TAR S29 E11: The underdogs are now top dogs

Anyonghaseyeo chingu! How are you? I must say that was a very disappointing leg in Seoul because of the way Matt & Red were eliminated. I think a team should be eliminated if they mess up a roadblock or detour, but simply getting lost because you can't communicate with your taxi driver? That's disappointing as Matt & Red actually did pretty well with all three tasks in Seoul. Having said that, none of the other teams seemed to have any trouble navigating their way around Seoul, so were Matt & Red responsible for their elimination in Seoul by putting too much trust in their taxi driver who misunderstood them? And how about Brooke & Scott's surprise win in Seoul? Wow. We shall talk more about that. But as always, let's do the statistics and see where the team stack up with just one leg left in this season.

Shame we didn't see more of the famous sights of Seoul in this episode.

Average rankings after 11 legs

Matt & Red 2.55 (eliminated in Seoul)
Tara & Joey 3.18
Brooke & Scott 4.36
London & Logan 5

But this leg proves that statistics mean little in this game - Matt & Red were eliminated despite still being the strongest team on record thus far in this season after 11 legs of the race. That is why Brooke & Scott's and London & Logan's performance in Seoul was a shock and in the words of Phil, the underdogs are now the top dogs - both teams finished the last roadblock at the same time and it came down to a taxi ride to determine which team finished first. It was a tense episode as it was hard to tell when Tara would finally get the hang on the video game whilst Matt was clearly quite comfortable with it. If Matt & Red had gotten a different taxi driver, the result might have been quite different in Seoul. I have expressed my feelings about some of Redmond's uncouth behaviour in this race, but even I felt bad for them because of the circumstances of their elimination. It is almost like going to the Olympics and being forced to concede a match because your driver took a wrong turn on the way to the competition hall rather than because you had a fair fight - but such is the nature of TAR and successfully navigating your way with taxis is part of the game.

There is a huge language barrier in Korea! 

Don't be fooled by the ultra-modernity of Seoul - few people there speak English for a simple reason: Korea is so homogeneous, most of the people living there are Koreans and even the expats there usually manage to learn enough Korean to get by. So if practically everyone there is either Korean or at least a Korean-speaking foreigner, then there is little incentive for the locals to speak English. Sure it is taught at school and some of the Koreans involved in the Kimchi making and video game challenges speak some English, but flag down a taxi in the middle of Seoul and chances are, your taxi driver is going to speak very little English. What do should tourists do to avoid what happened to Matt & Red then? Here's a rather famous viral video to give you an idea of the standard of English in South Korea.

So you're given an address (in this case, Hanyang University) - unless it is written in Korean like so 한양대학교, your taxi driver may not be able to read the English address and may not understand you well enough to know where you want to go, especially since the A sound in Korean is more like an ah - so the Han in Hanyang should rhyme with 'bun' and not 'ban', but Americans who don't speak Korean will tend to default to using the 'eh' sound as in 'ban' when they see a word like Hanyang. The racers were at Gangnam Station - try to find someone who speaks English, perhaps a high class restaurant. boutique or hotel would have English-speaking staff. Then ask the English-speaking person to write down Hanyang University in Korean like so 한양대학교 , then when you get into the taxi you can show the taxi driver an address in Korean which he can read. You should always do that in any country where they use a non-Western script (Japan, China, Cambodia, Taiwan, Thailand, etc) - yes you may lose a few minutes running to the nearest hotel, but the teams were gambling on getting a taxi driver who spoke some English. That's a gamble that worked out okay for three out of the four teams admittedly, but is that a risk worth taking on TAR?

Seeing Seoul by night 

This was a leg that was mostly run at night - the racers landed at Incheon airport in the late afternoon but by the time they made it into Gangnam, it was already dark. This reminded me of leg 5 in Milan which was partly run at night and we didn't get to see some of Milan's most popular sights. I do wonder why the producers are having these 'night legs' though. Since the teams are clearly no longer booking their own flights from one country to another, the producers could have picked a flight that landed in Seoul earlier in the day that allowed the teams to run this leg in daylight. Not that it would much difference to the tasks, but at least it would have given the teams more options with transport should any of the teams wanted to use public transport instead of taxis and public transport options are limited very late at night. It is also far easier to find a taxi earlier in the day as well. If you are going to do something in Seoul at night, then at least do something to feature Seoul's vibrant nightlife or how about a K-pop related challenge - but instead, we got cup stacking, kimchi making and video games? That is a bit odd to say the least as neither cup stacking nor Street Fighter tournaments are really that Korean - it almost felt like the kimchi challenge was thrown in as an afterthought, just to make sure you show the viewers something quintessentially, stereotypically Korean in this leg.

