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Episode 7 ended in Al Leppey, a rural town in Southern India, with the following standings:

1. Best Friends: David & Jeff arrived at 4:02 p.m., and departed at 4:02 a.m.
2. Clowns: Jon & Al arrived at 4:06 p.m., and departed at 4:06 a.m.
3. Engaged: Kelly & Jon arrived at 4:16 p.m., and departed at 4:16 a.m.
4. Virgins: Millie & Chuck arrived at 4:16 p.m., and departed at 4:16 a.m.
5. Gay Couple: Reichen & Chip arrived at 4:17 p.m., and departed at 4:17 a.m.

They were provided with $120 for this leg of the race.

True Confessions

Ordinarily an episode of The Amazing Race begins with a quick summary from Phil of the previous week's episode, and a mention of the teams' "mandatory rest period". Usually we only see a few brief shots of the teams having dinner together, talking, or sleeping during the rest period.

However, in this episode we were treated to a scene of the racers having dinner together. Chip and Reichen, the gay couple, were married in California, and this was their anniversary. While they had avoided telling the other racers that they had a romantic relationship, they decided to let the others know about their anniversary and that they were a couple. Reichen did most of the talking, and became very emotional.

The other teams clapped for them, and indulged in some "true confessions" of their own. Millie let the others know they'd dated for twelve years, and Chuck let them know that they were still virgins. Jon (Engaged) was more (mock) shocked about being next to a 29-year-old virgin than he was about Chip and Reichen's relationship. For their part, Team Engaged told the others that they'd gotten engaged just before the race started, had been living in sin for years, and had sex the first week.

Jeff (Best Friends) remarked to the camera that the race wasn't about who was gay or a virgin or whatever, it was about "two people working together and taking advantage of the strengths that they have."

Making Their Way To Malaysia

The first clue as the racers started off instructed them to head to Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, more than 5,000 miles from their starting place. It was a race to the airport, and then for information, because Kota Kinabalu was a harder place to get to than Paris or Venice.

The popular wisdom at Cochin Airport was to travel to Mumbai, where there would be more international flights to choose from. While the international terminal would seem the best place to find a flight to Malaysia, tickets to Mumbai needed to be obtained at the domestic terminal, where racers started lining up in order to get their tickets when the offices opened at 6:30 a.m.

Chip and Reichen, however, are not "popular wisdom" kind of guys, and they ended up being directed to the back offices of Air India at the International terminal. There, they crunched schedules with the people in the back offices. While they were talking, Chuck and Millie saw them and decided to listen in, figuring they'd try to get the same flights. Millie stationed herself outside the door, which was slightly open. Reichen tried to push the door shut, while Millie kept holding the door open. Of course, none of the information was exactly secret, but I sympathized with Reichen's desire to keep the fruits of their labor private. After all, who knew if Millie and Chuck would ask the right questions -- at the least, they should be made to actually ask them.

At 6:30 a.m., the teams tried to purchase their tickets to Mumbai, and were successful for the most part (although some locals tried to push their way to the head of the line. On the other hand, over in International, Chip and Reichen found that they needed to go to Domestic to get their tickets, and Millie and Chuck followed behind, having decided to get tickets to Mumbai. With a little prompting from Al (Clowns), the Virgins ended up on the same 8:30 a.m. flight to Mumbai as the Clowns, Engaged, and Best Friends.

Chip and Reichen had trouble getting the exact flights they wanted from the airport personnel. However, a travel agent heard their requests and offered to take them to his office -- an hour away! They decided to roll the dice and go with the travel agent to his office. When they got to his office, they found that the locale was closed, and they had to wait for another employee to come and open up the office. After an anxious period of waiting, the man arrived, and Chip and Reichen were ushered inside. Unfortunately, the flight they'd been pinning their hopes on was full. They ended up on a fallback position of traveling through Kuala Lumpur.

The other teams arrived in Mumbai, and split up looking for ways to get to Kota Kinabalu. The Virgins and Team Engaged both ended up going to Singapore. The Clowns, closely questioning their ticket agent, went through Kuala Lumpur. The Best Friends went through Singapore, but on a later flight than the other two Singapore-bound teams.

At Singapore Airport, there was an almost 10-hour wait between arrival of the first two teams at 12:30 a.m. and their departure to Kota Kinabalu at 10:05 a.m. Kelly and Jon (Engaged) took advantage of that time to sack out on the airport floor, but Millie (Virgins) swung into action to try to rustle up a better connection. After numerous phone calls, Millie located an 8:40 a.m. flight to Kuala Lumpur, which gave them a better connection -- a flight to Kota Kinabalu which they shared with the Clowns and the Gay Couple! All three teams arrived in Kota Kinabalu sharing the lead.

After the Virgins left, Best Friends ran into Engaged; although they'd left on a later flight, the long layover in Singapore put Dave and Jeff on an equal footing with Jon and Kelly.

