We're Going Down The Wrong Side Of The Freeway...And The Lights Are Off!

Previously on Taxicab Confessions: Mumbai: There are only so many windmills you can stare at before you start to get dizzy, so it was time to bolt Amsterdam and head for India. Tears were shed at the living conditions of some of the local population, to the point where there was hardly time for all the hating, complaining, and line-jumping that characterized legs. Millie wanted to come back and help the poor people if she wins the money. (If she doesn't, it's every man for himself.) It turned out that rush hour on a train out of Mumbai was a bad place to be a boob -- no, not a boob like BuffJon is a boob. A boob like a boob, you know? Kelly got a mouthful of laundry water but avoided the shower of fish juice, giving her a .500 average in Avoidance of Fetid Fluids (AFF) for the week. Tian and Jaree reversed their rapidly sinking fortunes with a surprisingly good showing, while Millie and Chuck continued to slide down the slippery slope to...well, to somewhere very bad. The Falconettes, who were hindered by markedly unhelpful locals, bad bus karma, and a bad case of Killer Fatigue, lost in a heartbreaker. "Who will be eliminated..." Microsoft completes work on a plan to stop giving stock to employees entirely, in favor of multi-packs of Jolly Ranchers. "�?" Ah, yes. The old "Who will be eliminated ?" -- the marker of all non-elimination legs. You'd think they'd be a little trickier. I'd say The Amazing Post-Production Facilities are suffering from a severe shortage of evil and trickery, wouldn't you?

Credits. This Week's Fun Fact You Can Learn By Zaprudering The Credits With The Assistance Of TiVo: There's a blue-and-silver outfit behind Al's head that appears to have been recovered from a prom limo that was lost in a tar pit in 1984 and only recently unearthed. [BOMP.]

Commercials. Use Kodak paper, it just might make your children better-looking. No promises, though.

"Chicka chicka chicka chicka-bucka-chicka chicka chicka chicka," says the music as we dive back into Mumbai, India, which is apparently a leading exporter of...um, drum machines? Anyway, Phil explains that eighteen million people live here, in a city only one-tenth as large as Los Angeles. Just as you begin to think, "Boy, that would make for some teeming throngs," Phil actually uses the expression "teeming throngs." You know, if there were an Amazing Race bingo game, one of the squares would totally say, "Phil Refers To Teeming Throngs." It would be to "Phil Refers To The Crowded Streets Of This Chaotic Marketplace," of course. Speaking of Phil, he now appears in a shirt that looks like two bicyclists riding beside each other ran right up and over his pecs, and explains that we are at the Gateway of India pit stop, where the six remaining teams have spent the last twelve hours eating, sleeping, mingling, and trying to get the fish smell out of their hair. For some reason, rather than giving the usual explanation of the pit stop protocols, Phil goes all the way back to the "they'll have to figure out for themselves...from clues they'll find in sealed envelopes" routine. Phil. Dude. This is not the remedial class. I don't cut with the blunt-ended scissors, so let's get moving. In his set of weekly contemplations, Phil ponders whether Tian and Jaree will continue to be the sisters who are doing it for themselves, or whether they'll start pecking at each other's eyes again. He also wonders about the much-loved clowns, who eluded elimination in the last leg but face a last-place departure. I wonder if unicycling is an efficient mode of international travel.

12:51. David and Jeff. ("Who?" Exactly.) David muddles his way through the rip-and-read as well as he can, but although he handles "Travel by train all the way from Panvel Station all the way to" without difficulty, he gets hung up at "Ernakulam Junction," and needs the Phil-over to bail him out. Phil explains that it's forty-three miles to Panvel, and then it's an 860-mile train ride to Ernakulam. Yowza. Eight hundred sixty miles of train travel? That is a lot of ass-pinching. Jeff's off-the-mat voice-over reasons that he and David have a "very good shot of winning," and he explains as carefully as he can that they've been doing better since they stopped getting lost and running past the clue box and tying their shoelaces together and stuff. In an interview, Jeff reasons that they are "firing on all cylinders," like, thanks for pulling that one out of your extensive quiver of clichs, there, Studly. You know, if Jeff didn't have the soul patch or the sunglasses on top of his head, he would be cute in this interview, but he does. And he does. And so he isn't. Nice eyes, though. As they get in their cab, David explains that they set up the taxi last night, so they're on their way, apparently heading in the cab all the way to Panvel. Man, their driver is wearing a crisp white uniform. Not one cab driver I have ever had has been dressed like an ice-cream man, and more's the pity, I say. Can you imagine how popular a service like the Drumstick Cab would be? The Chipwich Taxi Service? Tell me you wouldn't pay extra for that in the middle of July.

12:52 AM. Chip and Reichen. Turns out that the take for this leg of the race is only $70, so it's beginning to be time to hang onto your cash, one might suspect. Chip interviews that Reichen has a way of deferring to him because he speaks so forcefully when he thinks he's right, and so he's trying to work on that, given that he's made "significant blunders." (cough parkinglotparkinglot cough) The Chipsters head into a hotel to talk to the concierge, undoubtedly hoping to get the skinny on the train situation before deciding what to do.

In the Who cab, David gets the driver to call the hotel on the cell phone, and the word comes back of the impending twenty-four-hour train ride, and that the train out of Panvel doesn't leave until 11:20 in the morning, which is still a good ten hours off. They, too, have hit up a hotel concierge by phone.

