Pack your bags, because The Amazing Race is back! Every week, Parade'sMike Bloom will bring you interviews with the team most recently eliminated from the race.Melinda and Erika Papadeas came onto The Amazing Race with a relationship only seen a handful of times across 37 seasons: Mother and daughter. And the two became even more of an endangered species as the race went on. Many of the other all-women teams were eliminated early, and despite having the oldest average cast in the show's history, many of the elder racers also fell by the wayside. But Melinda and Erika were dead set on not joining them, and so they powered through every leg through communication, a steady approach and the potential to take big shots if needed. The latter was fully on display, for example, when they U-Turned Nick and Mike Fiorito, a move to guarantee their survival that ended up spurning the brothers.
Going into Leg 8, despite being in the back of the pack, Melinda and Erika talked up the skills that had accumulated through their early stumbled. Particularly, Erika prided herself on one big thing that's kept them in the race: Reading the clue. And as she and her mom wended their way through the Bulgarian countryside, she had no idea she'd be eating her words like some delicious handmade yogurt. Upon reaching the capital city of Sofia, they terms were informed they must not take taxis for the rest of the leg. However, Erika misread a crucial element of the clue, believing they must rely on cabs moving forward. As a result, despite their transportation's speediness keeping them neck-and-neck with the other teams, they had the shadow of a penalty menacingly hanging over their head. Luckily, Melinda and Erika never had their accumulating penalties come into play. Unluckily, it was because their struggles during the leg put them in last, elimination them from the race.Now, out of the race, Melinda and Erika talk about how their handful of penalties came to be, their reaction to getting iced out, then helped by Han and Holden, and how a series of preseason accidents from Melinda left them physically hampered going into the race.Related: Everything to Know About The Amazing Race 37
I have to start with how things ended for you. Ultimately, the penalties you accrued didn't matter. However, if you had not finished in last, do you know how long you would have had to wait out due to taking taxis for the second half of the leg?Erika Papadeas: So we've kind of talked about this a lot. The taxis are totally not what killed us. It actually kept us in it to see people! But we would have had a 30-minute penalty for each taxi. So four taxis, two hours. So, I mean, that would have hit us. But as you can see, throughout the whole leg of the race, the teams were running a lot. And I mean, my mom can attest to it. I don't think she would have even survived the day if we had not taken taxis. It was just a lot of running that leg of the race that we didn't anticipate. I don't know if we would have been able to keep up in the long run. We probably would have been a couple hours behind.Melinda Papadeas: Yeah, it would have been hard to do the dance. But after all that taxis, it's like, "Let's go ahead!" I don't think the taxis are what took us out. I really think it was a cipher.Melinda, I know when I talked with Jeff, he said you both bonded over being big fans of Big Brother. But talk to me about your history with The Amazing Race. And what made you decide to go from fans to racers?Erika: Yeah, Jeff and I fully bonded over Big Brother the first leg of the race. I was like, "What? You're fully obsessed with Big Brother?" But growing up, my mom, she was the one who loves The Amazing Race. And so we watched it religiously when I was a kid.Melinda: Yeah, we use the race to see the world. It would educate her to show her different countries and cultures. And that's what I really loved about the show. It just really kind of drew you into the world and to be able to see this beautiful creation that God gave.Erika: And then what kind of spurred us to actually audition for it or whatever. My mom did not portray how much she actually talks. And everyone who met us was always like, "You guys should do The Amazing Race. You guys would be so good atT he Amazing Race." And so finally I was like, "We should just try it." And it kind of worked out. So that's kind of how we ended up even doing it. Literally people are like, "You guys would just be good TV." Because usually we argue so much more, and usually she talks so much more. But she gets camera-shy apparently.