Trick bar Twister and me in the newspaper

There was a newspaper article about our magic bar here in Sapporo in the Hokkaido Shinbun. I wrote about it on my other blog.

先週うちのマジックバーの話が新聞に載っていた。僕の写真も載っていた。英語で僕の別のブログで色々説明を書いたが日本語の分かる方なら、上の写真をクリックして自分で読めば一番良いよね。

Visiting Toto's Bar in Tokyo

When in Tokyo, I almost always visit Toto's Bar, a magic bar in Ginza. Toto is very very entertaining, and the other magicians there are good too. This time too, I found some time to stop by (which resulted in me getting a severe lack of sleep, since I had to get up early for work every day, but it was worth it).

東京に行く時にほぼ毎回銀座にある都々's Barに行く。都々さんが大変盛り上げ上手だ。めちゃくちゃ楽しい店なんだ。他のマジシャンも上手だし。今回もちょっと時間作っていった（そのせいで仕事中で寝不足で大変だったけどね）。

Toto did a parlor magic show and there were doves and bowling balls produced, fascinating cigarette magic, rope tricks, and much much more. I also saw Toto do a colored sand in a bowl of water type of magic trick for the first time, which was nice. Toto also did some very nice close up magic. Apart from doves and canaries that I have seen before, Toto's bar now also has an owl that helps out with the magic show.

都々さんがサロンマジックのショーを見せてくれた。鳩やボーリングボールが出現した。タバコの不思議なマジックがあった。笑えるロープマジックも良かった。色々あった。初めて都々さんの水に色々な色の砂を入れるマジックを観れた。きれいだった。最近、フクロウも都々's Barにいるし。可愛い。

I also saw the magician Yamato, who showed off a very impressive bottom deal and some mental magic.

他に大都（やまと）さんがきれいなボトムディールを見せてくれたし。メンタルのネタも色々やった。

One thing that surprised me a lot was that another guest there started speaking Swedish to me (he was Japanese)! It turned out that one of his relatives had married a Swede and now lives in Sweden, so this guy had also lived one year in Stockholm. I also ended up talking to an older and very drunk Japanese businessman who had been to Sweden several times for work.

一番驚いたのが、他のお客さん（日本人のお兄さん）が急にスウェーデン語で喋ってくれた！家族の誰かがスウェーデン人と結婚し、スウェーデンに住んでいるそうだ。お兄さんも1年間ストックホルムに住んでいたからちょっと話せる様になった。他に日本人の酔っ払っていたおじさんとスウェーデンの話もした。おじさんが何回も仕事でスウェーデンに行ったそうだ。

There was also a woman there who I have talked to at other times in Toto's bar. She remembered me (and I her), and she gave me a slice of apple pie that she had brought because of someone's birthday. It was a very good apple pie. Ginza is one of the expensive high class districts of Tokyo, and this pie had that kind of feel to it.

前に都々's Barで何回か会ったことがあるお姉さんにもまた会えた。僕のことを覚えてくれた。誰かの誕生日の為にアップルパイを持ってきていたから、僕も高級なアップルパイをいただいた。美味しかった。さすが銀座、レベル高いなと思った（笑）。

I also met a young Russian girl, who originally came from a place where my brother spent 6 months. She seemed nice, but had to leave fairly quickly.

他にロシア人のお姉さんにもあった。うちの弟が半年くらい住んでいたところから来たそうだ。面白い人だったが割りとすぐ帰ることになった。

Visiting Magic Bar Issey in Tokyo

The huge fish tank of magic bar Issei

During my Tokyo trip I also had time to stop by the magic bar Issey in Roppongi. They do a stage show three times per night, and they show you close up magic at your table or at the counter too. There are not that many places with stage shows, so I like visiting Issey for this reason.

東京の出張の夜にマジックバーイッセイにも行けた。毎晩ステージショー3回もやる店なので、テーブルマジック以外のマジックも観れて、結構好きな店だ。

I had to work much later than I had expected and I had to run from the subway station to the bar (which is a very short run, but still) to make it in time for the 21:00 stage show. As it turned out, I did not actually need to run. When I entered, I was the only customer there. The weather was really bad, which may be why the place was empty (the previous times I have been there it was packed).

仕事が思ったより遅くまで続いていたから、21時のステージショーに間に合う為に地下鉄から店まで走ることになった。大した距離ではないけど。店に着いたら、結局走らなくても大丈夫って感じだった。他にお客さんがいなかったから貸切状態になった。他の人がいないから、ステージショーは今やらないと言われた。その代わりに、カウンターで普段より長くやって貰ったし、普段やらないクローズアップも見せて貰ったし。行った日は大雨だったせいで人がいなかったかな？前に行った時に毎回混んでいた。

Since it was only me, they explained that they would not do the stage show. Instead, they did a "counter show", where they did more close up magic than they normally do, and different magic than the standard close up things.

