The Magic of Kurt

My hunger had brought me back to Koreen’s Grill last night. I was drained from what had happened to ZeeWee early in the morning and I basically spent half of my day in the traffic police office to report the accident involving my car and an owner type jeep. This jeep was driven by a senior man and it nudged ZeeWee from behind. My car was once again damaged.

In sheer sadness, I skipped lunch which was why that night I craved for grilled tuna belly and the seafood soup. At Koreen’s I had dinner with the manager and the chef and talked about what vacation and trips to do this year.

After dinner, the chef summoned the on-the-job trainee and requested for a magic trick. His name was Kurt, a graduating hotel-and-restaurant management (HRM) student. I sat at one end of the table and I saw him ran to the kitchen and emerged from it a few minutes after with a deck of cards in his hands.

People began to gather around as he started his card trick on me. As he was describing the trick, I saw the cards being shuffled in a unique manner. The cards were moved too fast. I could not follow how the cards went out from the deck and swallowed back in a flash. His hands were too fast.

He spread the cards like fans and had me pick a card. I was told not to flash it to him because the trick was to guess what card I picked. He shuffled the cards the instant that I drew one and had me insert it back to the deck. I chose 9 of diamonds and I had it stored in my mind. Kurt wanted me to think about the card I picked and to think of nothing else.

He shuffled the cards once more. As he spread the cards on the table, he asked me to hold his left arm with my right hand. He kept telling me to think about the card I picked. I was informed beforehand that Kurt could read people’s mind. So I was trying to test him if he could still guess the card I picked. I knew that holding his arm has something to do with the telepathy that he’s trying to utilize and so I thought a different card instead of the 9 of diamonds. But I was a bit confused. If it’s telepathy, then why do I need to hold his arm?

From the spread cards, he pulled out the 9 of cloves. I told him that it’s not. the card I picked.  My hand was still holding his arm as he asked me to think about my card again. I thought of other cards instead. I blocked my mind from thinking about the card I picked.

Then he pulled out another card. For the second time, he was wrong. I saw beads of sweat on his face. He was embarrassed for picking the wrong cards. I was amused of what just happened. I thought his magic trick failed him.

He asked me to let go of his arm. I removed my hand from his arm and I freaked out. On his arm I saw the figure 9 and a diamond. The quad figure was quite unclear but the figure nine was very visible. Chills went up my spine. How on earth such a mark would be made on his arm when I didn’t even move my hand when I held him.

He explained why he picked the wrong cards. The diamond was a bit indistinct because he noticed that I did not focus on the card I picked. He said that I thought of something else which is why it was all the more difficult to point the right card.

I wondered what other tricks he had up his sleeves.

The restaurant manager mentioned that Kurt could solve the Rubic’s cube in a flash. Less than 10 seconds and blindfolded at that.

 

And he claimed to have telekinetic abilities too. He demonstrated it on several occasion at Koreen’s Grills. A couple of weekends back, Kurt would move from table to table, asked the customers if he could show a trick or two and then perform magic to their delight. One of his tricks was to make the lit cigarette dance in air. A group of young ladies freaked out when they saw a cigarette stick making somersaults unheld.

After his trick, he would then make a pitch and urged customers to order for more food and drinks. Talk about marketing tactics too.

Kurt showed me at least 10 tricks that night. I was so amazed by what he demonstrated. It switched on my probing nature. He said that he knew he had the so-called gift ever since he was young. His first trick involved the use of rubber band. He claimed to have been self-taught and he never had formal or serious training on magic and tricks.

But what did I think about his magic? I was made to believe that it’s the real deal. But deep inside, I had reservations about the whole thing because I might have been tricked. To see is to believe but then I doubted what I saw.

Magic to me is not only when something impossible happened but also when I was there to see, hear and feel it happen. I could say that there was magic when I saw the figure 9 and a diamond as marks on Kurt’s arm. There was magic when he solved the Rubic’s cube at a nick of time. And there was magic when he let the cigarette stick float in air.

Magic to me is a race between the senses of the magician and his audience. In Kurt’s case, I think it was a question of whether or not the magician’s hands were faster than the eyes of the viewers. Kurt’s hands were fast. I bet his eyes moved faster than mine.

It is a matter of how the eyes could quickly follow the motion of the magician’s hands. Whereas the eyes move slower than the hands, the limbs on the other hand were made to keep the eyes from catching the twist of the trick. Most of the tricks were about letting the eyes focus on something while the magician’s hands were busy doing something else.

It’s like pulling the rug under our feet and yet in shock, we wondered how it happened. Magic is a puzzle, a trick. It’s how the eyes were fooled and how the mind was made to believe that impossible things could happen. Oftentimes what is visual could trigger the mind to accept it as real even though they weren’t. Magic hoodwinks our eyes. It hoodwinks our soul and mind.