Blessings From The Priestess

At Kota Kinabalu, the teams needed to find the Monsopiad Cultural Village, where they were to receive a traditional Malaysian good luck blessing from a priestess, and then their next clue.

While the Clowns' taxi was the first to arrive at the Village, Chuck and Millie got a better start out of their cab and were first to reach the priestess. The Clowns were, however, still more fortunate than Chip and Reichen, whose cab missed the turn-off and had to travel more than a mile before it could turn around.

The blessing from the priestess involved her waving a collection of leaves around the pair of racers and chanting in Malaysian. Chuck and Millie were a little uncomfortable, but most of the racers enjoyed the experience. Jon (Clowns) saw it as a chance to think and reflect, and he and Al bowed respectfully to the priestess after she was through. Reichen said that he felt like he and Chip were getting married again.

After leaving the priestess, the teams had to travel to the city boat terminal and take a marked boat to a particular fishing trawler and get their next clue.

Once the teams reached the trawler, they had to grab a clue from the side of the boat. The clue was a Detour, which offers the racers a choice between two tasks, each with its own pros and cons. This Detour was called "Net or Trap." In the Net option, teams had to take their boat to a fishing platform, choose a marked pen, and catch 15 fish from the pen with the nets on poles. The task wouldn't require a great deal of strength, but it would take some measure of skill to catch fish with the nets. In the Trap option, the teams had to take their boats to a lobster fishing boat and pull up a trap, which would contain the next clue. It didn't require skill, but the lobster traps were very heavy and this option required a lot of strength.

Lobster Traps and Fish Catching

Millie and Chuck decided to do the lobster trap, as did the Clowns. Meanwhile, Kelly and Jon were just getting blessed. Jon somehow was bored with the activity and looked at his watch during the blessing. In my opinion, this was very rude of him. Kelly seemed to agree with me. Millie and Chuck arrived at the "lobster boat" and realized they were taken to the other Detour. Instead of wasting more time by going to the lobster boat, they decided to do the fish task. Therefore, they had to get 15 fish from the boat containers.

The Clowns were the second team to arrive at the Detour - and they arrived on the lobster boat. Jon and Al put on white gloves and were heard grunting loudly while they pulled on the lobster trap. I have no idea how any team could have done this task if they didn't have two strong men as part of the team. By the time they completed the Detour, Jon and Al were breathing heavily and had grunted quite a bit. I cannot fathom how the Models (the team eliminated last week) would have done the task!

Reichen and Chip also decided to do the lobster boat task. They were on their way to the task while Millie and Chuck continued to collect their fish. Millie and Chuck were having a devil of a time getting all 15 fish. There is no way that they could have done the lobster boat task, but I think Millie needed to slow down a bit while doing this task because she really put her team at a disadvantage. Both Millie and Chuck hopped into the containers trying to get the fish. At the point that they had caught 4 fish, one hopped out and they were down to 3 fish. At this point, the Clowns had been successfully pulling up the weighted lobster trap. They finished the Detour and picked up the next route marker. After the teams completed the Detour, their next stop was Manukan Island for their next route marker.

Reichen and Chip's boat captain took them to the wrong Detour location. Chip said, "Where's the lobster? This is fish. We need to go over to lobster." And with that, he and Reichen hopped back in the boat and drove to the lobster boat. Millie and Chuck were still fighting with the fish. The basket where Millie and Chuck were putting fish was also filled with quite a bit of water. Millie said, "We need to drain this water, Chuck" and proceeded to tip the basket to pour out water. Of course, a fish slips out also! So the team had 8 fish and now was down to 7. I have no idea why they didn't bring the basket of fish to the attendant and then go back with the empty basket to collect more fish. That would have been one way to do it. Millie is pretty single-minded in her approach to things and she cannot see where she might be making mistakes. Because her approach is so different from Chuck's they fight with each other constantly.

Several minutes later, the leading teams (Clowns and Gay Couple) were heading toward the island in speedboats and Chuck and Millie finally finished the task successfully.

Malaysian Weapons and Bad Choices

The Clowns were the first to arrive on the island, and they discovered their next task was a Road Block. A Road Block is a task that only one person on a team may perform. In this Road Block, each team had to pick a person "whose skills were most on target." The person had to hit three different targets using traditional Malaysian weapons- a bow and arrow, a blowpipe, and spear. Jon performed the Road Block. After the teams completed the Road Block, they could head down the beach for several yards to the Pit Stop. Chip and Reichen (Chip performed Road Block) reached the Road Block and Millie and Chuck (Chuck performed Road Block) were right behind them.

All three men were having trouble with the bow and arrow. Chuck had the most difficult time. Reichen and Al were pretty encouraging toward their teammates. Millie, in my view, tried to be encouraging but it wasn't working for Chuck. After several tries, Jon completed the first task first, then Chip, then Chuck. Jon did the blowpipe very quickly and moved to the third task. Millie said in a voiceover that she was "agonizing over every missed arrow" because she was hoping that Chuck wouldn't fall into a downward spiral and never be able to perform. At this point, Kelly and Jon decided to do the lobster boat task. When they made that decision, I said out loud, "I don't think these two will make it."