There were two magicians there, Shun and K-suke. There was also two non-magicians working, and one of them remembered me from my last visit. The first time I visited magic bar Issey, Shun performed both stage magic and table magic for me and my friend. I had never met K-suke before.

マジシャン2人がいた、シュンとケイスケ。初めてマジックバーイッセイに行った時にもシュンのマジックを観た（ステージもクローズアップも）。ケイスケは初めてだった。

First K-suke showed me some magic. He did some nice card tricks and quite a bit of coin magic. He also made a crushed can of CocaCola return to its unopened and uncrushed state full of soda, and he made a signed card appear inside an unopened PET-bottle. The things I liked the best was when his booklet thingy that had a cover text saying "K-Suke" changed into a booklet saying "magic show" instead, and a trick where a cocktail shaker (that had a signed card appear out of it before) suddenly stopped being empty and instead contained a cocktail of the color I had selected from a menu earlier.

最初はK-SUKEさんのマジックだった。カードマジックもコインマジックも見せてくれた。他にコーラの復活もしたし、サインカードが新品のペットボトルに入ったし。僕の一番好きなマジックはメニュー表みたいなものに「K-SUKE」と書いてあって、「Magic Show」に変わったマジックとシェーカーから僕が選んだ色のカクテルが出てきたマジック。その前にシェーカーが空だったし、サインカードなども前にシェーカーから出てきたし。

Shun, with a nail in his nose

The Shun did a counter show for me, including some Tom Mullica style cigarette magic. He also did some card magic, including a signed card appearing inside a kiwi, a chop cup routine (where the kiwi appeared), fork bending, and some levitations with one of my credit cards. I was also quite happy to see him produce three big nails from his nose. I have never seen anyone do the nail in nose stuff live (apart from seeing myself do it). The first nail seemed to have been there more or less the whole time he did the rest of the magic, but I do not think I could pull out three nails that size from my nose (and his nose was smaller than mine), so that was nice.

SHUNさんも長くカウンターショーをやってくれた。トム・マリカ風なタバコのマジックが凄い。他にカードマジック（キウイからサインカードが出た）やチョップカップ（カップからキウイが出てきた）やフォーク曲げとかも見せてくれた。僕のクレジットカードが浮いてきたし。一番面白いと思ったのは鼻からでかい釘を3本も出した。鼻からの釘は初めて生で観た（僕がやっている以外ｗ）。最初の釘は他のマジックをやっている時から入れっぱなしっぽくて、ウケると思った。僕の鼻に3本が入らないと思う（僕の鼻の方が大きいと思うし）から3本も出るのが不思議だね、笑。

Presents for me

After the magic was finished, we sat around talking about Swedish magicians and other things for a long time, and the owner (?) who did not do magic also joined in. They also gave me two business card size magic tricks as a gift, and both tricks are pretty cute. Last time I was in Tokyo I considered buying one of them (in a magic shop in Ikebukuro), but in the end I did not.

マジックが終わってからも長く皆でスウェーデン人のマジシャンの話とかしていた。マジシャンではない店長（？）も面白い話色々してくれた。名刺サイズのマジック２つをプレゼントで貰ったし。前回東京に行った時に池袋のマジックショップで買おうかなって悩んでいたネタだった。

Visiting magic bar Surprise in Tokyo

Kamiguchi Ryusei folding cards

I went on a business trip to Tokyo for my non-magic related work. I managed to sneak away at around 21:00 in the evening and decided to visit the magic bar "Surprise". I have been there four or five times.

北大の仕事の出張で東京に行ってきた。夜にちょっと逃げれて、東京のマジックバーもいけた。最初は赤坂にあるマジックバーサプライズに行った。4回目か5回目だった。

When I got there, Kamiguchi Ryusei (magician and the owner of the place) was sitting next to a customer and they were talking magic. The other customer was also a magician (though perhaps not a pro-magician). There was also a young girl standing behind the counter, and she later introduced herself as the magician Ko-ume (which would translate as "small plum").

店に入ったら、上口龍生さん（マジシャン・オーナー）がお客さん1人とカウンターに座ってマジックの話をしていた。お客さんもマジックをやっている人だった。カウンターの中に若い女の子のマジシャン小梅さんもいた。

I had never met Ko-ume before, but I have met Kamiguchi several times and he always remembers me. We talked about various magic related things for awhile, and later the magician Sacchi also showed up. Even later, Kamiguchi Ryusei said: "Maybe someone should show Jonas some magic". The girls said that since I was a magician, maybe I already know all the tricks they do, or perhaps it should even be me showing other them magic. He said that even so, it would be strange if you come to a magic bar and no one shows you magic.

