Michael Palin: Around the World in 80 Days

In Mumbai, Palin finds himself a week behind Phileas Fogg. He is able to find a train from there to Chennai in the south. Before leaving Mumbai, he runs into an astrologist who, after giving him a chart for a baby to be born to one of his referees, tells him he will complete the journey on time. He finds himself in trouble, however, trying to get a connecting boat to Singapore. Eventually, an "...Anglo-German-Indo-Yugoslav agreement the UN would have been proud of" was reached and Palin was on his way, albeit eleven days behind. This agreement meant that only Palin and the cameraman Nigel could travel aboard the ship, meaning that Palin had to take a "crash course in sound testing" so they could film aboard the ship. One of the train stops on his way from Mumbai to Chennai is Poona, where Palin talks about his father winning two rowing cups there in the 1920s.

Palin takes a boat from Singapore on to Hong Kong, where he wins big in a horse race, is attacked by a cockatoo and meets up with his friend Basil Pao. He attends a party thrown in his honor at the halfway point in the journey. Then, it is on to Guangzhou for a dinner of shredded cobra and then a train to Shanghai. On the train, he is asked by a Chinese businesswoman if he carries an umbrella all the time. Palin states, "I just get wet." As well, he collects a roofing tile requested by Terry Gilliam.

In Shanghai, he gets some herbal remedies to help him on the rest of his trip. He and Basil take in a Chinese jazz band. After parting with Basil the next day, he takes a ferry to Japan, where he rides the world-famous shinkansen train. Meeting up with David Powers, a fellow Brit, he is taken to a sushi bar and then a karaoke bar, where he does a duet singing You Are My Sunshine. After spending the night in a capsule hotel, he is off on to the Pacific Ocean for eleven days, one of which includes crossing the International Date Line.