[Laughs.] Was that the case, Melinda? Is it a matter of circumstance? Or did we just not see it in the edit?Melinda: Well, part of it was that I really thought we could even do better, but we needed to decide who was going to be in charge. And we made the decision that she was going to be the one that led. And she did a phenomenal job of leading and taking charge. And so I didn't want to fight and debate. It also the part of the reason I struggled. Because six months before, I had fallen out of the attic and broken my heel, and I didn't walk for eight weeks. And then two months later, I was in a car accident and got four bulging discs, and my hip was all messed up. So I was only walking a mile before we left once we found out that we were going to be on the show. We didn't have very long, so I was just struggling with pain and trying to just support her.Erika: It was really funny. Actually, what they didn't show to you is we wanted to both read the clue. But it turned out my mom couldn't read the clues.Melinda: I found out that my vision was affected with the car accident, also the jolt of the car. So I wasn't able to read the clues. Any of the clues?!Melinda: No.Erika: So basically, what would happen, it was so comical, kind of played a part into it. Most of the time, you get your first clue, and then there's additional details. So you have to rip and read the first. And then as soon as I would do that, she wouldn't know which way she was going. But my mom was so stressed about being last, always, that she would just start running. And so whenever I read the additional details, I would just be running and reading it with her, trying to catch up.Melinda: I'm very ADHD. I didn't want to be the last all the time, and I knew we were going to be last because I was the slowest. One time, I got when we were running everybody from the airport. And I don't even know who it was. They were running, and I got hit with the big backpack, and I kind of went flying off to the side. So I'm like, "I can't do this again. We're just gonna have to be the back of the pack." So for me, that gave me anxiety that I was always seeing us behind. And I'm competitive, like she said.That's so interesting. Because I would say a lot of what we saw of your dynamic was that, Melinda, you would be a bit more pessimistic whenever a team passed you or you were in the back of the pack. Does that represent your general dynamic, or did it come from more specific situations?Melinda: I thought they were more specific. But I see you're opening your mouth, Erika. But no, I mean, I had a lot of anxiety because of the pain and feeling like I wasn't everything that I could be. I mean, I wasn't at my best.Erika: I think she was just consistently stressed. When she was younger, or, before all injuries, we probably would have been able to keep up with them. And, I mean, we always knew I was really competitive. But with my competitiveness, it had to take a back seat. Because I was like, "Oh, she's freaking out. I have to calm down." So we almost switched roles. Whereas usually, normally, she should be more calm, or things like that. But I think she was just so stressed of, making us last, even though she wasn't. The Amazing Race totally isn't about speed. We're a good example of that. We made it so far an all-female team, and my mom was the oldest on the cast. But I think that, for her, she was consistently stressed that we were last because she thought she was slow, but she really wasn't.The previous leg, we saw you U-Turn Nick and Mike, believing you were the last two teams. Talk to me about your decision, and your subsequent regret upon finding out not only were there other teams behind you, but it led directly to their departure.Melinda: As you saw when we were leaving the haystack, the only people we saw were Nick and Mike. We had no idea Han and Holden were even there. We saw that they had come, you don't pay attention of who's still there because you were too busy looking for the needle in the haystack. So we saw them, and she's like, "We gotta do it." And then we get to the box, and she's like, "Well, do we do it?" And I had to run through the grass to beat them, because I saw them coming, and I knew we were going to be in a foot race. And they knew they should have yelled that Han and Holden were behind them, and they didn't. So we went and used the U-Turn. And we felt bad about it when we found there was other people behind. But then they didn't show this. When we got in the car and we kind of got lost, we're like, 'Oh, this is karma. We shouldn't have done it." And then we end up making it, and they don't make it at all. It was hard.Erika: When you do a U-Turn, you usually don't see the team. And so having them right behind us was like, "Oh crap. Hey guys, we just you U-Turned you!" And then seeing three clues, it was like, "Crap. We didn't necessarily have to." And I think if they had gotten to the board, they wouldn't have done it. Because we would have just done it to Han and Holden. But I think if they had gotten to the board and we hadn't U-Turned the at that point, they still would have U-Turned Han and Holden. No one knew where Jack and Carson were, although all of us wish we had now! Jack and Carson were just too good that we would have rather not had them in the next leg with us. But we can't regret it at all. We would do it again, just because we didn't know the situation, and we had a kind of life-or-death [situation] in that moment. But it was really funny to hear my mom. Because I got to the board and I was like, "Do we really have to?" And she was just like, "Do it!" [Laughs.]You mention Han and Holden. At the cipher task, we see the two of you briefly work together to ice out Carson and Jack. But then, when you leave the room, they end up working together with them to ice you out instead, though they do eventually help you with the solution. Talk to me about