The Chipsters, meanwhile, are told that it will take about an hour and a half to get to Panvel, so they order up a taxi and thank the concierge, who seems to be ordering their ride from something called "Cool Cab." Ah, yes, the cabs where the radio only plays the hip tunes with the crazy beats and there are no squares to step on your buzz. When the taxi comes, Reichen double-checks that it has enough gas for the relatively long trip. Considering what a recurring theme this turns into during the leg, I have to think at least somebody had some adventures with under-fueled taxis in the leg. Or else it's a very specialized compulsion.

1:19 AM. BuffJon and Kelly. Kelly's off-the-mat speech this week concerns the fact that she knows herself to be "high maintenance," and she's trying not to be. You know, "high maintenance" is one of those terms I sometimes regret was ever introduced, because, like people who sarcastically apologize for not being "politically correct," women who label themselves "high maintenance" often seem to think that once they slap the label down, they've taken the relevant behavior off the table. It's like yelling "shotgun!" -- the first woman in any group who declares herself to be "high maintenance" gets to have other people refill her drink all night, and actually gets sympathy when she complains that her beer is too cold. Whatever, Little Red Whining Hood. Kelly, in an interview in which she looks mighty tired, explains to us that she still thinks Jon is "selfish," and returns to her theme that he needs to remember that she's part of the team, too. (Except when they're doing something really yucky -- at those times, she'd just as soon he'd forget.) These two wind up taking a different approach, which is to cab it to Victoria, a nearer train station, and catch a train to Panvel.

1:34 AM. Millie and Chuck. Millie interviews after their rip-and-read that she and Chuck have been concerned about how nasty things have gotten between them in the last couple of legs, so they agreed to try hard to be more pleasant to each other. Good idea. I can't decide whether she looks here like she hasn't washed her hair in twelve or thirteen days, or whether she's going for a sort of hippie look at which she has excelled. She looks a little like the Herbal Essence girl and a little like an escaped convict. Maybe they finally locked up the Herbal Essence girl for all those lewd public displays, and this is what happened to her.

1:36 AM. Tian and Jaree. A very perky Jaree voices over that she and Tian are now getting along just swell after their big bonding leg last week. She interviews that she "want[s] to be the first girl team to win." Man, I want that, too. Anything to wipe Flo off the record books and throw her farther into irrelevance works well for me.

1:37 AM. Jon and Al. ClownJon explains that the last leg was "too close," and they need to work harder and pay better attention to the details. In other words, you have to fight off the mental, as well as the physical, Killer Fatigue.

These last three teams to depart are grabbing their cabs out of the pit stop at approximately the same time, but Jon and Al get the scoop from their driver that they might want to take the train from Victoria to Panvel, just as Jon and Kelly are doing, in part because a local taxis from Panvel will be expensive if they go that route. Speaking of Jon and Kelly, they're just arriving at Victoria Station, and one the many rather sad-looking dogs that are hanging around looks up as if to say, "Oh. It's her." They go inside to try to buy tickets, just as Jon and Al, back in their cab, find out from their driver that the ticket counter will be open in the morning, but wouldn't be open right now. This is just what Kelly is finding out at Victoria, where she's learning that the counter isn't open until 4:00 AM. She and BuffJon pile back into the cab, with BuffJon making the very middle-of-the-nightish observation, "This just gets funner and funner." His second-grade language arts teacher cringes and takes a swig of brandy. And then she drunk-dials his kindergarten teacher, who was technically responsible for cleansing the vocabulary of the word "funner."

Al and ClownJon seem to be heading back to the hotel where they started, given that they can't leave yet anyway. As Kelly and BuffJon do the same, she mentions to the driver that it doesn't look like anyone is out "partying on a Friday night." BuffJon makes a BuffJoke about looking for clubs. Ho ho ho, lack of leisure activities humor! I suppose everyone deals with abject poverty in his own way. Back at the hotel, ClownJon and Al turn in again, happy to get the extra couple of hours of sleep, but when Kelly and BuffJon de-cab, they sacrifice a few minutes of sleep to make time for a squabble over when they should leave in the morning. She wants to get up early and go at 6:00, because she wants to be sure to miss rush hour after her last unpleasant experience on the train out of Mumbai last week. Jon thinks leaving at 7:00 will leave them plenty of time to avoid rush hour, but Kelly puts her foot down. It's really interesting, because although they're arguing, and she's saying, "It's 6:00 or nothing, that's it," he reaches over and picks something off her shoulder at this point, which I immediately took as a subconscious gesture of concern because although he thought she was being ridiculous, he also felt bad that she was so upset about the train ride. I mean, I think it's pretty well-established that the lint-pluck is a mark of affection, so even though he's genuinely annoyed with her, I think he also feels for her. At any rate, he says, "I don't know why I argue with you," and walks away.

For a change of pace, Tian and Jaree's cab has ventured onto the wrong side of the road, where it is now hurtling toward Panvel on what appears to be the opposing shoulder from the side of the road where it should be. Tian takes note of this with some trepidation, adding that the headlights aren't even on. Wow. Out of all the times it has occurred to me on this show that they're lucky nobody got killed, this is right up there. I love how the teams always have to warn their drivers not to speed, but flying down the wrong side of the road? No problem! As long as you do it at a reasonable speed. Finally, the driver gets himself turned around and pointed in the right direction. "Thank God," Jaree says. Well, that was hair-raising. Just one of many of this year's Race Moments In Which I Like To Picture Flo Just For Giggles.

