Challenge 14: ACCOMPLISHED!
Challenge 14: Appear on National TV.
Hunan province is famous for Chairman Mao’s hometown…and a TV show aired all over China where contestants tackle an obstacle course and almost always end up falling dramatically into the water (click here for the official website for the show, all in Chinese). We’d hitch-hiked for 2 days to get here and it wasn’t because of Mao.After going to the TV centre and getting ourselves invited for an interview, we were immediately accepted onto the show to be filmed 2 days later. We’d seen it on TV many times and always thought how easy it looked, but a quick tour of the course revealed how much harder it is in real life. We should have known that any obstacle course involving a pole vault would be tricky! In fact it was hard just walking up the ramp to the start!We were told to turn up for filming with our back-packs and a map so the presenters could interview us about our trip. With the cameras rolling, Albert did an amazing job fielding all their questions in Chinese before we both serenaded the female presenter. Once the formalities were out of the way, it was time to meet our fate on the obstacle course.While we both ultimately failed and ended up in the water, we met with somewhat different endings. One of us drew gasps from the audience by falling at the very first hurdle and landing flat on his face, while the other went on to win a small consolation water heater! You’ll have to wait to find out who was who, but we’ll send out the link to the show as soon as it’s aired.[UPDATE: The show has aired and you can watch it here.]