We start at a beach in Thailand. It kind of looks like the location of the Leonardo Decaprio bomb “The Beach”. Perhaps we’ll be lucky enough to see a shark attack? Leaving in first place are Rob and Brennan at 6:03 with Frank and Margarita right behind them. They have to get to Beijing, China so off they go. Brennan has done some research and found out the best airport to go to is in the city of Phuket. I had to rewind my VCR when I heard that because I thought that he was cussing about the next location rather than describing where he wanted to go. They hop on a boat and make their way there only to discover that they’ve missed the next flight out to Bangkok by a few minutes. “Phuket!” Rob says.

Frank and Margarita show up and are given the bad news. The two leading teams get a midday flight into Bangkok and plan to figure out what to do when they get there. For Frank and Margarita, that apparently is to go shopping. They seem to want to lighten their load, so they find a different backpack and take out things that they don’t need. Or things that Frank thinks they don’t need, anyway. Margarita tries to make some analogy about how they are leaving behind all the troubles of the past, but we don’t believe her. They spend half of One Night In Bangkok and get on a midnight plane to China.

Now they show the Festers leaving the beach at 11:35 at night. They are trying to find their way to the airport and go in to use the phone at the only establishment in Thailand that is open at that time of night. Of course, that’s a whorehouse. After ‘taking care of business’ shall we say, the two guys head off the airport. The Gay Team leaves at 1:30AM at night but if they found any boy-brothels, the producers neglected to show us and they get to the airport. Of course, they catch the early morning flight that the two previous teams missed.

Speaking of witch, they get to China and head towards the Jingshan park pavilion. There they have a detour. They can either go play Ping-Pong against a local champion until they score five points or they can ride various local forms of transportation. Both teams go for the Ping-Pong challenge, but Frank and Margarita are a bit ahead so they go first. The local champion comes out to challenge Frank and he looks about 8 years old.

“Oh, the little boy,” Frank says. “You’re going to bring some kid to spank me? No problem.” And he's right. Frank runs up the score to 3 – 1 before the kid even gets in the game. He pulls out a few, but the score is 6 – 5 at the end. I’ll bet when his coach reviewed that tape, Frank wasn’t the one who got spanked. That poor boy probably got his bare bottom whacked with that paddle five times for each point Frank scored.

Rob and Brennan show up. Brennan is going to ‘do the footwork’ since Rob has a bad hand. I didn’t know there was any footwork in Ping-Pong, but anyway. That spanking the coach game him must have really hurt because the boy runs the score up to 13 – zip before Brennan even scores a single point. At 15 – 1 Rob takes over, bad hand and all and closes the game out at 24 – 5. That means that his score against the boy was 9 – 4. And with a bad hand. The coach bends the poor lad over for another spanking.

Frank and Margarita have moved on. They’ve been presented with a shopping list in Chinese and instructions to go to a food market. They need to get (5) rat tales, (2) dog shanks and (1) whole cat. No, I’m just being the typical xenophobic foreigner making fun of another culture’s cuisine. They were supposed to get (5) beetle larvae, (2) chicken feet and (1) squid. Really. No, I’m not kidding anymore.

Margarita puts her shopping skills to work and gets the items, but feels slightly put out because beetle larvae is cheaper by the pound and she feels that she didn’t get value for money. Perhaps she should have bought extra for their friends back home? After all, they have space in their backpack now. Rob and Brennan also do the market thing and get back in their taxi. Rob playfully bites the squid. He suspects what’s coming.

Frank and Margarita reach the roadblock. The clue is that whoever does it should be hungry. Let’s see, you just picked up a bunch of exotic food that you are still carrying. What could the roadblock be? Frank has an upset tummy so Margarita, being a mommy, offers to do the unknown deed. Frank is kind of doubtful but she takes it from him and opens it, only to find out that they have to take the items they just bought to a cook who will prepare it for them and then she has to eat it. She must have been the only one who didn’t see that coming because she turns green at the thought. “You’re a moron,” Frank tells her. “This is what I get for trying to help you,” she replies as they argue again. Then something amazing happens. Frank goes off by himself and realizes that he was being an ass and goes back and apologizes to her. They kiss and make up.

