We had a little fun and a little misery last night. Hurley beat an over-confident Sawyer in a ping pong match, meaning that Sawyer had to give up using nicknames for a week, which probably felt like torture to Sawyer. In the flashback, Sayid had to face one of his torture vicitms. It wasn’t a good night for Sayid. He was shot by Patchy, and in his flashback, he was beaten and threatened with torture himself. Not good.
I’ll start with the flashback. Sayid was working as a chef in Paris when a strange man comes to his restaurant and asks Sayid to come work for him. By the way, Sayid was using another name (Najim maybe?). It turns out that this guy’s wife, Amira, was one of Sayid’s torture victims while he was a member of the Iraqi Republican Guard. Amira’s husband wants revenge; it seems Amira merely wants an apology. Amira talks to Sayid alone and tells him a story of some children who were torturing a cat. She rescued the cat, but sometimes it will scratch her or bite her because the cat forgets that he’s safe. Amira says that she knows what it feels like to never feel safe because of what Sayid did to her. She asks him to admit what he did to her and say that he remembers her. Sayid says, “I remember you. Your face has haunted me. I am sorry, so sorry for what I did to you.” She says she forgives him and that she’ll tell her husband that she was mistaken so he would let Sayid go. She says she will never be like a torturer. Wow.
The cat shows up late in the show when Sayid, Locke, Kate, and Rousseau find the Flame station with Patchy (aka Mikhail? The names were hard to catch). Sayid decides to walk up to the house unarmed to talk to Patchy. Patchy shoots Sayid in the arm, and Locke and Kate shoot at Patchy. Patchy claims that he is “the last living member of the Dharma Initiative,” but Sayid’s not buying it. Patchy sews Sayid up and tells him about his past. He claims he was a member of the Soviet army and was stationed in a listening post (is it the same listening post we saw at the end of last season??), but he was dismissed from his position. He saw an ad in the paper for the Dharma Initiative that said, “Would you like to save the world?” He joined Dharma, and he’s been on the island for 11 years working in the Flame. The Flame’s purpose is to communicate with the outside world. He says that Dharma had had some problems with the Hostiles (obviously the Others), who had been on the island a long time before Dharma arrived, and he was one of the few who survived. Turns out that Sayid was right not to believe him because Patchy IS one of the Others, and the black lady Other is there as well. They all fight, and Patchy ends up holding Locke at gunpoint while Sayid has the lady at gunpoint. Patchy starts speaking in another language to the lady, and obviously she told him to shoot her because he does shoot and kill her.
Before all of this, though, Locke had found a computer in the Flame with a chess game. He’s immediately sucked in. Patchy said he’s never been able to beat the computer, but Locke does. When he beats the computer, Alvar Hanso appears on the screen and starts giving instructions about what numbers to enter for certain situations. He says something about the Hostiles (anybody catch it??) and to enter 77. Well, that’s what John does, and the Flame explodes a few moments later. Sayid’s furious, of course. Rousseau wants to kill Patchy. Sayid says, “No, he’s my prisoner. I will decide his fate.” And the episode ends with a shot of the cat.
A couple of questions:
Why was Locke so obsessed with the computer?? Did this bother anyone else? And why would he enter any number into the computer without checking with someone else? It makes you wonder whose side Locke’s on…
Why was Sawyer’s only task after losing to stop with the nicknames? Do they really bother everybody that much?
Did anyone catch the funniest line? Sawyer to Nikki: “Who the hell are you?”
What did you think? What did I leave out? There was a lot of information, and I only got to watch the episode once, so I may have missed something. Let me know what you thought!
Lost, Sayid, Enter 77, Locke, Rousseau, Patchy, Kate, torture
Finally, there’s a novel that I don’t have to research to understand the significance! Sawyer was reading Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead. This novel is about an architect named Howard Roark who has ideals that he refuses to compromise for anyone. His refusal to compromise costs him many things–fame, fortune, society’s respect. But the thing is that he doesn’t care to have any of those things. His “integrity” is more important to him. I put integrity in quotation marks because Roark has his own ideas about what’s true and just. So, which character does this sound like? Some might say Sawyer since he was reading the book, but I’m leaning toward Locke. His actions have always been questioned by fans. We never really know what he’s thinking, but we know he’s passionate about what he believes. What do you guys think?? Given my brief description of Howard Roark, which Lost character resembles him most?
There’s a great article about Michael Emerson, who plays Ben, on 
Here’s what’s coming up in this week’s episode titled “Par Avion”:
I know many of you don’t like spoilers, so if you don’t want to know, please don’t keep reading!
All you Jorge Garcia fans, listen up. Big-O at CrazyFanatic.com has a podcast of an interview he conducted with Jorge Garcia. They talked for around forty minutes. It’s really great. So, if you’re a Jorge Garcia fan, I think you’ll really enjoy it.
According to 
Winnie over at Watching the View let me know that Evangeline Lilly was on The View today. Sadly, she didn’t reveal anything much about the show, but if you want to read Winnie’s recap, check it out 
The Daily Record has a great interview with Henry Ian Cusick, who plays Desmond on Lost. Any fears that Desmond may not be around for a while on the show can be forgotten after reading this:
