Amazing Race 14
Episode Eleven:
He Made Me Look Like Alice Cooper!
TO BE CONTINUED
...when we were so rudely interrupted by the faux pit stop, Phil was telling Jaime and Cara that they were team number one; but then he let the other shoe drop by saying “…but guys, this leg of the Race is not over yet, you are still racing, here is your next clue…”
Just to reset: the teams were told that they were heading the to the next pit stop and to go to the North Gate of the Beijing Drum Tower. Technically, they were still on a journey to the pit stop, but this time instead of finding a clue box at the Drum Tower, Phil’s role had been reduced to merely handing out clues.
One other consideration about the use of the mock pit stop. The Puli Brothers think that this trick is hardest on the team in last place, because realizing that they are likely last, and facing elimination, disappointment begins to set in and destroys any motivation to race further. All the other teams are still highly motivated and excited, with the energy to at least hold onto their place.
As Margie and Luke leave the Drum Tower to find a cab, Luke is racing ahead of his mom, and yells back, “Mom, let’s go!” to which Margie replies as she is getting in the cab: “Yell at me again and I’m finished!” and then in a inserted scene from a pit stop she elaborates saying, “The longer were on the Race, the harder it is. I just don’t want to hear him yell mom one more time,” which seems to indicate that she is okay with intra- team frustration boiling to the surface, it is just inter-team frustration that she deems inappropriate.
Route Info: Shops at Bei Hai Dong Men
The clue that Phil hands the teams at the drum tower tells them to head for the ‘Bai Hai Dong Men’ shopping district. This is another one of those place-name spelling issues: ‘Bai Hai’ or ‘Baihai’ does not result in many search results, but ‘Beihei,’ which appears to mean North Sea, is both a city in China, and a park very near the faux pit stop. Therefore, I am going with the more common spelling, because the park is beautiful and worth looking at.
The entry on the Beijing Trip Web site shows both spellings in its description of the park, and the Travel China Guide Web site describes “This ancient garden, with over 1,000 years’ history, is not only a classic combination of the grandiosity of the northern gardens and the refinement of the southern gardens in China, but also a perfect integration of magnificent imperial palaces and solemn religious constructions.”
Once the teams arrive at the street with a variety of small shops, they have to search the stores for the Travelocity Roaming Gnome. Teams are told that their next clue is on the bottom of the Roaming Gnome, and as usual, the teams are instructed to bring the gnome with them to the next pit stop.
Again the park (and therefore I’ll assume the shopping district) does not appear to be very far from the Drum Tower.
Route Info: Roaming Gnome
Teams seem to struggle as they search for the Roaming Gnome, and between searching for a cab, the cab rides, and locating a gnome, the lead changes. When the first team finds a gnome we see the clue of the bottom of the gnome reads:
Find the marked bicycles across the moat
from Gu Gong Xi Bei Jaio. Ride them to
Dong Dan Tie Zhan (Dong Dan subway
station), by way of Tiananmen Square.
Search near one of the entrances of the
subway station for your next clue.
At the same time as the first team is reading the clue, a caption on the screen tells us that Gu Gong is the ‘Forbidden City.’
Route Info: Gu Gong Xi Bei Jaio
Travel China Guide offers a good but brief description of the Forbidden City, while the Wikipedia entry has more details and history.
The marked bicycles are in fact small electric powered commuter bikes that look quite useful for getting around a city. Giant is one of the largest manufacturers of these bikes but the manufacture's name was never displayed, and I cannot find a Giant model in the US that has the distinctive shape of the one used in Beijing.
This has been the hardest Race to estimate times and the number of days the teams have been racing—mostly because of the indeterminate length pit stops or departure times that don't match possible arrival times given a 12-hour pit stop duration.
The teams arrived in Beijing around 8:00 PM, and it was almost ten o’clock when we see a clock as the cheerleaders are entering the swimming pool complex. So it must have been around midnight when the teams were arriving at the faux pit stop.
Now it appears as if the teams have been racing through the night, as the sun is beginning to rise as the teams get to the Forbidden City to find the bikes. It is also quite cold in the early morning air.
As Victor and Tammy are riding through Tiananmen Square Victor comments: ‘Doing their military exercises in the morning, that’s so cool.” The Puli Brothers were a little surprised by this comment although Victor isn’t that young, as we always find the square a makes us a little uneasy, in remembrance of this place in a different time.
When the teams arrive at the subway station they get their next clue.
Detour: Beijing Opera or Chinese Waiter
A detour is a choice between two tasks…and Phil describes the tasks “as Beijing professions famous throughout the world.”