Kimchi and TAR

I thought that the Kimchi making challenge was a bit lame - sorry, but it didn't look all that challenging. All the teams had to do was follow the demonstration and make sure every cabbage leaf was well coated. Sure it showcased a popular aspect of Korean culture, but compared to the other two challenges, it definitely came across as a lot easier. May I refer you to TAR China Rush S3, in leg 3, when the teams visited Jilin, the province on the border with North Korea, the teams had a Kimchi themed detour dubbed "pot luck or pot belly" - in pot luck, teams had to balance a pot (traditionally used for preparing kimchi) on their heads and walk around a courtyard (a lot harder than it sounds, the teams really struggled with it). In pot belly, the teams had to eat a 1.2 kg plate of spicy kimchi - now that was just pure evil and there was a lot of vomiting involved. Yucks. Compared to "pot luck or pot belly", the kimchi making challenge in this episode was a breeze. But let's move on to the difficult road block in this leg: Street Fighter.

Street fighter and video games in Korea

Oh South Koreans love their video games - gaming culture is huge in South Korea. However, Street Fighter was in fact a Japanese game created way back in 1987. I must have last played it in 1997, when I left the army and yeah, I remember how much I used to enjoy it but I suppose it was something I have outgrown. TAR likes making racers take on experts in a popular local activity - we have already seen that in E1 in Panama where many of the teams took on the experts in a cayuco canoe race. I also remember TAR S21 E1 in Shanghai, when one team member had to score one point in a game of table tennis against a 10-year-old Chinese national junior table tennis champion in order to receive their next clue. For each attempt after their first, the table tennis champion would play with an ordinary household object such as a clipboard, frying pan, or tambourine instead of a paddle. The handicaps are designed for comedy effect - but even when playing a blindfolded expert using only one hand, Tara still struggled with the computer game. I feel for her but that was when Joey got really quite nasty in the way he attacked the gamer playing Tara.

Don't hate the player, hate the game. 

Look, these challenges are designed to be difficult - the actors or experts who are engaged to be a part of the show are under instructions from the directors, they do as they are told. Tara sucked at Street Fighter, that much we can tell - I don't even want to quote all the nasty things that Joey said about the Korean teenager, he just sounded like a really nasty sore loser. I don't want to quote the words of an inarticulate, angry reality TV contestant with no class, it would cheapen the tone of this blog. The key mistake that Tara made was that she kept switching characters - now every Street Fighter character is unique and has different special power moves. Even if you have never played the game before, the sensible thing to do would be to pick one character, stick with your choice of character and figure out how to operate this character until you can win. Every time Tara switched character, she had to figure a new character out from scratch since she had never played the game before. I am surprised her instructor didn't point that out to her, even I found myself shouting at my computer, "stop switching characters Tara!" Joey expected the gamer she was playing to give her a break or a chance, but that's clearly not up to him and definitely not how TAR works.

So, imagine if we cast our minds back to that aluminium strainer making challenge in Dar Es Salaam back in leg 4. Imagine if the Tanzanian judge encountered one of the racers who was a young, pretty female (ooh someone like Brooke for example) who begged, pleaded, flirted or cried when presenting a badly made strainer to him at the roadblock and for some reason, he felt sorry for her and accepted the poorly made strainer. However, all the other racers were subject to the same strict standards - that would not only appear incredibly unfair to the other racers, but would make the fans of the show extremely displeased with the producers. After all, it is down to the production team to ensure that the race is at the very least fair to the racers, that they have to all complete the same challenges, to the same standard without any favours or anyone getting a "break"out of sympathy. By all means, use your charms and beg, flirt, cajole, persuade your way to get any help you may need from strangers or other racers, such as when London got Floyd to help her in Ninh Binh, despite Floyd merely passing out from the heat at that point. But don't expect an expert employed by the production team to bend the rules for you just because you're not having a good day. The nasty way Joey dealt with that situation shows you what he would be like in real life - but more on this later.

