Episode #1208

BOMBAY DREAMS
Departing the Pit Stop in first place at 10:12pm, grandson and grandfather Nick & Don discovered they needed to fly almost 4,000 miles to the city of Mumbai, India, formerly known as Bombay. When they landed, they had to take an auto-rickshaw to a newspaper stall where they needed to purchase a copy of the Times of India newspaper and search for an advertisement containing the location of their next clue.

After searching for the best flights online, Nick & Don walked to a nearby hotel and called Air France to secure tickets on a flight landing in Mumbai at 10:35pm the next night. With a full night to spare before leaving Florence at 6:50am, the pair wisely went back to a hotel room for some rest before the craziness of the race would begin. Hours later, after dating couple Nate & Jen left for the airport, father and daughter Ron & Christina, like Nick & Don, opted to walk to a nearby hotel and use the telephone to reserve the exact same flight to Mumbai landing at 10:35pm the next evening.

BACKUP PLANS
Nick & Don made the wise choice to sleep in a hotel room as Teams gathered outside the closed doors of the airport. When the doors finally opened at 4:30am, a line formed in front of the Air France counter with Nate & Jen leading the way. After the dating couple secured tickets on the same flight as Nick & Don and Ron & Christina, dating couple TK & Rachel stepped up to the window and stood in disbelief when they heard the flight was now full.

After the stunned TK & Rachel walked away, dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin, with a Speed Bump penalty to consider, asked the ticketing agent to look for connections in other cities that could land them in Mumbai around the same time as the 10:30pm flight the other Teams booked. Their persistence paid off when the agent found a connection through Amsterdam that would arrive at 10:50pm. As they booked tickets on the flight, the dating Goths kept their cards close to their vest by acting upset and disappointed when they noticed TK & Rachel looking over from another counter. Kynt commented, "At this point in the game, Vyxsin and I are resorting to a lot of performance art." He added that they wanted to "make sure they get on the wrong flight and we get on the good one." This sly gamesmanship paid dividends for the Goths when TK & Rachel settled for a Lufthansa flight not scheduled to land until 1:00am, hours after the other Teams.

THE PAPER CHASE
Because of a delay in Paris on the plane carrying Nick & Don, Ron & Christina, and Nate & Jen, dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin landed first in Mumbai and soaked up the atmosphere, remarking, "I can't believe we're in India. This is so amazing." Arriving at the M.R. Naik newspaper stall, the pair discovered that it wouldn't open until 6:00am. While Jen was unhappy at having to wait, TK & Rachel breathed a sigh of relief at having caught up to the other Teams.

Still in the early dawn darkness at 6:00am, the M.R. Naik newspaper stand opened for business as the five Teams purchased copies of the Times of India newspaper. With pages and pages of advertisements, some in vibrant colors, some in black and white, in large and small sections of the paper, Teams began the arduous task of searching for their next clue. TK wisely pulled out a pen to mark off each ad he checked while a crafty Nick took note of TK's strategy and stood near nearby in hopes of catching a glimpse when TK would find the clue. As Nate & Jen began to show signs of their familiar bickering, Vyxsin calmly found the small black and white advertisement directing them to Chauhan Tailors. Riding in their auto rickshaw, Vyxsin noted, "We're gonna have to work really hard to stay far enough ahead of everyone so that when we hit our Speed Bump, we don't get left in the dust."

DELICATE DETOUR
With a fighting Nate & Jen alone in last place unable to find the advertisement, Kynt & Vyxsin watched their lead dissipate as their driver couldn't find the tailor shop. This allowed grandson and grandfather Nick & Don, who successfully spied on TK & Rachel at the newsstand, to arrive at Chauhan Tailors in first place where they encountered a Detour choosing between Paste 'Em and Thread 'Em. In Paste 'Em, Teams made their way to a marked underpass and used the provided supplies to properly paste a 6-panel Bollywood movie poster onto the wall. When the advertisement was complete, they would receive their next clue. The poster panels were large and unwieldy, and if even one panel was out of alignment, teams could have to take them all down and start again. In Thread 'Em, Teams made their way to Dardar Flower Market and found a marked flower stall, where they had to create a traditional wedding garland by threading 108 flowers in an alternating pattern. When the judge decreed that the garland had been properly made, Teams needed to deliver it to a nearby bridegroom and exchange it for their next clue. Threading flowers was delicate work, but Teams with deft hands could find themselves moving ahead.

RELAXATION ON THE RACE
As Nick & Don and Ron & Christina hurried off to paste a Bollywood poster, dating couple TK & Rachel opted to string together a garland of flowers because of Rachel's profession as a florist. With their lead now gone, dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin finally arrived at the tailor shop and found the dreaded Speed Bump task waiting for them. In it, the pair had to make their way to a Yoga Master and successfully perform a series of complex Yoga poses. When completed, they could continue on the race in hopes of making up the valuable lost time. In their auto rickshaw, Kynt remarked, "With all the stress going on…it's actually going to be great to take a break for a moment and do some yoga."

OLD DOG, OLD TRICKS
Arriving at the underpass in first place, father and daughter Ron & Christina began laying out the large, colorful panels of the poster on the ground and applied paste. When Ron started pressing the panels on the concrete wall, he immediately lost his temper as he accused his daughter of "being cheap with the paste" causing the panel to wrinkle and fold over. His mood worsened after a wooden crate Christina offered him collapsed under his weight as he tried to reach the top panel with the paste brush to correct her mistake. Over Christina's effusive apologies, Ron shouted, "You now gave me a lot of headache!"

