Paradorn Srichaphan's wife on the Amazing Race Asia 3

The Amazing Race Asia is coming back for the third season!

I'm not so into this franchise reality show simply because it's filled with 'beautiful' contestants who are usually models, celebrities and gwai lous (caucasians).

One of the contestant in the new season, scheduled to be on TV this September, is a familiar face. She's Natalie Glebova, former Miss Universe in 2005 and also Thailand’s highest ranking (and once world #9) tennis player Paradorn Srichaphan.

Natalie & Pailin team on TARA 3

Paradorn and Natalie, the husband and wife team

Naturally, Paradorn was her first choice for a teammate. "But during the application period, he was busy with his tennis training as he's hoping to go back on tour next year," she explained.

As Natalie was gagged by the show's confidentiality clauses, she said Paradorn discovered her participation only two weeks ago, when it was officially announced.

So how did she keep it from her hubby?

"I travel a lot, hosting and presenting TV shows. It's been like this ever since we started dating, so he thought I was just going for work again."

"He was shocked when he found out (I was on the show). We had a good laugh about it."

She gushed that married life is 'really good' and Paradorn is a 'great husband who cares for her'.

The couple are planning to start a a family soon.

Awww... isn't that sweet?

(Via asiaonenews, The Amazing Race Asia AXN, t-pagent.com)

The Amazingly 'Beautiful Asian' Race is back

Yay, The Amazing Race Asia (TARA) is back for season 2!

I must admit that I love the Asian edition although I can't help myself from comparing them to the US edition. Anyway I'm very positive that season 2 will be better improved compare to the first one.
Here are some of the things I'm looking forward to in this season:

1. Allan Wu will be more relaxed and not as stiff as he was in the first season.

2. Consistent when implementing time penalties. Do not imply time penalty at the beginning of the leg like what happened to Andy and Laura for speeding in one of the episode. Time penalty should always be given at the pit stop. In Andy and Laura's case, if this rule has been followed, they would have been eliminated from the race. Obviously, the producers wanted to keep them in the race but not through such a bias and obvious ruling.

3. There we go again... models, tv personalities, beautiful Asian people with great body on TARA. Honestly I would prefer to watch fat soccer moms, ordinary son and dad team, geeks, etc.

4. What? No Indian contestants?

5. Hope to see more dramatic scenes when boarding flights e.g. competing to get seats, using alternative airlines/routes to get to the same destination, etc.

6. More self-driving, please. It's always more challenging to see the contestants drive in foreign countries rather than just taking the cabs.

7. Do eliminate a team during the first leg. During the first season, again it is very obvious that the producers wanted to keep Sandy and Francesca in the show after they were spared the elimination after came up last during the first episode.

8. Would like to see the contestants travelling farther and more countries rather than just focusing in Southeast Asia. And the contestants in season 2 will be travelling outside of Asia which is a good news.

9. I'm hoping for more drama between the team members. It seems that there are more all-female teams this time around and my instinct tells me there will be cat fights going on. Meow!

10. I'm rooting for one of the dating couples to win in this season.

applying for The Amazing Race Asia 2 like everyone else

I'm supposed to blog about the Amazing Race Asia 2 yesterday, which is open for application now. I read in Che-Cheh and Chingling blogs first.

Of course my buddy and I don't want to miss out this opportunity to apply. Syong and I did not apply for the first season because we thought we were not ready. Besides she never watch a single episode back then.

Now, this year we are determine to send in our application. Syong is ready ever since I persuaded her to join me at the AXN Amazing Mall Challenge last year. Yesterday, we talked about it for awhile and decided to start shooting the Amazing Race 2 audition tape this weekend.

Why we want to join? It's not about the money. It's not about fame. It's not that we want to prove to the world that Malaysians are the best for the second time. It is also not because we are a huge fan of the Amazing Race. Although all the above are actually true but frankly speaking we just want to be able to travel and participating in as much activities as we can for free :p

Syong and I have been participating treasure hunts recently to improve our driving and navigating skills as well as to sharpen our mind to be able to think out of the box. We have done quite a lot of travelling to new places without a map in Malaysia but we have not travel to overseas together in our lives.