Jon was attempting the spear task (the third and final task) and he was not having much luck. Chip was at the blowpipe and Chuck was still trying to use the bow and arrow. Best Friends arrived at the Fish Detour task (they immediately decided on this task as opposed to the lobster bait task. I am not quite sure why they decided so firmly on this task). Once at the task, they quickly collected 15 very small, white fish - each the size of a dime. The attendant told them they needed to collect larger fish. So they went back and collected the necessary number of larger fish.

As the Best Friends went back to get more fish, Kelly and Jon (Engaged) attempted the lobster bait task. Kelly was behind Jon and they both pulled on the rope. Kelly said in a voiceover that her biggest fear was not pulling her weight in the race. So of course that was blatant foreshadowing that the team (specifically Kelly) would have problems doing this task. Chip had just finished the blowpipe task and starting throwing spears. Jon was having more and more trouble with the spear task and he started to show some frustration. Chuck was still trying to figure out how to complete the bow and arrow task.

Chuck finally finished the first task and went to the blowpipe. At the same time, Chip finished the spear task and he and Reichen were headed in the wrong direction to the Pit Stop. They did not figure this out until they saw the Clowns (who finished the spear task minutes after Chip) running the correct direction to the Pit Stop. Chip or Reichen called out "Jon, let's get to the Pit Stop together!" and the Clowns just kept running. Somehow they seemed to get to the Pit Stop at the same time, or close to it, but Phil (the host) said that the Clowns were first and the Gay Couple was second.

Chuck was stuck on the spear task and not finding a whole lot of immediate success. Kelly and Jon were having a difficult time pulling up the lobster bait while David and Jeff completed the Detour and were on their way to the island. Kelly said she could not help pull the bait box up and Jon had to drop it back into the water. He cussed several times and seemed angry (or irritated?) that Kelly could not help him. Kelly and Jon decided to do the fish Detour since it was incredibly unlikely that Kelly would develop super-strength and be able to help Jon pull up that bait box. During the fish Detour, one of the fish jumped out of the basket and Kelly was irritated that instead of 8 fish, they suddenly had 7. Kelly decided to sit on the basket for a minute and Jon said, "I need you to help me not fart on the fish." He said it now you explain it.

At this point, Best Friends arrived at the island and started on the Road Block. Jeff performed this task. Chuck finally successfully threw the spear. They were the third team at the Pit Stop.

Kelly and Jon just completed their Detour and were headed to the island as David and Jeff finished the blowpipe task. As Jon and Kelly arrived at the Road Block, David and Jeff finished the third task and headed to the Pit Stop.

Kelly performed this Road Block and Jon was saying stuff to her like "Be the arrow. Be the bow." Kelly begged him to shut up but he wouldn't. Jon would definitely annoy me after awhile, but I think these two deserve each other. They arrived at the Pit Stop in fifth place, but this was a non-elimination episode. So Jon and Kelly are still in the race.

The standings at the end of the episode were:

1. Clowns: Jon & Al won a vacation to Mexico
2. Gay Couple: Reichen & Chip
3. Virgins: Millie & Chuck
4. Best Friends: David & Jeff
5. Engaged: Kelly & Jon

Mary's Final Comments: Based on recent episodes, I think I'm most rooting for the Clowns right now. They have good personalities, respect the cultures they have visited and seem like all-around nice men. Reichen and Chip are a bit too intense and have made stupid errors. I just don't think they will win this contest. One of their mistakes will take them out of this race I think. Millie and Chuck, previously a favorite of mine, is no longer a favorite. The tension between the two of them and Millie's unwillingness to listen to Chuck will be their downfall I think. The race is really wearing on the two of them. Kelly and Jon both have very irritating personalities that may make me underestimate them as a team. I just don't think they have the resourcefulness to win this race, but I could be wrong about these two. Finally, the wild card is David and Jeff. Generally, The Amazing Race seems to favor male teams (the first two season winners were youngish male teams), so I think the odds are great that they may win this race. Their racing skills have improved significantly since the beginning of the race; they may be the darkhorses to win.

Molly's Final Comments: While entertaining, I found this episode also disappointing. Kelly and Jon came in last, and it was a non-elimination round? Darn! I also felt sad watching Chuck and Millie struggle through the Roadblock. It reminded me of last season, when John Vito had so much trouble with the archery task and Jill was so great at encouraging him. There's no one this year I like as much as Jill and John Vito from last year -- I miss them!

Congratulations to The Amazing Race for the Emmy nomination! Best of luck in September!

The Amazing Race 4 is on Thursdays at 8:00 p.m.

Previous seasons of TAR.