Team Who is pulling up at what does not appear to be a bustling train station. It appears to be a fairly small, fairly old building, and when they get up to it, Jeff and the cab driver knock on the door and are greeted by some guys who clarify that this is not the Panvel station. This is the old Panvel station, and a new one has been built. "We just got a ride to the train station," David explains, "and we, I think, woke up some guys at their house." Heh. Oops. The driver gets the skinny, and explains to Who that the other station is nearby. As the driver and Jeff head off toward the cab, David trails behind, sort of muttering, "It's actually nicer than this? Oh, wow." Heh, again. If he had said it to the guys in the house, it would have been kind of rude, but it's not like it's the cab driver's house, so...funny.

Before you know it, Team Who has made its way to the new and improved Panvel Station (motto: "New, Improved, and Not Located on a Guy's Porch!"), and they check out what's inside. David explains that they considered sleeping on the floor, but they found that a number of fellows inside were taking quite a bit of interest in them and doing a fair amount of staring, so they decided that falling asleep there alone might not be the safest thing to do. They decide to take off and find a hotel where they can relax for a couple of hours. They're presumably going to spend part of the time perfecting their beards, because I swear, I have never seen such impeccably-sculptured facial hair on this show. It's like art, only ugly.

The Chipsters arrive at the station when David and Jeff are already gone, and Chuck and Millie and Tian and Jaree seem to be close behind them. When Tian and Jaree get to the station, they are very happy to see Chip, and enthusiastically sputter that he will love the story of how they almost got splattered on the freeway like errant Texas grapefruits from an overturned citrus truck. "Come on in," Chip says as he leads them into the station. "Welcome to Fantasy Island." Can I just mention that he is getting to be completely charming? Ah, Chip the charming Chipster makes me so chipper. I'm sorry, where was I? Oh, right. Anyway, as everyone settles in for the night, Reichen voices over that spending the night at the train station was not exactly the most fun he's ever had, but they somehow managed to get some sleep.

The morning at about 6:40, Kelly and BuffJon are at the Victoria train station, and he's sarcastically pointing out to her that it doesn't look like there's any risk of their being crushed by rush hour anytime soon. Butbut doesn't that prove she was right? What would it prove if it had been crowded when they got there? At any rate, she says to him, "Wouldn't you rather be safe than sorry? Why do you have to be such a jerk about it?" On the train, they find spots to sit down, and Kelly happily notes that "at least [they're] not packed in like sardines." Totally. All that oil? Not good for your skin.

A bit later, ClownJon and Al make their way to Victoria Station, and as they get out of the cab, Al voices over that the poverty they've seen in certain places has been particularly hard to take. ClownJon adds that he thinks he's a good husband and a good father, but he tears up and explains that when you see how much need there still is in the world, it "makes you realize that you can always do better." Astonishingly, this remark did not annoy me in the least, despite the dicey nature of this sort of philosophizing as a general rule. In the station, he bends down and hands what appears to be a donut to an old man sitting on the floor. The guy takes it and looks back up at him, and Jon gives him a quick, relatively inconspicuous thumbs-up and returns to the line with Al. Those are good guys right there, I think. They board the 7:10 train from Victoria to Panvel.

Kelly and BuffJon are preparing to get off the train at Panvel, and have moved from their seats to a standing position nearer to the doors. It's still not terribly crowded, but there are indeed some guys standing around. Kelly feels like the guys are all glaring at her, and she's having bad flashbacks to the last train ride, so she asks Jon if he'll stand behind her and make sure nothing happens. "Jon, please stand behind me," she says seriously. Now, she should have known right there what was going to happen, but apparently she didn't. She does get herself maneuvered so that he's behind her, and then as she stares off unhappily, he reaches down and pinches her on the butt. She jumps and turns around, he laughs, she swats him on the chest...it's your basic misguided attempt to relax her because she's being so paranoid. She says it's "not funny," at which point he sort of puts an arm around her backpack and laughs, because I think Kelly almost always says things aren't funny when they first happen. As he puts his arm around her yet again, she says with more twang than usual, "You shouldn't have done that; now I'm not speakin' to you for twenty-four hours." At the station, she can't help bringing it up yet again, muttering, "That wasn't very funny. I don't appreciate that at all." Again, he laughs, and again, he puts his arm around her. It was that fact that he kept putting that arm around her that convinced me that he was not trying to upset her -- he thought she was going to laugh. Perhaps a misguided attempt on his part, but hardly a flagrant foul. She seems to be wearing her funny-story-telling smirk when she tells the story in the interview as well. In any event, she seems to be fine when they get into the station, because what's on her mind is inquiring into whether Al and ClownJon have arrived yet.

As morning comes to Panvel Station, the clowns arrive, as does Team Who. David pauses to exchange a little smooch with Tian and then heads for the ticket counter. The Whos have apparently decided not to waste their fancy duds on a dirty train ride, because they appear to be wearing their cheapest white t-shirts. V-neck, eeeew. Heh: sunglasses by Armani...underwear by Wal-Mart. As the train pulls into the station, Al and ClownJon go for the laugh by posing on the platform as if prepared to leap on board with great excitement. Once the train, which looks like it has just returned from starring in a movie called Tootles The Train Accidentally Crushes The Safety Inspector Under His Rickety Wheels, comes to a stop, the teams slowly amble on, with the clowns and Chip apparently at the back of the line. "I'll let you get on," ClownJon mutters to Chip. "I'll let you get on," Chip says with exaggerated courtesy. "Please, age before beauty." Hee. Of course, the only thing to say as you board the train in ClownJon's position is "pearls before swine," but he doesn't go for it.

