From waiter to celebrity magician: The magical journey of a Filipino expat in Dubai

Gulf News

All it took was a deck of cards lying in his cupboard to change the course of his life.  Meet Normando Macalinao, 27, a waiter in Dubai who turned a celebrity magician.  Read the full story here: https://gulfnews.com/uae/the-magic-of-success-filipino-expats-magical-journey-from-waiter-to-celebrity-magician-in-dubai-1.95796959  See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km  Subscribe to Gulf News on YouTube and watch more of our videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/GulfNewsTV  #UAEnews #filipino #magician

Transcript

00:00I have my wallet right here, normal wallet just like everyone else.

00:04Keep my money, my cards and everything. Nothing in my hand.

00:08One, two...

00:13It's actually a real fire. The wallet is still there,

00:17money is still there. That's how you make fire.

00:21Being a waiter, being a hotelier doesn't make me happy. So one day I found a deck

00:28of cards in my closet. This deck of cards

00:31basically changed my life. So I do magic to every single guest.

00:36After doing magic, I gained my confidence.

00:39After that, I quit my job being a waiter and I just started doing magic around

00:45Dubai. I thought being a magician is gonna be

00:48easy. I thought I'm gonna get a job quickly, you know. Then I just do

00:53magic every single street. I lost all my

00:57earnings from being a waiter. So I feel like

01:00I'm hopeless already because I cannot find a job

01:04being a magician. So I just keep doing what I love, you know.

01:08Keep doing magic in the street until one day someone

01:12finds me. He actually basically invites me to one of his events.

01:17So on that event, I met so many potential people, you know.

01:23I got this opportunity to meet all these

01:27celebrities on this event. So I did magic to them and then one of

01:32the guys told me to do magic to his Instagram.

01:37But Instagram just blew up, you know. Everyone's

01:41asking who is this guy, you know. I want to meet this guy and stuff like this.

01:45And then one day Paris Hilton noticed me and followed me on my Instagram.

01:52And then she was like, oh I want to see you when I come to Dubai.

01:56I want you to do magic to me. She came to Dubai and then did magic to

02:01her. It just blew up, you know. I got a lot of these events coming up, a

02:05lot of different people approaching me. Then I

02:09started getting all this work, you know.

02:14I started earning money and started doing magic to all these

02:18big personalities, celebrities, Hollywood celebrities,

02:21business tycoons, millionaires and billionaires. And now I'm here right in

02:25front of you and talking to you guys. And one day I

02:27want to compete on the biggest stage in the world

02:32like America's Got Talent and British Got Talent.

02:36So I hope you guys watch me there one day.

02:40So guys I have different receipts right here.

02:44I always collect my receipts because I can do a lot of things with my receipts.

02:50One of the things I can do with my receipts, I'll show you guys right now.

02:54Got receipts right here. It's in one, two, three.

03:00That's how you make money right there. That's how magicians make money actually.

03:06Angela, I want you to just take one card. Anika, whatever you want.

03:11Pick your favorite one. Make sure everybody see it.

03:16Okay. Got the card? Memorize it for me, yeah?

03:20Yeah. Put it back. Okay, this time what I'm going to do, I'm going to shuffle the

03:24deck. Okay. First, let me shuffle it right here.

03:31Now, first of all, king of spades, that's not your card, right? Nine of clubs,

03:37that's not your card. Angela, you're going to tell me exactly

03:40where the card is. I want you to say any random number between

03:44one to ten. Any number, whatever you want. Just a random one. Seven. Seven. I'm going to

03:50count seven cards. Exactly at the seventh position, I'm going to find your card.

03:53First of all, I'll show you my both hands.

03:58One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

04:04No, no, no.

04:16Is that your card? It is! It is! Oh my goodness, it is!

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