A good mix of challenges for all the racers

What I do like about this leg however, is the fact that none of the challenges were that physical - the cup stacking challenge required coordination and dexterity, rather than brute strength. The video game challenge would clearly favour those who have played the game before (like Matt and Scott) but at least someone who was a bit older, fatter or weaker wouldn't be at any kind of disadvantage as long as they were fast learners. I dislike TAR challenges which clearly favour stronger racers with big muscles, in fact I believe that purely physical challenges should only be offered in a detour situation, such as back in Panama where you had the choice between rowing and archery - the archery challenge is similar to the cup stacking challenge in that it requires a lot of hand-eye co-ordination and barely any physical strength. I am glad we have not seen any gross eating challenges this season but I would love to see more puzzle type challenges which would give smarter racers an edge over the dumber ones - such as in TAR S27 E1, where the teams had to solve a giant geometric slide puzzle in Rio de Janerio. I would love to see more intellectual challenges in TAR as there are way too many physical challenges that favour stronger, younger teams.

Do you only like one racer but not the other in a team? 

Yes I do have that problem with some of the teams. I think Scott's alright but I don't like Brooke's negative attitude (gosh the way she went on and on during the kimchi making challenge). I thought Liz was pretty cool but was put off my Michael's nasty temper (both in the show and on social media). I think Tara's a superwoman but Joey's behaviour has been appalling (again both in the show and on social media). I actually thought Matt is pretty cool, but I didn't like the way Redmond behaved after the U-turn in Zanzibar. In fact the longer the teams stay in the race, the easier it is to find a reason to dislike the racers. But such is the nature of the game because of the way the teams were paired up during the first leg, rather than the usual format where each team already has a pre-existing relationship. I actually preferred that, because I think some of the racers made some rather poor choices during the selection process in leg 1 - but they had barely known each other and had to make a snap decision based on first impressions. I actually liked Seth & Olive and Vanck & Ashton - it is such a shame that both teams didn't last till the end. Given the way things have progressed, I actually want team Lolo to win now for no better reason than I don't dislike either of them - they are just a bit bland that's all. Heck, I won't even mind if Brooke & Scott won, maybe Brooke will grow from the experience.

It is 2017 - why is the grand prize still US$1 million? 

I note that the grand prize is still one million US dollars, to be shared between the two racers. That had been the prize since season 1 and indeed, for Survivor, another very popular reality TV show, the prize is still a million dollars despite the fact many years have passed since the first season of these shows. Back then, one million dollars was a lot of money, but these days, once you factor in inflation, it is far less. Given that the average price of an apartment in Manhattan these days is $2 million, half a million isn't going to get you much unless you live out in the middle of nowhere. Nonetheless, one million does sound like a nice round number which is good for marketing the programme - compare that to say 1.1 million or 1.25 million. However, the producers of the show can always sweeten the deal by doing what they do in TAR Canada by getting loads of sponsors to offer the winners some very attractive prices, thus bumping up the overall value of the winner's package. Compare that to TAR China where they seem to get a trophy and some token gifts from the sponsors - after all, they are mostly celebrities who are filthy rich already and have been paid for taking part in TAR China. It is a completely different format but it seems to work for the Chinese fans.

Why do rich people take part in TAR (and Survivor, for that matter) then? 

I note that in this season, you have some racers who clearly have good jobs (and by that token, I will assume are fairly rich): Vanck works in investment research, Shamir is a Wall Street banker, Brooke is a lawyer, Redmond must be doing rather well as a motivational speaker, Sara works in high end real estate - those are probably the five racers (especially Brooke and Shamir) who don't need that half a million dollars as they are already fairly wealthy or at least have good jobs that will enable them to earn a lot.  But this is hardly the first time we've had very rich contestants take part in TAR or Survivor - remember back in TAR S26 when Jonathan Knight (formerly of New Kids On The Block) took part with his boyfriend? He is fabulously wealthy after having been in one of the most popular boy bands in the world from the period 1988 to 1991 - he is probably the richest racer ever on TAR's history. Let's contrast that to some others like Michael who is a butcher, Joey who is a cop, Floyd who has just graduated and Becca who is a climbing instructor and barista who would have been more desperate to win TAR because they simply don't earn as much. We've seen contestants on Survivor get voted off simply because the other contestants reckon they were rich enough and didn't really need a million dollars - so this begs the question, should TAR be treated like a lottery for poor people to change their lives and should contestants who are already millionaires (like Jonathan Knight) be barred from the show? I do wonder about contestants on Survivor and TAR who claim, "I am doing this for my kids" - if their future is so important to you, like if you really needed the money to say pay for their education, why are you gambling on winning a reality TV show rather than doing something like training to get a better paid job? What if you don't win - what are you going to do then, go buy lottery tickets or visit a casino and hope to strike jackpot? Are you going to say to your child, "sorry darling, I can't send you to college because I missed a turning in Greece on my way to the next challenge, but hang on, I am applying for next season's Survivor, fingers crossed they may pick me - maybe you should apply too."