Settling in on the train does not fill the teams with glee. "This train smells so bad, it makes you want to gag," Reichen says plainly. As we look at Tian lying on a raised platform with her head on her backpack, Jaree interviews that she doesn't mind "roughing it" when you're talking about a "campfire on the beach or something," but this is a bit more than she's used to. "I feel like we're all packed in here like we're getting ready to go to the gas chamber or something." Oh, oy. I get what she was going for, in terms of a ton of people crammed on a smelly train, but...no. Just...no.

Commercials. Jeff Probst cares. He does. Honestly. He CARES.

The Amazing Yellow Line makes an unusual appearance in support of ground transportation as it marks the path from Mumbai to Cochin, where Ernakulam Junction is to be found. Al explains to us that ClownJon did a little checking when the conditions revealed themselves to be so unpleasant, and he discovered that they could upgrade to a first-class car for about $16 per person, so they went for it. ClownJon fills us in that everyone actually upgraded except for Chuck and Millie, who decided to rough it in second class to save money. It's a shame, because that probably won't benefit Chuck and Millie very much given the non-tight finances, and it should. That's exactly the kind of thing I wish played a larger role -- deciding when those trade-offs are really important. I suppose, on the other hand, that you could argue that the other teams may have done better conserving money up until now exactly so that they'll have the freedom to make this decision when the time comes. Anyway, we see the clowns relaxing with Team Who, while the Chipsters kick back with Jon and Kelly.

As they wrap up the upgrade transaction with the conductor, Reichen thanks him, and then says, "How do you say 'thank you' in Hindi?" "'Thank you in Hindi,'" he responds. Hee! Cute. Reichen laughs good-naturedly. It's not up there with the classic train language barrier moment in the first season, but still, pretty funny. Reichen and the conductor laugh.

The teams rest overnight as the train rumbles through the dark.

In the morning, Tian and Jaree enjoy what appears to be a breakfast consisting entirely of Coca-Cola products, as Tian explains that they, too, are enjoying the upgraded accommodations. I've had that breakfast, by the way -- the two-course version includes Hostess goods. Tian adds that among other things, a twenty-four-hour rest isn't a bad thing, either, after all the running around. I do remember hearing past folks say that the only really good sleep came on trains and planes, so it makes a certain amount of sense.

Millie is gamely making the best of things where she is as well, taking the time to "think and look out the window and see how the other half of the world lives." Chuck adds that he also enjoys not having to be around all the other teams. As they themselves explain it, Millie and Chuck have apparently not befriended other teams the way those teams have befriended each other. The comments here are very disjointed, because all we really hear Millie say is "sometimes, there's stuff that people say," and Chuck saying "sometimes we feel like we're back on the playground," and then Millie saying "it's fifth grade all over again." I would point out that neither of those comments necessarily indicates any awareness that they're specifically the topic of nasty conversation, but only that a certain amount of gossip and immature behavior is going on. I mean, they very well might know, but you can't tell from this scene. It could be very much like what Frank and Margarita said back in the day about how they just wanted no part of the drama that was flying.

But in case you missed the point, we cut directly to the Chipsters and Kelly and BuffJon sitting around filling part of their time with trash talk about the people they don't like. As you do. Chip talks about "making fun of each other, which is good," which sends Kelly directly to, "And we can make fun of everybody else, like Moley-Moley-Moley-Moooole." We get to once again hear Kelly's not-very-funny explanation of the not-creative nickname "Millie Mole," followed her not-very-funny explanation of the only slightly more creative nickname "the Werewolf," which I do think is slightly, um, apt. Back in the car with the Chipsters, BuffJon busts out his werewolf impression, which...again, I find the werewolf thing slightly funny, but not so much what he does with the joke, which is basically nothing. "He looks like a werewolf" is the beginning of a joke, really, not the end, you know? Anyway, Chip laughs, but feels guilty for thinking it's funny, so he says he wants to "go on record" as never having used either of those nicknames himself. Heh -- chicken. Sensing Chip's efforts at covering his ass, Kelly cajoles him. "Say it! It feels good! Moley-moley-moley-moley-mole..." BuffJon adds that he thinks "the mole is growing throughout the race, just because of stress," which makes the Chipsters laugh -- again, in spite of their better judgment. Ah, I have so been there -- you shouldn't laugh, but you laugh anyway, because sometimes, being mean is funny. Officially bad, but funny. There's a nice little cymbal-crash and a cut to an unhappy-looking Millie here, as if she can hear the whole thing, but considering that she's in a different car in a different part of the train? I think not. At any rate, the trash talk itself doesn't bother me so much. The affect bothers me, and the fact that it's lame and not that funny bothers me, but I'm hardly throwing stones because Kelly mocked someone she dislikes. Because even I would find it hard to take myself seriously.

As the train pulls into the target station at last, ClownJon and Al show that they have made the fashion-dubious but comfort-wise decision to tie damp white do-rags on their heads to keep themselves cool. Once the doors open, the entire crew bolts out of the train and runs up a big set of stairs in search of taxis. Team Who is first to get away clean, and David gives his driver some extra encouragement on the way out of the station.

Now that we're here, Phil fills us in on exactly what it is the teams are doing -- as it turns out, they have to drive along Highway 47 and search for a yellow-and-red billboard that says "Get Here," where they'll find the clue. The teams trailing Team Who -- the clowns, Tian and Jaree, the Chipsters, Chuck and Millie, and Kelly and BuffJon -- are all grabbing cabs now, and the Chipsters even change taxis once because the one they originally get hooked up with doesn't have enough gas for the trip. The teams start to take off and fly down the highway. My favorite shot in this section is this lady all dressed in bright purple, riding sidesaddle on the back of a guy's motorcycle. Now that is a bad-ass chick. If I weren't a boring Midwestern government worker, I would thoroughly enjoy being a lady in India dressed in bright purple and riding sideways on the back of a motorcycle.

