Tonight, 37 members and 2 guests (Mr and Mrs Aamir Nakhoda), attended an evening of “Magic from Out of The Pocket”, hosted by Ng Kah King and assisted by Axl Ching.

Starting off the meeting was Ng Kah King, who shared about his experience at a magic event in Nanning City, China.  His main observation was that Chinese stage magicians weave a storyline into their magic act, complete with appropriate music and lightings.  His performance consisted of the transformation of a lit candle to a stalk of rose, strips of paper into dollar notes, and the retrieval of a correct prediction from his wallet of what the audience would say.  He also correctly predicted that a volunteer would select ‘3’ from among 5 cards printed ‘1’ to ‘5’.

Harapan Ong promoted his upcoming “MegaJam – We Flourish and Bloom” event that was to be held on 15 November.  On the 14 November, there would be a lecture by “Ponta The Smith”.  Harapan then presented 6 large cards, each displaying a different country flag.  He correctly predicted a volunteer’s choice viz. France.  Each of the cards had the beginning letter of the country printed boldly on its back.  All the cards were arranged to read “F-R-A-N-C-E”.

Shade Soo presented his modified version of “The Fastest Gun” card trick where he and a volunteer both pulled out a card each from their pockets at the same time.  Both cards happened to be mates: the 8 of hearts and the 8 of diamonds.  In explaining how the effect was done, Shade gave helpful tips on how to use our pockets for performing magic.

Axl Ching was the first of 2 members to take their Induction Tests.  He switched a volunteer’s card with his own, when both of them were still holding on to their cards in their hands.  He also transposed the 4 Aces cards into black colour cards.

Teoh Zhi Chun transformed 5 indifferent cards into the Royal Flush.  He proceeded to change the backs of the royal flush cards to multi-coloured ones.  Finally, all the backs of the cards in the deck changed to multi-coloured backs.

A short break allowed members to patronise sales of magic items brought by members.

After the break, John Teo displayed an interesting criss-crossed set of red and blue decks of cards.  A volunteer selected a card in the red deck.  When the cards from the blue deck were taken out and spread, the duplicate of this card was seen reversed in the blue deck.  John shared his dream of nailing a chosen card, the 4 of diamonds, onto a block of wood.  He showed a photograph of this card being nailed to a block of wood.  A volunteer chose a card, but it was not the 4 of diamonds.  It was the King of Clubs.  John then caused the King of clubs to be transformed into the 4 of diamonds, complete with the nail hole.  On the photograph was the king of clubs nailed to the wood.

Ian Tan had a signed card vanish from the deck to reappear in his pocket.  This was repeated.  Finally, from his pocket were 51 playing cards and the signed selection was the only single card held in his hand.

Thomas Yeo transformed 5 peanuts with different colour wrappings inside a foulard into colour sticks.

Desmond Peh had a volunteer choose an ESP card.  When the rest of the 4 cards were flipped over, they formed a prediction message of the chosen ESP symbol.  He then caused a signed selection to vanish from the deck to appear first under the card box, then it rose to the top of the deck, stuck to his forehead, and finally as a folded card found inside the card box.

Kai Emmanuel invited a volunteer to place thumb cuffs on both his thumbs and cover them with a scarf.  He managed to free his thumbs and also produced a bottle of drink from under the scarf.

Chew Liang Huat showed us a magic apparatus he produced using his 3D printer.  A solid plate was placed inside a box and 6 miniaturised swords were used to pierce through the box, plate and cover.  The plate was later shown unharmed.  He contributed this piece of apparatus for auction later in the night.

With the help of a volunteer, Charles Choo tore a piece of paper into several pieces and then restored it.  This was followed with an effect using ESP cards.

Joseph Then demonstrated the concept of oil and water not mixing, with 4 black and 4 red cards.  He mixed them up in various combinations but somehow, the black cards stayed together and separate from the red cards each time.  Eventually, even the shuffled deck from which the 8 cards were taken, also demonstrated this property as the black cards and red cards were magically separated.

Eisen Lee had a volunteer select a picture card from a set of 8 different cards.  He proceeded to eliminate the non-chosen cards.  Just when the audience thought he got it wrong, he produced the chosen card with the cello!

Wee Kien Meng successfully predicted the favourite doughnut flavours of his 2 volunteers correctly – chocolate and strawberry.  He then performed a ring and string routine using a shoelace and a doughnut.  Finally, the doughnut vanished and magically appeared inside the doughnut box.

The meeting ended with an auction of magic paraphernalia with proceeds going to the late Ashish’s family; and a lucky draw where 6 members got to bring home a magic item each.

Reported by

Low Hwee Lang (Ms)