Japanese Title: Love and Borscht, the Fierce Fight!
After Garurumon and Stingmon destroy a Dark Tower in Acapulco, Mexico, Ken informs Yamato that the renegate Digimon have escaped to the Mayan ruins in Palenque. However, upon arriving at the ruins, they find that a curfew has been enforced for kids their age - and when they try to enter the ruins, they’re quickly threatened and turned back. As they try to formulate another plan, Ken reveals he speaks “a little” Spanish, while Wormmon, Yamato, and Gabumon are impressed.
Help arrives in the form of José, yet another identical copy of Gennai, who creates a diversion for the four to enter the ruins with some...interesting antics in front of the guards. As they explore the ruins, Wormmon gets a little freaked out by the atmosphere and decides to bring in a little light...only to run into a Gotsumon and get freaked out again.
The Gotsumon turns out to be partnered to a Mexican Chosen Child, Chichosnote , who’s sneaked out of her house in order to help in the rounding-up efforts. Chichos immediately takes a liking to Ken and latches onto him, to the horror and jealousy of Wormmon, and the two immediately start a war over the hapless Ken as they search for the renegade Digimon. José arrives to lend them a hand, and they go deeper into the ruins.
The renegade Digimon turn out to be a Dokugumon and a Minotaurmon, both of whom seem to be very agitated. Knowing that it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to destroy an important Mayan cultural icon through Digimon battling, Yamato and Gabumon lure them outside while the others chase them out. On the way, Chichos falls over and lands on her face and Ken picks her up on his back...and when Wormmon falls over in an attempt to get to Ken, he only ends up running into Gotsumon.
Once they successfully get the Dokugumon and Minotaurmon out of the ruins, Ken has Wormmon evolve to Stingmon and Ken commands him to prevent the ruins from being damaged. Gabumon super-evolves to WereGarurumon and Chichos’s Gotsumon evolves to Monochromon to help out, and they knock out the renegade Digimon and send them back to the Digital World via Ken’s D-3 and José’s laptop.
Chichos, having fallen asleep on Ken’s back, mutters that Stingmon was amazing, to the happy embarrassment of Wormmon. Ken, Yamato, Wormmon, and Gabumon drop Chichos off at her home, bid her “adiós”, and depart.
Meanwhile, Miyako and Sora arrive in Moscow and destroy a Dark Tower. They meet up with the Russian Chosen Children: Anna with a Unimon, Laranote with a Snimon, and Yuri with a Kuwagamon. Unfortunately, even though they’re eager to get to know each other, the language barrier is thick and they’re not able to fully communicate. Miyako tries and fails to get them to understand sign language, and even worse, Sora only knows two words in Russian: “piroshki” and “borscht”.
This gives Miyako an idea, and she creates a code for the three Russian Chosen, “piroshki” meaning a command for them to turn right, “borscht” being one for “left”, and “caviar” being one for attacking. Now with a feeble way to communicate, the kids begin their attack on the rampaging Flymon, with Miyako leading the attack force using their new code words. Unimon, Snimon, Kuwagamon, Aquilamon, and Garudamon’s combined efforts knock out the Flymon, and Miyako sends them back to the Digital World.
As Miyako shakes hands with Anna, her stomach grumbles and she realizes she’s hungry from yelling all of these food names. The Russian Chosen offer to treat them to food, but before Sora and Miyako can accept the offer, Gennai’s comrade Ilya informs them that they need to take care of some Mammon rampaging up north. With food back in Moscow as a motivation, the two of them head up north to assist the Siberian Chosen Children and their Yukidarumon, but end up so cold they can barely function. Fortunately, they’re bailed out by Imperialdramon, who has most of the other Japanese Chosen with him.
After Miyako sends the Mammon back to the Digital World, the kids head off to pick up Hikari and Koushirou in Hong Kong, since it’s now past 5 PM in Japan - to the despair of Miyako and Sora, who were looking forward to eating real piroshki and borscht.
As Gennai successfully removes the data on the Digimon from the international military databases, we see a Good-Times Montage of the international Chosen Children enjoying their Christmas and Imperialdramon returning the Japanese Chosen Children home. Back in Tokyo, a boy is approached by Archnemon, and she takes him into a van with Mummymon and drives off...
Tropes
- As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Chichos? Really? note The dub had the sense to rename her the much more fitting “Rosa”.
- Bilingual Bonus: Although Ken and José helpfully explain most of what’s going on, several of the Spanish phrases are left untranslated in the Japanese version. The English dub just has Rosa speak English with a fake Spanish accent and removes the entire language barrier aspect for that half of the episode.
- Bowdlerise: A scene in which one of the guards threatens Ken and Yamato with a gun is cut out in the dub.
- Hidden Depths: In the Japanese version, Ken knows a good deal of Spanish, or at least enough to communicate relatively well with Chichos. One wonders if he’s smarter than he claims to be.
- Out-of-Character Moment: Wormmon acts very out character in this episode when trying to get Ken's attention, and behaves jealously when Chichos expresses interest in Ken. Yeah...
- Precocious Crush: Chichos is not subtle about having a thing for Ken, asking him directly if he’s got a girlfriend and what kind of girls he likes. The dub takes it even further by having Rosa asking Ken if she can be his girlfriend if he doesn’t have one.
- Recursive Translation: Chichos’s Gotsumon’s evolution is translated in the Japanese version as “Digievolución”, which is the Spanish dub’s counterpart to the English dub’s “digivolve”. Weirdly enough, among the six countries visited during these episodes, this is the only one where “evolution” is re-translated; all of the other countries’ Digimon used the Japanese shinka.
- Shout-Out: While commanding the other Chosen, Miyako yells for them “Go! Go! DigiRangers!”
- Some fans have speculated that the naming of Anna, Lara, and Yuri is a reference to Doctor Zhivago.
- Would Hurt a Child: In a scene cut from the English dub, one of the security guards points a handgun at Ken and Yamato while making a very creepy smile, implying that he was not above this.