David tries to get to know his driver by asking his name. According to the yellow captions, the driver tells them that his name is Money, although it would be interesting to know what he actually said. Certainly, the boys think he said "Money," because they launch into the obligatory "Money-Man! You're the Money-Man!" patter, which I'd like to think I'm too dignified for, but I'm probably not. It's probably exactly what I would do, if I successfully restrained myself from going for some far worse and far more involved pun. ["I went with 'big money, big money, no whammies -- STOP!' Probably a bad call." -- Sars] Among other things, Team Who is just generally wound very tight, and you get the feeling that they have been really struggling with dumb mistakes early and feeling like if they could break out of their slump, they could take a lot of the rest of these people without too much trouble. And if they can solve their navigation (and idiocy) problems, I tend to agree.

Back at the cab corral, Chip is still trying to make sure the cab they're grabbing has enough gas in it. "Chip," Reichen says finally, "we're spending too much time arguing. Let's go." Chip pops the trunk, drops his pack in, and they're off. Well-handled, I think, on Reichen's part, because it didn't come off like whining or a put-down. I always think the most impressive thing you can do on this show is successfully communicate an opinion different from your partner's without sounding obnoxious.

On the road, Tian and Jaree are just ahead of Millie and Chuck as they search for the flag. Millie and Chuck, meanwhile, note Kelly and Jon behind them, trying to pass. BuffJon tries to get their driver to pass Millie and Chuck. Chuck laments that, indeed, they're falling behind. "I know, Chuck," Millie says. "Please tell him to go faster." Much as Millie bugs me, I don't blame her for this comment, necessarily -- it's entirely possible she had already noticed that Chuck had better luck directing the driver than she did. As they drive alongside Jon and Kelly, Kelly says with something approaching surprise, "She does not like us! She won't even wave." "She doesn't even wave," Jon agrees, in a similar indignant tone. Oh, please. You don't have to be friends, but then don't be surprised when the people you detest aren't friendly to you either. "Wave," indeed. "What did you do to her? Did you say something to her or something?" Kelly wonders, which is what makes me think that as obnoxious as Kelly has been, she hasn't been obnoxious to Millie's face up to this point, so she's wondering how she got busted. She seems not to account for the fact that when you're talking shit as much as she does, there's always the risk that someone else entirely is going to tattle on you -- any one of a number of people could have let on to Millie what Kelly says about her when she's not around. Jon, dragging out the long-dead joke for another trip through the wringer, claims that all he did was call her "Moley-Moley-Moley-Moley Mooooooole." The joke moans in agony from overwork. Jon needs to shut up. Badly.

Al and ClownJon and Tian and Jaree all lament the difficulty of spotting the clue from a cab. Among other things, they feel like half the stuff they drive by is red and yellow. Of course, it's the age of McDonald's, so you'd think so.

Chip and Reichen are having an interesting driver experience, in that their guy is slow, but he seems to be good at wiggling in and out of traffic. He's also barefoot, so that's an interesting feature. I think you can trust any taxi driver who will let you inspect his toes.

David and Jeff are just beginning to wonder whether they've passed the clue, because they've been on the road for half an hour or so. That would be the hardest thing about this clue, I think -- you wouldn't have the comfort of even knowing if you'd missed it entirely. Just then, though, they spot the billboard and yell at the driver to pull over. He does, and as the cars honk at them, they run across the street to the clue box through traffic, all "woop woop woop!" like the Three Stooges. (Except that there are two of them, of course.) Ah, just another near-death experience on the highways of India. The route marker tells them that they need to get to a sports field in Alleppey, which Phil explains is a twenty-five-mile taxi ride from the billboard. The boys hop back in the cab and tell Money to hurry along to the sports field. They're following what I would call The Bulk Email Theory: Make Money Fast. (See? See? I would have been so much worse.)

Tian and Jaree, Chuck and Millie, Kelly and BuffJon, and the clowns all seem to spot the billboard relatively close to each other, and they all scoot across the street to get to it. They all pull it, rip it, and read it, and then they're all off. Tian and Jaree note that they're glad they were able to find the route marker in the sea of red and yellow, while in his cab, ClownJon makes sure the driver knows where he's going. Not only does he know where he's going, but they weasel past Tian and Jaree into second place, behind only the currently ass-kicking Team Who.

Chuck and Millie, on the other hand, have fallen on hard times as their cab runs so low on gas that their driver has to stop. As they wait for him to fill up, Chuck tells Millie to watch and see who passes them on the road. Kelly and BuffJon see that there's a team that's stopped, and as they fly by, Jon remarks that he thinks it's "Millie Mole." That joke writes a letter to OSHA, complaining that its working conditions are leading it into an early grave. I don't mind, however, the part where Jon laughs happily about having passed Millie and Chuck, because after all, the race aspect does require you to try to beat everyone else. Chuck laments the bad cab luck.

Chip and Reichen are just making it to the billboard, having apparently learned that their cab's maneuverability didn't make up for its general slowness. Maybe their driver was barefoot in park. Wow, see that? I'm getting worse. They need to end the taxi sequence before somebody gets hurt. Like Sars.

