teams had been told to go to Thrifty Parking, not park at Thrifty Rental. Several teams read “Thrifty” and automatically assumed that it was a car rental place, and drove straight into car rental parking where they spent several fruitless minutes trying to find “Thrifty Rentals”. In reality “Thrifty” was the name of the parking garage, which is indeed what the gigantic “Thrifty Parking” billboard said. Other teams found this with no problems.
Jokingly, HELL. I just gotta drop a few more pounds and work on my upper body strength. And maybe learn more Cantonese. CCBC has language courses, you know. HINT HINT.
PS: The dog doesn’t stink anymore.
Also, after watching the part which I missed last night, I want to punch team Ironleg in the face. Just the girl, though. And now I’m even more sad that Vipul and Arti have been Philiminated.
Yeah, there’s a large parking garage at Sea-Tac, with one floor dedicated to rental cars. The Thrifty Parking they were supposed to go to looked like it was off the airport grounds, but not very far away.
I lived in Seattle for many years, not all that far from Gasworks Park, so I was trying to figure out what routes everyone was taking to get to the freeway and the airport. I’m not sure it all adds up yet, but I’ll watch my tape again.
Last season they ended the race at the same place they started. I kinda like that idea; if it’s a race “around the world” then it should be all the way around. I’ll be curious to watch the finishers try to find their way back to Gasworks.
And eliminating one team so quickly was too harsh. The show was fine, leave it alone. I don’t buy cereal so I can get the toy in the bottom of the box.
Well, as many of you know, I attended Aras’s viewing parties at his mom’s house for this past season of Survivor, and now have the pleasure of attending viewing parties for James & Tyler (who I met about 6 months back), as well. It’s actually co-hosted by Rob & Kimberley, the “I didn’t know Thrifty was a car rental company” dating couple (who are, apparently, still together). It was a good time…Aras was there (he’s good friends with James and Tyler), as was Erika from Big Brother and Rafe from a former season of Survivor.
When Phil announced there were 12 teams, and 8 elimination legs, some quick math told me…uh-oh…something is up. When I saw the “Last Team” tile at the Forbidden City checkpoint, I guessed that would be what happened. Good news is…there won’t be any more surprise eliminations (based on the math). Unles…maybe…Team Karma gets to reappear later in the race? Now THAT would seem immensely unfair.
Oh, and apparently the contestants were sequetered on an island this time around. And sometimes the pitstops are actually 36 hours, not 12…but we, the viewing audience, just aren’t told. Interesting.
Crap crap crap crap crap!
Missed it.
See, now I’ve met Robot Arm, and I still read this in Phil’s voice, not his.
That’s because I was thinking in Phil’s voice while I was typing it.
Seriously.
A little late to this table, but personal opinion…Eating eyes in the very first episode bothers me. Eating gross things is the trademark of Fear Factor.
TAR’s trademark is altitude. We got some altitude with the wall climb, but usually it’s the other way around…going down real fast vs. going up real slow.
I don’t know how many of you have had the pleasure of watching teams struggle to figure out your towns, but this makes twice for us Seatleites. I just wish they hadn’t used the same park twice.
I-5 goes across a huge bridge in easy view of Gasworks Park, but I knew they’d all have trouble finding an onramp. It’s the main freeway through town, but none of the access points are obvious to newcomers.
For me, the most annoying thing in the whole ep was at the paving challenge, when the woman (Kimberley? I can’t remember which one it was) was starting to figure out that they’d missed the gray brick part, and her partner kept telling her to get to work and stop bothering him with all the thinking. That does not bode well for them.
You just have to learn, “Rapido, por favor!” in several languages.
Thank God. I mean, seriously, my eyes were watering*. I hope she got a cute pink bow in her hair.
- Not really. But she was stinky. The dog, not Gingy.