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Rob and Brennan guessed what the roadblock was and Brennan agrees to be the eater. He should after Rob had to save his ass in the Ping-Pong game. At the restaurant, the meals are prepared. “Don’t stand there looking at me like Frank’s doing with her,” Brennan whispers. Frank is hovering over Margarita like an evil teacher making sure a reluctant pupil doing her lessons. She’s trying to take the food like pills (something I used to do as a boy with okra), washing it down with Chinese Sunkist. Brennan chokes it down, saying that it “tastes like nothing I’ve ever eaten.” Then it’s off to the races. Margarita gets to the bathroom first and vomits just ahead of Brennan. Then they race again, this time to the pit stop. Frank and Margarita move into first, but not by enough of a margin for it to matter.

Back to the race for last. The Gang of Four are unleashed on China. For once, the Guidos are the last out of the airport. “This is the Brawl for it All,” Drew says, “The Thriller in Manila, the…I don’t know.” His rhyming skills apparently failed him. The Ring-A-Ding in Beijing, perhaps? When they reach the detour, they decide to take the transportation route instead, as do the Gay Team. I’m sure the boy champion breathed a sigh of relief. I don’t like to think of what his coach would have done to him if one of those two fairies beat him.

Kevin and Drew worry about catching the 101 bus because they think the numbers might be in Chinese. I confess I don’t know if they have Chinese numbers, but the bus has a big old ‘101’ on it. This is supposed to be the longer but easier route, remember boys? The Guidos catch the next bus. The next leg is on a motorbike with a sidecar. Drew and Kevin get in looking like the Two Fat Ladies in Drag meet the Kung-Fu Master. “You look like such an idiot,” Kevin says. Look in the mirror lately, Kev?

“I think my left testicle is rolling around the streets of Beijing,” Drew adds. Joe and Bill have a different type of conversation. “You’re doing okay, honey,” one of them says to the other. Obviously they were not leather, bike-riding gays in their youth. Drew feels like the Fonz and is probably the first person in history to go “Aaaayyyyy!” while going down the streets of Beijing.

Somehow the Guidos catch up at the end of the leg. The final leg is on a bicycle-pulled rickshaw. The Gay Team gets a bit of a jump and Kevin and Drew browbeat their driver into going faster. Joe is passing their driver money like stuffing dollars down the jockstrap of his favorite stripper trying to coax more speed out of him. “Do you know how heavy they are?” he says of the overtaking Festers. Anyway, after the poor drivers have nearly killed themselves, it turns out to be meaningless because their next stop is the market and it’s closed for the night.

Kevin and Drew go to a hotel and make friends with a boy, who agrees to be their interpreter the next day. This is something Joe and Bill apparently didn’t think of, because they have to kidnap a lady on her way to work to get her to guide them through the supermarket. They get their 12 items or less and check out, both getting to the restaurant at the same time with Joe and Drew as the designated eaters. “I’m not that hungry, we had Danish this morning,” Drew complains. Yes, I’m sure that’s the problem. Squid, bugs and chicken legs are better on an empty stomach. Bill advises Joe that Drew will pig out so this one time it’s all right not to be prissy about eating. Drew starts off with utensils, but Kevin makes him drop them and use his hands. “Eat, you fat bastard!” he says. “I don’t want to give you the Heimelich. You’re way too fat for me to get my arms around you.”

Drew finishes first and they run out with the Guido’s right behind. At this point Satan looks down and touches his finger to the Earth. Drew and Kevin have the only polite taxi driver in the world, you lets other cars out in front of him, including the Satan’s Own. At least the Fester’s Taxi knows where he is going; Joe and Bill have to break out the phrase book before their guy understands it. The Pit Stop is the South Gate to the Tianten Park. Drew and Kevin see a gate and get out, running for it. It turns out to be the East Gate, so they take off across the park.

Meanwhile, the Guidos have also found a gate. And, damn it all, it’s the right one. They make it in third. Winston Churchill then rolls over in his grave as the evil pair of Gay Nazis recite his famous 1940 speech as their inspiration. Kevin and Drew show up and Our Host informs them that they are out. He actually looks sad for once. I guess he knows that they are the funniest part of the show. Drew actually tears up, but then they go to recover their stuff from the taxi. And so pass the Festers, the most entertaining team in the race. We’re left with the villains, the Vanilla Lawyers and the least entertaining couple (after Matt and Anna who don’t count). Yawn. I think I’ll root for the Gay Team just for the hell of it.

Next Week: Team Guido tries to catch up and Frank finally hits the snow.