Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Out in Africa
By M. Giant | Season 19 | Episode 6 | Aired on 10.30.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.All seven remaining teams take the same flight from Bangkok to Malawi, where they race to a tobacco warehouse for the Road Block. The task requires them to wheel an actual ton of tobacco through the warehouse, one 200-lb bale at a time, amid the distractions of the loud, busy workers, few of whom are making much effort to stay out of the racers' way. Despite starting the leg last, Jeremy finishes the Road Block first, followed by Ernie, Justin, and Tommy.
The next stop is Memorial Tower, which is the starting point for a Detour. The choice is between going to a marketplace to sew a suit, or going to a school to make toy trucks out of milk cartons and bottle caps. While the lead teams split up for that, Laurence and Bill beat Marcus out of the Road Block. Jeremy and Sandy are also the first to finish the toy making Detour, followed by the siblings and the snowboarders, while Ernie and Cindy win the sewing Detour.
Then it's off to a furniture shop to pick up a wooden bed to schlep to the Pit Stop, which is a village at a wilderness reserve, where they'll be spending the night on the beds they brought. The snowboarders accidentally hijack Jeremy and Sandy's truck out from under them, while Marcus and Amani continue to be in last place at the end of the Detour. At the Pit Stop, everyone has to carry their beds a fair distance by hand. Still in last, Amani and Marcus's bad luck continues with a cab breakdown, while Justin and Jennifer get to the mat first. But they forgot to pay their truck driver, so for the third time, the snowboarders win a leg as a result of another team's mistake.
On the footpath, the bed-carrying proves a major challenge for Sandy, who along with Jeremy comes in right behind the siblings for the second time and also behind Bill and Cathi, who have to go back to pay their driver as well. Laurence and Zac make it in fourth, while Cindy has some highly amusing difficulties that result in Team Control coming in fifth. The race for last ends up between the retuning Bill & Cathi and Amani & Marcus, but the unladen grandparents return to the mat before Team NFL does. And it's another non-elimination leg already, so Amani and Marcus are still in it. Well, at least there won't be any non-elimination legs in the second half of the race. Right?
Want more? The full recap starts right below!"This is the Kingdom of Thailand," Phil announces over footage from all over the country, from the towering islands off Phuket to the towering skyscrapers of Bangkok. Whoa, I'm starting to write like this show. I guess Phil doesn't want to get too specific about what part of Thailand he's in, since last week's leg was pretty much evenly split between two very different parts of the country. Instead, he says, "Its diverse regions offer stunning tropical islands and ancient temples that have stood for centuries." And also the Kukrit house in Bangkok, which he says is the start of the sixth leg in a race around the world. Amani and Marcus won the previous leg (in fact, the happy screams they emitted after getting that news are still echoing through the garden), so they'll be leaving first, at 7:22 AM. Amani's pretty happy to read from the clue, "Fly to the warm heart of Africa [yes!], Malawi." Phil says that's more than 5,000 miles, across the Indian Ocean. After landing in Malawi, they'll need to get to a tobacco warehouse, specifically gate #7, to find their next clue. As they jog off the grounds to find a cab, Marcus VOs that they have four kids, the youngest of whom is a special needs child. He adds that he's always reminding himself to be patient with her, and they need to show her the value of not giving up. Oh, and they're also very excited to be going to Africa. Seems like the Amazing Editors always go out of their way to make sure we see how much the darker-skinned racers appreciate getting to visit that continent.
Bill and Cathi, who arrived at the mat right behind Team NFL, are leaving one minute later, at 7:23. They get in a cab, and Cathi says, "Africa's just fabulous." Which makes it sound like she and Bill have already been there, even if they don't look like it.
Ernie and Cindy's departure time is 7:24, which puts them a lot closer behind the other two teams than I thought. Cindy's also excited to be going to Malawi. In a pre-race interview, Cindy says with a rueful smile that they've made a mistake in every leg save the first one. That first one is why they have an Express Pass. Ernie says mistakes are inevitable, but they can try to minimize them. Seems to me the best way to do that would be to listen to Cindy more.
Siblings Justin and Jennifer are leaving at 7:29, in a relatively distant fourth. Jennifer solo-interviews that she teaches special-ed, she would do anything for her special-ed kids, and this race is like her special-ed baby. Except The Amazing Race gets Emmys instead of Special Olympics medals. Jennifer adds, "And I'm going to do what it takes to win." As long as that doesn't include much running.