Although he had managed to avoid another elimination, Jean-Robert was quite shaken up by the surprise turn of events.  Had Jaime possessed a real Immunity Idol, he would have just attended his last Tribal Council.  Sadly, the man still didn’t have a clue his exit could be coming someday soon.

Meanwhile, Amanda was growing concerned about James’ position in the game.  He was always a physical threat; now he was equipped with both Immunity Idols.  Would it even be possible for them to take him down now? Uhh – did anyone think about asking him to give the unused idol back?

The Hae Da Fung members later gathered for their next Reward Challenge.  This time around, the competitors were divided up into two teams of four.  The goal of this aquatic challenge was to sink the opposing team’s small boat using buckets of water.  One person positioned inside each boat would do their best to avoid the direct lines of fire while bailing water out.  The first team to sink two boats would win the group reward.

Team leaders Jean-Robert and Peih-gee were assigned to kick-off the alternating team selections.  Jean-Robert started off by picking James; Todd and Amanda later completed his group.  On the opposing side, Frosti and Erik were the first two people added to Peih-gee’s team.  When it came down to selecting the fourth team member, they collectively decided to choose Courtney.  They thought it would be a strategic move to have someone light sitting in their boat.  Unfortunately two teams of four meant the ninth competitor (Denise) would have to sit this one out.  In the end, weight didn’t seem to factor in the game-playing at all.  Courtney’s inability to paddle or bail easily gave the Round One victory to Todd.  Her teammate/lovebird, Frosti, didn’t fare much better.  The athletic competitor somehow managed get himself stuck in a corner within reach of his opponents’ buckets.  Round Two went to Amanda.

For their reward, Todd, Amanda, James and Jean-Robert were taken to an ancient village where they were treated to an authentic Chinese meal.  In the middle of their feast, Jean-Robert opened up the scroll Jeff handed them before their departure.  It was the final clue to the whereabouts of the Immunity Idol – the idol that James, Todd and Amanda already knew about.  Realizing that there had been several clues prior to this one really bothered Jean-Robert.  How could the savvy poker player not know there was a hidden idol out there this whole time?  He became so fixated by this new information he didn’t even notice how badly the other three were playing along.  Jean-Robert was now officially the last person in the whole camp to know that an idol existed.

Back at camp, Denise felt slightly betrayed her former Fei Long members.  She didn’t appreciate being excluded by her friends during the Reward Challenge.  Should she take this as some sort of sign?  Has she now been left behind?  Realizing they now had five people sitting back at camp, Peih-gee seized the opportunity to form a new alliance.  Although Denise toyed with the idea of voting off Jean-Robert like Peih-gee suggested, she still worried about possible retaliation from her original alliance.

The next day, Jean-Robert woke up early in hopes of finding that mystery idol.  Although he successfully narrowed the location down to the two pagodas near camp, he naively took down the three blank tiles still posted to the archways.  Once his ‘idols’ were secured, he quickly made sure to hide them.  Uhh - did he not realize there was a fourth tile already missing?  Did he not remember what Jaime’s fake idol looked like?

Having played the game for 20+ days now, Todd was getting slowly irritated by everyone at camp.  One particular thing that bothered him was James’ cushy position.  This inspired Todd to come up with Brilliant Idea # 111.  Instead of voting off Peih-gee first, why not conspire to get rid of James?  If he didn’t know a threat was out there, he wouldn’t be able to use an Immunity Idol in time to save himself.  Although Amanda believed they should stick with the original plan, Todd insisted they eliminate James the minute he lost an individual immunity challenge.  They had now way of predicting how far in the game he could get on his challenge wins alone.

The Hae Da Fung clan later crawled through a swamp to get to their next Immunity Challenge.  This particular battle would require each competitor to have a strong sense of balance.  The challengers each had to sit on a raised barrel full of water.  Over time, their seat would become increasingly wobbly as water drained from the barrel.  The person who managed to stay on the longest would win the immunity necklace.  Although the challenge required a strong core, it didn’t favor those with large muscles.  The heavier you were, the sooner you fell.  In other words – this game was meant for the skinnies.  After 32 minutes of barely any movement, Courtney came away with the surprise victory.

Back at camp, Jean-Robert made an unexpected move and revealed his immunity idol discovery to Erik.  Hoping to somehow work this to his advantage, Erik decided to let Jean-Robert in on his secret.  He admitted to J.R. that he and Jaime had found several tiles in James’ bag; he was 99% convinced that James was already in possession of both idols.  Of course, Jean-Robert took the devastating news pretty hard.  How did the poker player allow someone to bluff him?  Feeling betrayed, Jean-Robert told Erik they needed to pull a fast one on James.

Hoping his ‘friend’ would admit the truth, Jean-Robert later confronted James about the idols.  J.R. didn’t say how or when he found out, only that he knew James had them.  If James would only admit to their existence, then maybe they could work together.  Unfortunately James chose to deny any ownership of the tiles forcing Jean-Robert to declare war.

Not realizing he was already in cahoots with James, Jean-Robert pitched a new idea to Todd:  why don’t they work on getting rid of James instead?  Although Todd agreed to the plan he had already conceived, he walked away irritated.  He didn’t like the idea that Jean-Robert was hatching up plans he had already envisioned days ago.  Just for that, Todd decided to change his vote again basically out of spite.  He told James and Amanda they should work on voting off Jean-Robert this time instead of Peih-gee.  (Or in Amanda’s case, voting off J.R. instead of James).

At the next Tribal Council, it was very unclear which way things would go.  Would Todd really vote off Jean-Robert like he last claimed, or did he just say that to throw off James?  Would Amanda go back to voting off Peih-gee – her first intended victim?  Would the former Zhan Hu members go with their original plan and vote off Jean-Robert or were they now aligned with J.R. to vote off James?  In the end, it was the poker player who was dealt the bad hand.  LOSER: Jean-Robert.

(You can review last week’s episode here.)
(You can read next week’s episode here.)