Magic show in English in Otaru

The room I performed in had a very high tech and fancy system for controlling all kinds of things

There is a university in our neighboring city of Otaru. The city is not that big, so one of the teachers working there thinks it is a bit sad for the students that famous people rarely visit. At his university in the U.S. they often had famous people visit the university and give talks on interesting topics.

He has tried to get such a lecture series going in Otaru and invites people that have interesting stories to tell. There are researchers that talk about research, but there are also people like tattoo artists, musicians that play strange instruments, ambassadors from other countries, etc. He asked me if I could come and do some magic and talk about magic in this lecture series.

The lectures are supposed to be done in English, and I rarely get to do magic in English so I was happy to get this opportunity. I learned magic in Japan, so I have problems knowing what to say when people ask me to do magic in English or Swedish, even though I am much more fluent in English (and Swedish, of course) than I am in Japanese.

The view from Otaru Shodai university is very nice (but better on a clear day)

I was lecturer #73 in this lecture series, and I did about 30 minutes of magic and then talked about how I ended up in Japan and why I started doing magic (which is related). I also talked a little bit about magic in general. Then the people there could ask questions, and many of them did. I said that I was not going to reveal how the magic was done (after explaining why it is better not to know during my presentation) but that they could ask pretty much anything they liked.

One guy asked me where I had bought my pants, so I decided if I ever get another chance to do a similar lecture, I should add a slide with "benefits of being a magician" listing among other things that it is a great excuse to wear weird clothes. A girl asked me if I "have a real job too" (which I do; the immigration office tell me they will not give me a visa for doing magic, they do not consider that a proper job). One guy told me that he had learned one magic trick and asked me if I could watch him perform that and then give him advice (which I did).

I had a great time, and the people watching seemed to be having a good time too.