Who walks around with a lemon?

The magic bar I work in is relocating, so only one of our two magic bars is open. The staff of two magic bars are all in that magic bar, so there is little need for me to help out there (though since also the customers of both magic bars end up in only one place, it is more busy than normal) and also almost no space for me to stand, haha. I take this opportunity to take some time off and do other things. Yesterday I went to our big fireworks festival.

僕が出ているマジックバーが今移転中なので、うちのマジックバーで1店舗しか開いていない。ということは、2店舗分のスタッフがそこにいるので、僕が手伝いに行かなくても大丈夫だ。まぁ、2店舗分のお客さんも同じ店に来るから普段より忙しいけどね。でも、狭くて僕の立つところもほぼないから僕が最近週末に休んでいる。昨日、花火大会に行った。

On my way home, I stopped by our open magic bar to see what is happening. They turned out to be quite busy, and there was no free seat for me, so my boss asked me to come stand inside the bar counter (and work) instead.

帰りにうちのやっているマジックバーにちょっと顔を出しに寄った。忙しかった。座れるところがなかったから、カウンターに入ってねって言われた。色々働くことになった。

While I was away watching fireworks, a pair of customers I have performed for in our other magic bar showed up, and one of them had found my explanation of my name very funny. "Jonas" is not a name that Japanese people can relate to as a name. Japanese names are completely different, and the Western names they are familiar with here ("John", "Mike", etc.) do not include Jonas. So I usually explain it like "Younasu [what my name sounds like in Japanese], with the 'you' from Hokuyou Ginko [North Pacific Bank, a bank here in Japan] and the 'nasu' from the vegetable 'nasu' [eggplant]". Japanese people often explain what kanji they write their names with in this way, since there are several ways to "spell" the same name in Japanese.

僕が花火を観ていた間、僕のマジックを前に観たお客さん2人が入った。その時に僕の名前の説明が凄くウケたみたい。日本人は「ヨーナス」という名前になじみがないから、「ヨーナスです」と言っても「え？よーな？」とかになる。だいたい「ヨーナスです。北洋銀行の『洋』になすびの『茄子』」と説明する。漢字を使うのもおかしいし、例えがおかしいし、覚えやすい。

It is of course strange to spell out a Western name with kanji, and my choice of examples is also strange; you would not normally exemplify with the name of bank but with some mundane word. The customer that came yesterday, after hearing my explanation, now says "Ah, this reminds me of that weird magician" every time she walks past a North Pacific Bank office. They had been talking about this quite a lot with the other magicians before I showed up, and they went nuts when I entered the bar. It turned out that she even had a present for me!

昨日のお客さんはそれが凄い気に入ったみたいで、北洋銀行を通ったらいつも「あ！ヨーナスを思い出す！」とかと言っているそうだ。その2人が他のスタッフとそういう話をしていた。僕が入った時に、凄く盛り上がった、笑。お客さんにプレゼントも貰うことになった！

I very very rarely get presents from our customers (or anyone else, for that matter), so I was quite happy. I received a lemon. Why would someone walk around with a lemon in their purse? I do not know. But I ended up walking home with a lemon in my yukata sleeve on my way home.

お客さんにプレゼントを貰うことがめったにない。（他の人からプレゼントを貰うこともそうだ。）嬉しかった。レモンを1個貰った。なぜ、生のレモンを持ち歩いていたか分からない。僕も一応レモン1個持ち歩いて帰ったけどね。