We are not physically strong and we do not have model faces. But we don't mind to be as cunning as Andy & Laura. Or perhaps as smart and strategic-thinking as Mardy & Marsio. We are not afraid of anything except not being selected for the audition.

TARA - Congrats JoeZab!

Some people don't think Joe Jer & Zabrina deserve to win The Amazing Race Asia (TARA) 1 compare to Andrew & Syeon or even Sandy Francesca.

Well, I have to say that the girls are able to keep their composure and played it smart. You can be winning all the other legs but if you are not cool (and smart) in the final race, chances are you are going to give away the #1 spot to someone who does. And this makes JoeZab the winner of TARA. They played it smart while Andrew&Syeon and SanFran struggled to find their way out of Kuching to Santubong. Instead of hiring a taxi (they were given USD150 at the beginning of the race) like what JoeZab did, Andrew&Syeon stucked with their Lonely Planet guide.

Anyway, kudos to the all-girl Malaysian team!

7 changes I would like to see on the amazing race

Be it the US or the Asian edition, there are a few changes I would like to see on the show.

1. There's a lack of transparency in the non-elimination leg. The producers can eliminate or not eliminate whoever they want. For example, if I'm not wrong, BJ & Tyler from season 9 survived twice from being eliminated and eventually won. In the Asian edition, it's very clear that the producers would like to keep "favourites" Sandy & Francesca from being eliminated in the first round.
2. I wonder why must there be models on The Amazing Race (TAR) and The Amazing Race Asia (TARA)? There are a lot of beautiful people out there and they are not necessary models.
3. Choosing Allan Wu as the host of TARA is obviously a mistake. This guy is so stiff and fake. If you watch AXN Xtreme Macau, the host Alex Niu, in my humble opinion, did a better job than Allan. Well, there's no way to regret now. Looking at the success of TARA probably we just have to accept him and see some improvement over time.
4. I'm glad that season 10 omitted the "strip all cash" from contestants who survived the non-elimination leg. TARA should stop stripping cash too in the future season because I think begging people for money isn't very nice.
5. The contestants rely too much on the locals and taxi drivers to bring them to places instead of self-navigation. Perhaps the producers should implement new rule to disallow locals to ride or join the contestants in their car. I prefer to watch contestants display their navigation skill rather than paying taxi drivers to bring them to places.
6. There are too many advertisement and product placement in the recent TAR. As for TARA, we can see them every week from Ford to Sony Walkman MP3 and MSN. During the last leg on TARA, contestant need to take a picture of their partner while performing the jump at Sky Tower with Sony Ericsson Cybershot camera. And the week before, teams have to record a video with Sony HD Cam.
7. I hope to see alliance being formed in TARA. I'm not sure why no teams form alliance to oust the others. It will be more fun than seeing teams minding their own business. The Six Packs alliance (Cho bros, Kentucky and Alabama) of season 10 did a great job and went really far.

The Amazing Race Asia - model teams only need to apply?

So the Amazing Race Asia (TARA) has revealed its teams. And I'm not impressed. The reason why I'm so into the Amazing Race show is because of the diversity of its team members. You get to see old couples, handicapped people who overcome their inability to compete just like everyone else, people from various backgrounds, etc. However, TARA gives me a different impression.

Looking at the participants in TARA, I almost thought it is a model-searching / beauty pagent kind of contest. And not to mention there are many gwai-lou looking people in this show. Come on, Asia is so big and this is the best teams that you can come up with? By the way, how come so many people from the entertainment industry?

I really hope to see more seasons of TARA in the future (because I'm interested to join one but now I'm not sure if I should send my audition tape because I don't have a model look). TARA must come up with better ways to promote the show and reach out to more people.

By the way, TAR 10 is such a great show. So far my favourite team is Peter and Sarah. I admire Peter the most because he has been so supportive to Sarah who is an amputee. I love to watch David and Mary (especially her) as well because they are small town people but get along so well with Tom and Terry, whom they said the first gay people they ever know. Too bad for Duke and Lauren, the father and daugther team who's out so fast from TAR last night. I wanted to badly for the single moms, Lyn and Karlyn to be out from this show. I don't have good impression on them ever since they refused to help Tyler and James when their jeep broke down in Mongolia last week. My bet for who to win? Definitely Tyler and James because of their consistency.