上口龍生さんに何回かも会っているが小梅さんに会うのが初めてだった。上口龍生さんにいつも「あ、北海道からのスウェーデン人」と覚えて貰える。皆でマジックの話をした。サッチーというマジシャンも後で入ってきた。もうちょっと後、「そろそろ誰かがヨーナスにマジックを見せないのか？」って上口龍生さんが言った。女の子たちが「マジシャンなら、全部知っているから何もしなくてもいいかな？と思って。逆に見せて欲しい」と言ったが「マジックバーに来て、マジック見せて貰わないとおかしいでしょう」って。

Ko-ume and a Rubik's Cube

So Ko-ume showed me magic. She did a nice routine with three ropes that changed lengths and also used a ring that kept going on or off the ropes in mysterious ways. I also saw a card trick where she used lie detector skills to determine which card was my card. Finally she did a set of Rubik's Cube tricks. A cube I mixed up turned up to be mixed up exactly like a cube she had in a bag. She put the big cube back in the bag and then solved my mixed up cube. When I opened the bag that I had been holding the whole time, the cube inside the bag was also solved.

小梅さんがマジックを見せ始めた。ロープ3本を使って、ロープの長さが変わるマジックや輪っかが不思議な様にロープと繋がったり外れたりした。カードマジックで、嘘発見器みたいなやり方で僕の引いたカードを当てた。最後にルービックキューブを使ったマジックも色々見せてくれた。僕がグチャグチャにしたキューブが元々予言みたに袋に入っていたキューブと同じになった。袋のキューブを袋に戻してから、小梅さんが僕のキューブを解いた。僕が袋を持っていたのに、僕が袋を開けてみると袋の中のキューブも揃っていた。

Sacchi then showed me one card trick. She said that since I had seen her perform twice before, she did not have any new tricks to show, but this one was a bit special. I picked a card, and she shuffled the cards perfectly, to "unshuffle" them. There was something written on the side of the deck and as she shuffled the text became clearer. It said the name of the card I picked. The cards were also in new deck order. After that I picked another card, this time from a face up deck. She then showed that not only were there letters on the side of the deck, there were drawings on the backs too. These were an animated cartoon, and when she riffled through the deck it showed an animation of a guy picking a card and holding it up. The cartoon guy held up the same card that I had picked. She said: "The really surprising thing about this is that I actually drew all the pictures myself. This is only impressive to magicians." I was impressed, haha.

サッチーさんが「前にも2回も私のマジックを見ているから、新ネタがない」と言ったがカードマジック１つ見せてくれた。僕が1枚を引いて、戻した。サッチーさんがパーフェクトの切り方でトランプを混ぜたというか、トランプがどんどん揃っていった。トランプの束の横に文字が書いてあった。パーフェクトな切り方でやっていけば、どんどん読み易くなった。僕の選んだカードは何のカードだったから、書いてあった。その後、表向きのカードから、また1枚を選んだ。今回、トランプの横だけではなく、裏面にも何かが書いてあるって見せられた。ぱらぱら漫画みたいなもんだった。そのぱらぱら漫画をみたら、小さなおじさんがトランプから1枚を出す漫画だった。出したカードが僕の選んだカードと同じだった。「これの一番凄いことは、横の文字もぱらぱら漫画も自分で描いたんだよね」と言われた。「その凄さはマジックをやっている人にしか伝わらない」って。僕が凄いと思った（笑）。

Sacchi also told me that recently another guy from Sapporo had been to magic bar Surprise. He was a student at my university, doing magic. I said that then there was a high likelihood that I know him, and it turned out he was one of the guys in the magic club I was also a member of. Small world.

ちょっと前に北海道からの別のマジックをやっている人も店に来たとサッチーさんが言った。学生だって。学生なら、知っているかもしれないと僕が言ったら、名前を思い出してもらった。北大のサークルの後輩だった。狭いね。

A tiny origami book

Another magician looking guy also showed up. He showed us how to take a single sheet of paper and fold it into a book. The book was tiny, but was a perfectly book-like object with pages you could browse through etc. Impressive.

後でマジックをやっているお客さんもう1人も来た。紙1枚で折り紙で本を作ってきれた。ちっちゃな本になったが本当に本だった。凄かった。

We kept talking magic for awhile more, and Kamiguchi Ryusei kept folding playing cards with a one handed card fold that I have also practiced. When he was pretty much through his whole deck, it was time for me to go back to my hotel, and I left.

もうちょっとマジックの話を皆でした。上口龍生さんが片手のカードの折り方をずっと練習していた。僕も同じやり方の練習したことがある。ちょうど52枚折り終わったら、僕がホテルに帰らないと行けない時間になった。