As the father and daughter appeared to backslide in their relationship, Nick & Don arrived and calmly worked together to properly align the poster panels as the equally mellow TK & Rachel strung together flowers without any problems. Without the shouting and hysterics demonstrated by Ron, Nick & Don finished pasting the poster to earn their next clue. Opening it, the pair discovered they needed to travel to a traffic island known as Kabutar Khana where the second U-turn of the race awaited.

With Nate & Jen arriving at the tailor shop choosing to string together flowers, last place dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin successfully performed their yoga positions and headed back to the shop as well. Kynt quipped, "Any chance to see Vyxsin twisting, turning, and contorting her body was always a highlight for me and I think it was a highlight for the instructor as well." Back at the shop, the Goths also chose to thread together the colorful flowers.

RELATIONSHIP WRECK
After Christina asserted herself and took control of her Team to finish pasting the Bollywood poster in third place behind the flower power of TK & Rachel, Nate & Jen battled against Kynt & Vyxsin to string together the wedding garland. While the Goths worked in harmony hoping to catch up, Nate & Jen continued the downward slide of their relationship. Nate wondered why Jen couldn't do this task because she's "a girl" prompting Jen to question why Nate couldn't row a boat in Croatia since he's a guy. As the sarcastic barbs flew, Jen sniped, "The tone in your voice is making me absolutely sick." However, even through the insults, Nate & Jen finished their garland moments ahead of Kynt & Vyxsin as both Teams now raced for the U-turn in hopes of using it on each other.

SPECIAL DELIVERY
With the three lead Teams all choosing not to use the U-turn, TK & Rachel, Nick & Don, and TK & Rachel all descended on Bharatgas Colaba Gas Service to encounter a Road Block. In it, one team member had to load a bicycle cart with six tanks of propane gas, pedal to the two addresses listed on their order slips, deliver three tanks to each address and then take a receipt from the homeowner's door as proof of delivery. Once their deliveries were complete, they had to hand the foreman their two order slips and two receipts to receive their next clue.

MAJOR MISTAKE
As TK, Nick, and Ron all loaded the large metal gas canisters and pedaled off the very heavy load, dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin arrived at Kabutar Khana with a U-turn burning a hole in their pockets. Having only seen Nate & Jen, who left the Detour before them, the Goths were unsure of where any of the other Teams were. Logically and incorrectly assuming that Nate & Jen still held a lead over them, Kynt & Vyxsin opted to U-turn the usually slow Nick & Don who in fact were well ahead of them. Arriving at the traffic island a few moments later, a very confused Nate & Jen couldn't figure out if the Goths had U-turned a Team or been U-turned themselves. Nate said, "It doesn't matter. Someone got U-turned and it wasn't us."

After delivering canisters in a neck and neck race, TK and Nick both returned to their waiting partners as the Teams opened their clues instructing them to take a taxi to the next Pit Stop at Bandra Fort. As the two taxis raced fourteen miles to the 16th Century fortress, Nick, exhausted and dehydrated from the manual labor he just performed, asked his taxi to pull over as he rushed out to vomit along the side of the highway. Nick's illness tipped the scales in favor of TK & Rachel, who stepped onto the mat in first place and won a trip from two from Travelocity to St. Maarten.

MORE MISTAKES
With Ron & Christina nabbing third place, the slender Kynt began hauling the large canisters onto his cart as last place Nate & Jen arrived on the scene. A remorseful Vyxsin noted, "We should have U-turned Nate & Jen. We U-turned a Team that is probably in front of us."

After Jen loaded the canisters, she caught up to Kynt who had difficulties controlling his cart until a local showed him how to use the brake. Jen delivered canisters to her first address ahead of Kynt, but she forgot to take the receipt as proof. The two rivals met up at the next address, Kynt's first and her second, where Kynt monopolized the elevator, angering Jen. As Jen made her second delivery, she realized she forgot her receipt and headed back to the first address as Kynt made a mistake of his own by taking the new receipt and leaving his original one there.

THE FINAL FIGHT
Arriving back at the gas service station to the sound of Nate's cheers, Jen delivered her receipts as the pair ran off in search of a taxi. Coming back moments later, Kynt stood in shock when he realized he needed to run back and retrieve the receipts he left behind. While it appeared to be over for the Goths, Nate & Jen reached a near meltdown when they couldn't find a taxi to take them to Bandra Fort. Minutes of Nate & Jen running back and forth on the streets of Mumbai in frustration allowed Kynt to return with the missing receipts. With both Teams now in a dead heat, it came down to a final taxi ride to Bandra Fort. Jen's continued stress and anxiety forced Nate to shout, "Jen, you're making it so much worse. Stop it!" In the end, Jen's worrying was for naught as the relieved pair stepped on the mat in fourth place.

Arriving at Bandra Fort in last place, dating Goths Kynt & Vyxsin received the awful news from Phil that they had been eliminated from the race. Kynt commented, "As exotic as we may look on the surface, we're still just a couple of Goth kids from Louisville, Kentucky." Vyxsin added, "I think Kynt and I have gotten to enjoy and appreciate what is unique and beautiful about so many different cultures. Though The Amazing Race is over for us I know in my heart of hearts that as long as Kynt is in my life the adventure will never end."