You see, the producers really don't care - as long as it is good for the ratings, they'll go with it. If they reckon that putting a major celebrity like Jonathan Knight is good for the ratings, then they'll do it. Never mind the fact that the fabulously wealthy Jonathan Knight really doesn't need the money, whilst someone who is from a much poorer, working class background may not only need the money quite desperately, but s/he would never ever get to travel around the world like that. Jonathan Knight has done so many tours with New Kids On The Block he can't even remember the name of every city where he has played a concert, whereas some of the contestants on TAR have never ever left the US before. Might it be perceived as unfair if a rich racer runs a flawless leg in Paris because he has visited France many times on holiday before whilst a poorer racer who has never visited Europe before would clearly struggle more with French public transport? Perhaps a sob story of a poor contestant desperately trying to change his family's life may be good for ratings, but would that make a good show if such racers are going to suck at the race because they are clueless once they are taken out of the US for the first time? The viewers are not going to enjoy a season if the racers are just plain incompetent and clueless - that would be bad for CBS' ratings. Their priority is to cast the right people to create a show that viewers want to watch, TAR is not a charity to give poor people a chance to turn their lives around. There are many charities out there to help poor people in America - CBS is not one of them.

Reality TV stars and social media

I know this blog post is about TAR S29 and not me, but I have decided to include this following exchange I have had with Joey and Michael on Facebook. Here's the thing: they have no idea whom I am, they don't know whom they are insulting, so I can't even take it personally. If someone I knew (a friend, a colleague, a family member) insulted me, then fair enough, that is personal; but if a reality TV contestant whom I have never met starts getting extremely abusive with me on social media, then I can only say that this is a true reflection of their characters. The post-production team at CBS would have probably edited out some of the nastier things they said and done during the race as they do want viewers to like them and if you have someone is extremely nasty (such as Jonathan of TAR S6) then it may turn some viewers off if they simply hate the character. Oh and thankfully, Jonathan and Victoria are now divorced, phew - she got out of that abusive marriage to such a nasty man. Such is reality TV, you want drama but you don't want to create a monster as that may have a negative effect on ratings, especially if that hated character plays a big part in the finals which is going to be the case in this season. So, here is the exchange taken from the Facebook group 'The Amazing Race Fans' where some of the racers (though not all) interact with fans of the show.

Joey Covino I listened to half of one of your blogs. Very uninspired and boring really. 
(You must remember I asked you once in a thread if that was you and when you so foolishly confirmed it,, I've been ignoring you ever since...)

I'm sorry, you know me but i have no idea who you are.. i like it that way... 
There ya go lil fella.. I spoke to you three times in ten weeks.. 
Feel good now, don't ya??
Finally getting that attention mommy and daddy never gave you as a child? All your "friends" (online friends I'm assuming) have done these wonderful things,, but not you,,, that's nice.. 

Funny thing here Alex,, is no one is talking about YOU, are they? Awww.... 
That must suck like the heat in Vietnam,,,, but you wouldn't know about that either, would you?? 

You're just silly, so scream upstairs to your Mom for some more meatloaf and let the big boys and girls play in the really real world.
Your 43 seconds of my time has ended...

Michael Rado Alex you are a loser of epic proportions dude. I literally cannot think of anything sadder than an armchair quarterback who slings mud from the safety of mama's basement. Keep on keeping on dude. I have lived more in a year than you will in a lifetime. Mic drop.

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Joey Covino Sent a canoe to sink a battleship dude... No time for nobodys

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Michael Rado Yeah dude talk about punching above your weight class. I'll make you cry in the language of your choosing. Nerd.

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Joey Covino Ooooh that one hurt... Lolol

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Logan Saunders Alright guys, I can see where this conversation is going fast.

You three knock it off, alright? :)

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Joey Covino What'd he call you to cry??? Hahahahahhaahahah
Pantload

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Michael Rado Out of 22 racers he picks us to fuck with. Dude must be a masochist.

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Alex Liáng Thanks for more interesting material for next week's blog post. It shall be about when you pick ordinary working class folks, put them in reality TV and then fans of the show start putting them on a pedestal - oh dear. What you said here is actually far more interesting and revealing than what we actually see in the final edit because what we don't see is far more interesting sometimes. Really guys, thank you. 