Millie and Chuck's bad taxicab karma continues; their cab suddenly fills with smoke and the driver has to pull over, as Millie says, "Oh, gosh, oh, gosh." As Chuck explains, once they got the gas situation resolved, the cab proceeded to overheat. We see the teams who aren't having trouble -- Who, the clowns, Tian and Jaree, and Kelly and BuffJon -- speeding toward Alleppey as Chuck explains that they believe the only team that's left behind them is the Chipsters. Indeed, the Chipsters are bringing up the rear at the moment, but they're doing everything they can to remedy that situation, as Chip promises the driver more money if he gets them where they're going quickly. Millie and Chuck's hapless driver, meanwhile, fills the radiator with water as Millie stews.

Commercials. Yeah, I like my Toyota, too, but not that much.

As the Chuck/Millie cab continues to spew angry blasts of steam, Millie suggests that they talk to some people across the street to see if they can get a fresh cab. Elsewhere, as if the teams haven't taken enough abuse from the cab gods, it turns out that the Chipsters' worst nightmare has come true, and their cab indeed needs to stop and fuel up as well. Moreover, when they fuel up, they've made it so clear that they're in a huge hurry that the driver is blackmailing them with a demand for extra money for gas in addition to the fare. Millie and Chuck's driver, meanwhile, sells Chuck on the idea that their taxi really should be okay now that he's filled up with water, so Chuck and Millie wind up waving off the folks they were asking for the new cab and climbing into their old cab again. "Oh, please, Lord, just let this car make it there." The Lord spits a mouthful of water in a graceful arc.

Asking their driver to wait for them, Team Who hops out of their cab at the sports field and runs to the clue box, with Jon and Al right behind them. The clue turns out to hold the instructions for this week's Roadblock. The task is to hold onto something very much like a water skiing rope while two bulls drag you on your belly through a shallow pond of what is being euphemistically referred to as "mud." The trick is basically the hanging on itself, because the bulls race like horses, and they move pretty quickly. Wow, that looks like...fun. I mean, if you like it when buses drive by you and cover you with mud, and you can only imagine improving the experience with the introduction of suspect organic material into the equation. One of the tricks is that only one team can go at a time, so if you can't hold on, you lose your spot and may have to go to the back of the line, if there is one.

David takes the Roadblock for Team Who, and Al takes it for the clowns. David will be our first racer to experience this undoubtedly lovely ritual.

The Chipsters, who have now entered into open hostility with their driver as a result of the gas money fiasco, now find that he's lagging on the drive to the field. Chip chastises himself in an interview for not getting a better cab or making sure it had enough gas.

Meanwhile, Tian and Jaree are being closely followed by Kelly and BuffJon. These teams both screech up to the clue box, with Tian and Jaree in the lead, and Tian takes the Roadblock for her team. Jon will be taking the Roadblock for himself and Kelly, unsurprisingly. Yeah, I don't think you put a girl who says "potty water" face-down in a mud hole.

David's team of bulls takes off, and he hangs on tight, being dragged for quite a while and successfully reaching the end of the course on his first try, or so it appears. The assembled crowd cheers. He looks very, very disgusting as he emerges from the mud. Looking rather like a monster from The Planet Clorox Not So Much Forgot As Broke Up With And Got A Restraining Order Against, David comments that he neglected to take his shirt or shoes off, so basically everything he had with him was filthy. They pull the clue at the end of the Roadblock and are directed to a route marker on Beach Road in Alleppey. Out in the lead now, the boys ask their driver to please hurry as they head out.

Al has what look to be his swim trunks on, and I have to say that my first thought was that those were not going to stay on under the prevailing conditions, but it appears that they do. As we see him do the bull drag, Al voices over that he kept his eyes and mouth closed as much as he could, but he still was loath to think about what was getting into his various bodily orifices. In a country where I understand the advice to be "don't drink the tap water," I have to wonder what the advice would be about taking a belly-bath in the pit of "mud."

As Tian sets up for the Roadblock, Jaree voices over that she and Tian have been "kicking butt" in the last leg or so, and she's hoping that it will continue. Tian is wearing the clothes I'm most sad about, because she seems to have not only a reasonably nice black shirt on, but also a nice pair of light khaki pants. Bummer. She gets down and tries to hang on to the bar, but as soon as the bulls take off, she pops clean off. This gives BuffJon the turn, and he seems not to have trouble with it. Before you know it, he's dirty, but he's done. When he's out, Kelly encourages him to hustle up and get his shoes on while she grabs the clue. I have to think they gave these people some kind of an opportunity to at least rinse off, because otherwise, I can't imagine how they got back in the taxis. I don't know how many rules these particular cabbies have, but I'm thinking there has to be one that says, "Please Do Not Drip Manure On The Seats." "That was yucky," BuffJon comments. Kelly reads the clue, and they're off.

On Tian's second try, she never really seems to have hold of the bar in the first place, and one of the guys is still sort of trying to help her adjust her grip when the bulls take off, so she never really goes anywhere on this attempt before the bulls fly off without her. Tian voices over that she had a hard time getting her hands around the bar. One of the guys running the bulls chastises her to "please hold properly," and she assures him that she's doing the best she can. Meanwhile, Millie and Chuck pull up behind them, and see BuffJon and Kelly skittering off in the direction of the clue. Jaree notes the arrival of another team and tells Tian she needs to get it in gear. Millie and Chuck grab their clue, as Tian voices over that she was starting to wonder whether she was going to be able to do the task at all.

Commercials. If there were no Applebee's, your house would probably burn up in a fire. IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?

One of the guys tries to help Tian get her hands firmly around the bar as Jaree continues to cheer her on. "You're a surfer chick!" she yells. "Surfer chicks hang on, man!" Quite tellingly, meanwhile, Millie's reaction to the scene is to say, "Please let it be a Roadblock...it is! Okay, it's you." Nice. This is not a democracy. It's a Millie-ocracy.