In ‘Beijing Opera’ teams will make their way to the Beijing Opera house, where they must apply stage make-up and costumes to portray a princess and a Chinese gentleman. When they are in costume the team members will walk onto the stage of the Beijing Opera to take a bow, and get their next clue from the opera master.
In this case, Beijing Opera is both a place (the Huguang Guild Hall), and a Chinese cultural event. The Travel China Guide Web site has a good short description, and Wikipedia goes into more detail, including a description of what the different colors in the make-up signify.
The opera makeup gives us the episode title, when Margie states that Luke's make-up application made her look like Alice Cooper.
In ‘Chinese Waiter’ teams will make their way to the Huguang Hui Guan restaurant where they will choose a table. The customers at the table will order their food in Mandarin. The team must write down each person’s order, and when they have all the orders they will go to the chef and tell him what to cook. When the team gets the dishes correct, the chef will cook them, and then the team will serve each dish to the correct person.
The dishes are: Good Luck Fish (a whole fried fish); Vegetarian Noodles; Fried Chicken (a whole fried chicken including the head with beak, eyes and comb still attached); Golden Pork Spareribs; and New Taste Beef. At first I thought this task favored Tammy and Victor, but as Victor says when they make mistakes, the Chinese language is nuanced, and Victor confuses fish for squid. In the end phonetically was the way to go, and it probably didn't favor them any more than putting on makeup for the opera favored the cheerleaders.
The restaurant is near the opera house so that regardless of the task the teams will be close together—and near the second U-turn. As they leave the restaurant at the opera complex Tammy and Victor find someone to ask where the U-turn location is, but the other teams spend a long time wandering the streets looking for the building.
Tammy and Victor choose to U-turn Kisha and Jen, claiming that the Sisters could out run the Lawyers to the final mat. But Kisha and Jen do really good at the waiter task, completing the other task or the detour as required by the U-turn relatively quickly.
A lot has been made of Cara and Jaime’s bad luck with taxi’s and it continues in Beijing as they are the only team who’s cab driver takes them to the site of the Chinese National Opera, rather than the Huguang Guild Hall theatre.
Route Info: Dong Hua Men Yi Shi Street Market
At the completion of the Detour, teams are directed to a street market, where they will find their next clue.
Roadblock: Who Has a Taste for Adventure
A roadblock is a task that only one team member…and by the title of this one, avid Race fans know this is one to avoid.
In this roadblock a team member will have to eat fried Chinese street food including: grasshoppers; scorpions; larvae; and starfish. The starfish has to be broken down, and the insides look a lot like the green parts of a lobster or crab, and it is not likely you can fry this enough to make it taste good. Victor, who is first to start the Roadblock, starts to eat the snacks raw, as he didn’t realize it would at least be fried. But despite frying he still calls it nasty.
All the teams struggle to swallow the street food, and almost all of the teams ask if there is any ketchup available.
Route Info: Niao Chao (Bird’s Nest)
Once they have eaten their Chinese delicacies the teams are again directed towards a pit stop, this time at the Niao Chao Olympic Stadium which Phil calls the center-piece of the Beijing Olypics.
This map shows all the locations in Beijing, and you may have to zoom out to see all the sites. In terms of mileages it is less than a mile from the Drum Tower to Beihai Park, and about a mile from the park to the Forbidden City. While we don’t know the exact address of the shopping street, it was likely not too far off the path from the Drum Tower to the Forbidden City. The bicycle ride from the Forbidden City through Tiananmen Square to the subway station was about 3.25 miles, which is the same distance as the trip from the subway station to the correct opera house. Using main thoroughfares, which appears to be a less direct route to the stadium, but which was likely faster, is about 10.5 miles.
View AR_14_31_Beijing_02 in a larger map
Victor and Tammy arrive first, and win an eight-day, guided tour with a trained naturalist of the Galapagos Islands from Travelocity.
Margie and Luke are team number two.
Kisha and Jen arrive at the food Roadblock first, but Jen struggles to eat the food, following each bite with a big swig of water. Cara just throws the food down without complaint—in fact it almost seems like she is enjoying it.
Kisha and Jen still finish first, but struggle to get a cab. In the cab drinking so much water begins to take its toll on Jen, and the producers must love it cause it really was a race to the mat.
In the end, Jen has to stop at porta-potty near the pit stop, and while she is there the Cheerleaders arrive and find Phil first making Jaime and Cara team number three (although Phil starts with an “I’m sorry to tell you…”)
So did a potty break cost the sisters the Race? Possibly, and while the sisters are disappointed they take the elimination well stating that they both enjoyed the experience and took pride in their efforts.
Next Week:
Jaime learns that it isn't just foreign cab drivers that frustrate her…