what that dynamic was like throughout that task.Melinda: Yeah, that was interesting to see that they kind of work together behind us. I'm not sure it worked to their benefit. Because they ended up beating them to the mat. So I think if they had stayed with us, they could outrun us. That's what I always figure that people would see.Erika: I mean, from my perspective, Jack and Carson already had it figured out. In reality, they're really good at this game. They figure everything out really fast. And so I was just grateful. And even after, when they left, I was like, "Oh, Jack and Carson already left. That was even kind of them to help us after that. So thank you so much for even telling us, because we would have been there forever not having flipped it." I don't think anyone realizes how heavy the cipher was. My mom actually tried to pick it up once. I didn't really look at it, and she couldn't even pick it up. So it was a struggle.Melinda: It felt like it was stuck to the mat or something.Going back to the cab mistake, did you see any other teams using public transit that leg. And did that give you pause that you might have done something wrong?Melinda: We never saw anybodyErika: We only saw people at the stops. We actually never saw anyone arrive to the stops. So it was kind of funny, like you said, [the cabs] kept us in the race. We just kept running into people. We're like, "Oh my gosh, we got here and they are just right ahead of us." I think we just got everywhere quicker, and then we're able to see everyone once they got there.You two made a bond with Pops and Jeff over all your similarities. Talk to me about your dynamic.Erika: We loved Jeff and Pops. Jeff and I think really just bonded right from beginning. Like I said, we were like, "Oh, we love Big Brother." But then we also realized racing with a parent is so different than any other dynamic on the race. And so there really is this shift of the parent is used to being in charge, and then the child has to almost take more of a lead, which is, I think, a struggle for every probably parent, on the race. It was different for me too. It's like, "I'm not going to be pushing my mom. I want to be encouraging." You don't want to be disrespectful to your parents, so it's just a different type of way of pushing. And I think Jeff understood that, too. Like, "You just want to push Pops. I just want to push my mom, but also in an encouraging way. You can't be like, "Oh my gosh, you could do better." It's like, "Wow, I'm impressed. You're the oldest one in this group and still keeping up." Wanting to encourage them and not letting them get down on themselves. And I think both Pops and my mom kind of struggled not wanting to let us down. It's a different way to encourage the teammate.Melinda: We felt that too. As a parent team, it was great to kind of support us. We were the older people, and so let's keep us both in as much as we could. And we just had a lot of similar values that we had with them. It was nice. And we had good karma with other people too. Jonathan and Ana, we had some good contact. That's why we knew if they got to the Driver's Seat, that they would help us out.Erika: My game plan was like when Scott and Lori played up their "slogging." I for sure told everyone we were slow. I was like, "We suck. We're terrible. We're slow. You can beat us." Because I wanted everyone to feel like, "Oh, we want to keep taking them to the next leg." Because it was such a "season of surprises." Every twist could benefit us, essentially. As long as it wasn't an Express Pass, there was something bad happening to a team, and it could benefit us. And I never wanted to seem like a team that would be a threat, and I never wanted a team to pick us just because we were on last. And I think we had really good relationships with all the teams. We loved everyone. But we would never be a target. Even though sometimes you just want to get the last team out, it was never targeted towards us. It was kind of like an, "Oh, we want to keep them going, because everyone just wanted to hang out with us." And you can hang out with them as you pass them by in the taxi!Melinda: There's so many funny things in the taxi. That last taxi, we're like, she's like, "Gosh, I don't think we have enough money to pay this taxi." And I was like, "Well, we have some left from before." Well, it's because we weren't supposed to be taking taxis! We didn't have money to pay the last taxi.Erika: And something that wasn't shown, that's hilarious, and it's so ironic. So the very first leg of the race, in Hong Kong, I kind of let "race brain" get to me. I thought we were totally last in the singing. And so I read the clue. Did not read the additional notes. And in the additional one, it actually said, "Take a taxi to Phil." Unfortunately, I made my mom run about two miles. So I think as soon as I read additional notes again, I was like, "It says taxi. 'You must take a taxi.'" Not "you must not take a taxi." So it was ironic that we took one when we couldn't and didn't take one when we could.
Related: 'The Amazing Race 37's Nick and Mike Fiorito Break Down That Shocking U-Turn and 'Heartbreaking' Elimination (Exclusive)
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