Tian gets a much better start this time, with her hands up on the high part of the bar and her body up out of the water as they're starting, much as the guys were doing. Once she survives the initial jolt of the bulls starting, which is what threw her the first two times, she's just fine, and she rides out the rest of the task. As she gets up out of the water, she does the check to see if her breasts are still inside her top, logically enough, and when she sees that they are, she makes her way over to where Jaree is waiting. "You rock, surfer chick!" Jaree yells.

The Chipsters are approaching the field, being promised by folks on the street that it's not far now.

In the cab on the way to the clue, Tian and Jaree are bantering. "You look sexy as shit right now," Jaree says to a laughing Tian, "with all that mud on you. I swear to God. That's hot, dude, that's totally hot." Hee. I like them. "At least I'm getting a facial," Tian says in her chipper voice. "Yup," Jaree says, then pauses. "Was that just strictly mud? Straight-up mud?" Tian smiles and says through clenched teeth, "Probably not." That was an awesome little scene.

Chuck finishes the Roadblock. Yep, he knows how to hold the stick. Just as they peel out, the Chipsters are arriving. In the cab, Chuck notes that the Chipsters will be going all-out (he actually says "full-fledge," but...no), so in order to win, he and Millie need to do the same, only do it faster without making any mistakes. Well, that's...indisputable reasoning in the sense of being entirely circular, I guess.

At the Roadblock, Reichen takes it for the team because it's his turn, but he is none too happy about it. He finishes quick, but assures us that it was very disgusting. And Reichen does not enjoy disgusting. "After all that, we're fuckin' last," he complains in the taxi as they leave.

Up near the front, Team Who notes that someone is behind them, and it turns out to be the clowns, in whose cab Al is taking the opportunity to change his disgusting shirt. So if you like some hairy shirtless muddy Al, here's where you can pick some up. Kelly and Jon are following, followed by Tian and Jaree, an inhaler-sucking Millie and Chuck, and finally Chip and Reichen.

Team Who runs up to the clue box and pulls the clue, with Al and Jon screaming up right behind them. At this point, it's time for this week's Detour. The choices this week are Baskets and Trunks. In Baskets, the team will load ten live chickens into the baskets on a traditional bicycle-wagon, and then they'll have to drive it themselves to a farm that's been circled on a map. It's a relatively physically demanding task, but they can go as fast as they can pedal, pretty much. In Trunks, you ride an elephant to deliver two bales of fabric to a shop near a church, also circled on the map. It seems to me that the reasonable analysis is that the chickens are probably somewhat faster, but (a) they're much harder; and (b) you don't get to ride an elephant. So part of it is whether you're up for a physically demanding task, and part of it is Salad/Dessert where Jumbo is the cherries jubilee.

Based on the theory that live chickens are tough to handle, Team Who goes with the elephant, as do the clowns. As they explain, ClownJon and Al are, of course, more familiar with elephants than probably anybody else here, so they never doubted they wanted to work with the big guys. After all, who ever saw a chicken in the circus? Chickens don't do tricks. ["More's the pity. Chickens = instant humor, in my book." -- Sars] Anyway, both teams of guys get up on their elephants at about the same time, just as Kelly and BuffJon are arriving. Having seen Who and the clowns take off on the elephants as they were arriving, Kelly and BuffJon choose the same, and before you know it, they're off.

As we see David and Jeff making their way through town on the elephant, they regretfully give a thumbs-down to the elephant-riding experience. "Riding an elephant is painful," David says. "The spine of that elephant is very close to the skin, and so you feel it right up the old, uh...you know, friendly family there." In the interview footage, there's a pause while Jeff takes this in, and then his bland countenance busts out in a "what he hell did you just say?" guffaw. The clowns' elephant doesn't seem to be any less skinny, as ClownJon interviews that he found it quite painful as well. "I will tell you it was very painful," he says. "Without saying any more." Aw, not even "the old friendly family"? Because I enjoy remarks that are both off-color and completely nonsensical.

Tian and Jaree pull up to the Detour. Jaree interviews that from the beginning of the race, all she really wanted was to ride an elephant. She also isn't crazy about dealing with the live chickens, so she pushes for Trunks. Tian, concerned that the bikes might be faster (because you wouldn't offer the Baskets as an option if the bike were more uncomfortable and involved live chickens and weren't faster), hesitates, but she eventually gives in. As BuffJon and Kelly take off on their elephant, Millie and Chuck come flying up the road. While they're rereading the clue, Tian and Jaree -- who are already on the elephant -- realize that they didn't grab the fabric they were supposed to get, so they have to get back down and get it. This news doesn't come fast enough, though, so their elephant handler gets the elephant standing up before they get the news across, meaning that now they have to go through sitting the elephant down and standing him up again. Millie and Chuck hop up on their elephant and manage to get out of Dodge while Tian and Jaree are still hassling over the cargo they didn't pick up. In fact, while the girls' cargo problems are still being dealt with, Chip and Reichen show up.

The Chipsters note Millie and Chuck leaving on the elephants, followed by Tian and Jaree and the cargo they've finally fetched, so the fellas know that they're in a rough spot. They figure that their only option is to pick something that might make up some time, so -- chickens it is. The chickens don't actually appear to be too spry, so the guys don't have much trouble getting them into the baskets, and then they take off with Reichen riding the bike and Chip running alongside and navigating.

