[1] It was modeled after the "Silent Library" segment from the Japanese comedy show Downtown no Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende!!
[2] The show consists of a team of 5 people (usually British males between 20 and 30 years old but sometimes females), under the supervision of a Japanese man, called the Zen master, played by actor Peter Law, and voiced by actor Silas Hawkins who assigns them rituals they must accomplish to allegedly reach Zen enlightenment.
The show consists of nine "Zen rituals", each of which presents the victim with some form of pain or discomfort, and must be completed in silence, and sometimes in a given period of time.
In this final test, they have to complete some task while their penises (the so-called "Snakes") are being pulled (supposedly by the Zen master) with a string that has been tied to them.
At that point, the Zen master is shown giving supposedly profound advice to reach enlightenment, which is usually totally random nonsense.