Unlucky guests from Hakodate

White "Black Sanda"

Two months ago when I was in France on a business trip (or possibly when I was in Sweden because of my brother getting married), a girl who lives in Hakodate had flown to Sapporo to see me do magic. She and a friend had come to our magic bar, asking to see me. Since I was not even in the country, they were out of luck but still got to see three other magicians. But the girl coming by airplane to Sapporo was a bit sad anyway, I was told.

Apparently, the two of them came to our magic bar again during the O-Bon holidays (holidays mean even some Japanese people do not have to work, so they have time to fly to Sapporo to visit magic bars) but of course the magic bar where I perform was closed during the O-Bon holidays...

They did a third try this weekend. They came to our magic bar on Saturday, and of course we are open on Saturdays. I am in the magic bar on Fridays and Saturdays unless I am out of the country or something exceptional like that happens, so I was there too. Unfortunately for these two girls, so were a LOT of other guests, so the bar was full when they showed up and they could not be let in...

They did however come back later. Our bar becomes fairly empty after midnight (after the last subway), so when they came back at around 2 a.m. the bar was empty of guests. So she could finally meet me and see me do magic.

The girl from Hakodate even brought omiyage (souvenirs) from Hakodate for us! So we got something called "White 'Black Sanda'" ("Black Sanda" is a type of chocolate, and this was Black Sanda except made with white chocolate instead of the normal type of chocolate), which is a strange name. She also brought Guarana drinks from the Lucky Clown hamburger chain (a famous hamburger chain in Hakodate).

At around the time they came to our magic bar, it was time for the second wave of customers so 4 other groups of customers also dropped in and I had to go do magic for other guests too. So in the end, I forgot to ask why she wanted to see my magic or how she even knew about me before coming to our magic bar. This remains an interesting mystery, but maybe they will come back to our magic bar again :-)

They were funny to talk to and nice guests. One of the funnier stories of the evening was when they talked about how after last time the girl had gone through airport security with a PET-bottle of tea that also had a signed playing card stuck inside it. That also makes the tea turn black (the glue in the card is dissolved by the water in the tea, and the glue is black). And instead of putting it in her check-in luggage, she had it in her carry on bag. In Japan you can travel with liquids but you have to let the security personnel check your bottles. She got some very strange looks when handing over an unopened (sealed) PET-bottle of black liquid with a playing card floating around in it...