Team Who is finding its way to the drop-off point for the fabric. On the Jon/Kelly elephant, things are even uglier. "I'm in so much pain," BuffJon complains. "You are? I've got a chain up my cookie!" Kelly responds. I'm sorry, I need to lie down.

Okay, I'm back. I'm sorry, did she say "cookie"? It's a rare expression that I can manage to find both cutesy and vulgar. Quite an accomplishment. In an interview, BuffJon says that he would "rather have gotten dragged for two hours by the bulls in poop than go on that elephant for five minutes." You can indeed see that Jon's sitting posture on the elephant suggest Man In Extreme Discomfort. Hee. "My cookie's killin' me," Kelly repeats in the interview. Man. "Cookie" and "Millie Mole" need a labor union.

The Who/Clown Express has made its way to the shop to drop off the fabric. A curious crowd awaits. They drop it off and grab the clue, which tells them to get to the pit stop. Phil explains that the pit stop for the leg is at a place called The Finishing Point, which I gather is just the spot where a local boat race customarily ends. Oh, and "the last team to check in here will be eliminated." WHAT? Ooooh, eeeeevil. They specifically threw that in there just to confuse us. Bastards. Hee.

The navigating is being a little rough on both Kelly and BuffJon and Millie and Chuck, as a bit of snappishness is exchanged between both couples. Elsewhere, Tian and Jaree are suffering navigation difficulties, too.

The Chipsters, meanwhile, are happily biking along to their destination -- or at least Reichen is biking. Chip is running. Rough gig. At one point, he yells at Reichen to take a right, but then stops to double-check with someone that he's right, employing the ever-popular Randomly Generated Funny Accent method of trying to get strangers in other countries to understand you. He has to call Reichen back from the turn he just told him to make, and Reichen's not happy about that at all. "Are you reading the map right?" Reichen says with frustration once he's turned around. "Honey, I think so," Chip says as he runs along behind the bike. "I want to show you, but you're not slowing down." Hee. Map-reading -- the universal fight-starter.

Elsewhere, Jeff tells his driver, "We're looking for a red and yellow flag." "Yes, I know," says their exasperated driver. A slightly sheepish Jeff leans back in his seat. For whatever reason, the only electric guitar music that has ever shown up on this show ever, as far as I can remember, accompanies the boys as they sprint toward the mat. They're young! They're hip! It takes a guitar to capture their mad crazy young-hip quality! Anyway, they run toward Phil, filth and white shirts flying. When we see the mat: Knock-knock! Who's there? Exactly! (Heh. I got a million of those. And they're all about that good, so...pack your first aid kits accordingly.) Welcome, Team Who, you are team number one. It is at this point, incidentally, that I remarked to Pool Boy, "They are kicking the shit out of this thing right now." And I stand by that assessment. Which means that the time there's an elimination, they're probably so gone. Phil tells them that in addition to being in first, they have won another cruise. Damn. They never used to give away cruises for winning legs. I am expecting the class action lawsuit by first-season leg-winners any minute now. "And," Phil adds, looking at David, "you need a shower." Hee! I lurve Phil.

Jon and Al run up to the mat. Welcome, you clowns, you are team number two. They're happy.

Kelly and BuffJon have located the shop, and they get their fabric dropped off. Millie and Chuck have caught up to them and are right with them as they get off the elephants. Both teams pile into little moped-and-canopy cabs (the ones they called "tuk-tuks" when we were in Thailand) and head for the pit stop.

Tian and Jaree, now at the back of the elephant-team pack, are still hunting for the shop, while Chip and Reichen are looking for the chicken farm. Interestingly enough, they first manage to dock at the wrong chicken farm. Man, I hate that. Then they manage to get stuck on a road where they can't fit the bike between two cars, and have to get a guy to help them get one of the cars to move. Reichen also seems to be getting tired -- that bike looks like it may conceivably weigh a ton -- and Chip offers to give him a push if need be. Tian and Jaree, elephanting! Chipsters, biking! Where's the chicken farm? Where's the church?

Reichen and Chip find the chicken farm and deliver the chickens, and Tian and Jaree get to the church and deliver the fabric. Finishing Point! And step on it!

The Chipster and Tian/Jaree taxis head for the pit stop, where Kelly and BuffJon are just now jumping onto the mat. Welcome, Team Needs A New Damn Joke, Already! You are team number three. Just behind them, Chuck and Millie check in at number four.

Cab race! Pit stop! Who will be eliminated! And...damn, I don't hate either of these teams. Damn. Anyway, go! Go! Phil waits at the pit stop with the pretty greeter. And running up to the mat, it's...the Chipsters. Who I don't hate or anything, but...damn. Welcome, Chipsters, you are team number five. And I don't know what the fuss is all about -- I like that hug. I think that hug looks quite sufficiently lovey.

Here come Tian and Jaree up to the finish line. They're a little too peppy -- I'd say they haven't caught on yet that the boys did the chickens and passed them. They step up, and are Philiminated. Tian interviews that she isn't disappointed -- she saw great things, and they did the best they could. She makes the rather unfortunate remark that they started losing when they stopped fighting, which may perhaps be true in a strictly chronological sense, but I think they did the right thing about six different ways by deciding to stop being so bitchy to each other, and in the end, they didn't lose because they weren't fighting, I don't think. I'll miss them; they were tough, and did a good job, and I do hate to see both of the chick teams bounced in two consecutive shows. Que sera, sera, I suppose.

Executive Producer? Jerry Bruckheimer.

week: More line drama. More Millie drama. People falling in the water. Big clown arms. Whee!