Can I clarify that Joey had confused me with Michael Harmstone - another Brit who has a podcast about reality TV programmes.  And as for Michael - well, I have not lived with my parents since I was 18 and I have a multi-million dollar property portfolio in London. Sorry to be this blunt, but I am like one of those rich people who don't need to go on a reality TV programme to win some big money because I am already very rich. So I can't even take what he said personally as neither of them know whom they are insulting - but it is clear from the way they speak that they are both working class, not very educated, not inarticulate nor intelligent. But hey, such is reality TV, they would cast anyone in these shows - I believe the casting directors for TAR probably have a pretty long list of regrets, but they'll never make that public. If that is exactly what Joey and Michael are like in real life, then so be it, CBS never claimed to only cast nice people on TAR. I work in finance and my social path will never cross with people like that. You can see why the Survivor Worlds Apart season was so successful, because the kind of drama you get when they created three tribes: white collar, blue collar and no collar. And these two have been like loose cannons all over social media, attacking anyone and everyone like that - the worst part of it all is that they are both fathers: what kind of example are they setting for their own children then? How would they feel if someone spoke to their children like that on social media? 

The situation we have here is that we have taken two very ordinary working class Americans out of obscurity and suddenly thrust them in the limelight and they just don't know how to handle it. Maybe Joey and Tara did go on to win the final leg - that may account for Joey's obnoxious attitude, but as for Michael? Perhaps he is genuinely this obnoxious in real life and we did see the nasty side of him in Norway and Greece before he got eliminated. Now what did I do to provoke such a response from those two? I merely participated in a thread about international versions of TAR and I mentioned that I have watched many other versions, simply because I am a big fan of the show and I speak several languages including French, Spanish and Mandarin - it just so happens that TAR is big in Latin America and China. Now Joey and Michael know nothing about me, I think they are only reacting this way because I have been very judgmental on the racers (no one is spared) in my blog - whilst the general reaction on social media has been overwhelmingly positive for them. The difference is that I have traveled around the world and have been to practically all of these countries in the race whilst many American fans of the show have never been to these places, so clearly a housewife in Nebraska who can count on one hand how many states she has visited is going to be far less critical than me. Some of the racers come to the Facebook page to seek love and adoration and when Joey and Michael encountered someone like me, well they turned nasty. If this is what they are really like, then good grief, you can imagine what Tara and Liz must have put up with behind the scenes.

The fact is yes I've been to all of these countries all over the world and I share quite a lot with the contestants - I have spent time in the military like Tara and Redmond, as a former national champion gymnast I have done competed at the highest level like Matt the snowboarder, I work in finance like Shamir and Vanck and within that context, I work in sales - just like Ashton and Sara. Oh and I have even done a couple of modeling jobs when I was younger, just like Jenn. I'm not some housewife in Nebraska who has never ever done anything interesting with my life - like Tara, my work has taken me to several different countries and like her, I am multi-lingual. It is clear why the housewife in Nebraska would hold these racers in awe and put them on a pedestal, whilst I am far more critical of the way they race. I get the feeling Joey and Michael have made some assumptions and have put me in the category of "the housewife in Nebraska who knows absolutely nothing", but I've probably done far more with my life than the both of them combined and even if Joey does go on and win the final leg next week, guess what? He'll only get half a million US dollars before tax - that is but a small fraction of my personal net worth You can see why I think it may be a good idea to have a season of TAR where every racer is very poor and so desperate to win the money because they are up to their eyeballs in debt and about to be evicted from their home - ooh it would be the most competitive season yet.

Who will win?

Quite frankly, I don't care. I clearly don't like Joey but I do like Tara - it looks like they both badly need the money. So if they do win, I'd be disappointed that Joey won but happy for Tara. I am not fond of Brooke after the way she has behaved in previous legs nor am I a fan of Scott. Team Lolo have been quite boring and unspectacular, but they have managed to sail under the radar all the way to the finals without winning a single leg. It does look like neither Brooke & Scott nor team Lolo are desperate for the money - they are doing pretty well in their professional careers, but someone like London could use her 15 minutes of fame to promote her crochet art and gain some major exposure. As this last leg in Seoul has demonstrated, anything can happen and a lot will depend on the kind of challenges awaiting them in Chicago and the taxi drivers they get there. I am already looking forward to the new season of TAR Canada which will premier on 4 July 2017. I hear TAR fans everywhere celebrating already. Let's hope the casting directors at TAR Canada have picked characters who are as charming and intelligent as Justin Trudeau. Many thanks for reading.