The Emmy-winning (seven times in a row) reality show, the Amazing Race is back for its fifteenth season. This is the first time that we saw an interracial couple in this show, and two professional poker players.

And the show began with a big twist! One team will be eliminated right before they start to travel around the world. The teams are given a task to find a license plate with the name from their first stop in Japan. It take some of them quite a few minutes to realise that the Japanese characters on the clues are clues to this task, eventually the others figure out as well. Married yoga teachers Eric and Lisa missed the last plate when they are searching from left to right, and is the first team eliminated. ( This new twist was a great idea, it added a lot of suspense to the opening seconds of the show. But, I felt very pity to Eric and Lisa, a trip of a lifetime like this was taken away before they even got in the car, it really sucks. I don’t know what I would react if I were them. )

Hilariously, the 11 teams got in a reality show in Japan, the first Roadblock they took. All teams had to stand around a sushi roulette and ate whatever landed right before them. Anyone who got to eat a wasabi roll (lots of wasabi in it, it’s no fun) and finish it within two minutes could continue. To make the show a bit funny, there was Godzilla pictures and some funny voices everywhere. Maria (one of the poker player) and Brian (husband of the interracial couple) were the only two that had to eat the roll twice, poor them.

But the funnier part was the next task they took. Each team had to lead 20 Japanese people through the most busy crossroad in Tokyo to a shrine, the pit stop. At first, it doesn’t seem to be difficult to finish after Meghan and Cheyne first checked in, however some teams didn’t have that kind of luck of having help from other people. Maria and Tiffany lost two of their team mates, and after searching for quite some time, they gave up and took the penalty. They were lucky that this was not a elimination leg, but they would face a Speed Bump on the next leg. (I don’t remember that there had been any non-elimination leg in the first trip in previous seasons, though I might be wrong. It seems that this was because of the new twist. But I have a feeling that the producers wanted to keep the only female team in this game for sometime, and changed the plan at the last minute. )

The second leg started right away. They were to fly to Vietnam. Some of them booked their tickets through Internet, smart moves. While the rest went straight to the air port and were told there were no economic seats available, however, Brian managed to persuaded the clerk to make seats for them. Wow. So all teams were on the same plane.

At the airport, everyone learned that Maria and Tiffany lied about their professions, making them a big target for the other teams. (It’s really a dumb move to lie, you have to come out with 100 more lies to cover it up. And to lie that they were working with homeless children, that was silly. My dislike to poker players widens.)

Many of them managed to get on the first bus and left for their next clue. A few teams were left behind, but they bribed the drivers some more money and had the bus leave earlier. (Which made me wonder, this kind of act should be considere illegal and the teams should receive penalty at the end of the leg. While apparently they were fine. )

The dock were to open in the morning, so they got grouped again. The task is to cover a tree’s roots in mud, an easy job? No. The mud was very thick, and everyone was struggling. While the Speed Bump that Maria and Tiffany had to do was a really easy one, they just had to carry some food for the guard near the dock. So they caught up with some of the teams.

After that, the teams faced their final task (Roadblock) for the leg, herding ducks. Each team had to herd a group of ducks out of the pen, moved them across a bridge, then back over the bridge and into their pen. Both women of the couples, Ericka and Jessica, were having troubles.

Matt finished it really quick, and together with Gary they checked in first. Zev was also quite good at this.

Jessica managed to get through on the third try, but it was too late for them. They were the second team being eliminated from the Race.