When the Onesies was announced near the beginning of the program, Lidya and I panicked. We love singing while walking down the hallways (much to Allam’s dismay), but we both knew we definitely couldn’t sing on stage, and unfortunately neither of us played an instrument. During our visit to Tygerberg the previous Thursday, Paul had mentioned that one group in a past cohort had performed magic. We laughed at the idea of learning a few tricks and surprising everyone, assuming it would remain nothing more than a joke.
Then Tuesday arrived, and the panic became very real. So busy studying for our final exam, we had completely neglected to come up with an actual act. Our joke had become our only plan. We promised ourselves that once the exam was over, we would finally learn some magic. By Wednesday afternoon, however, the documentary had completely taken over our attention, and there was still a glaring lack of magic happening in our room. Realizing time was running out, we escaped for a quick meal at Sonny and Irene. While waiting for our food, Lidya pulled a deck of cards out of her bag, and we searched YouTube for “Top 5 Easiest Magic Tricks.” The first trick was surprisingly simple, yet it completely fooled us. We kept gasping as the magician revealed one clever illusion after another, amazed that something so convincing could rely on such subtle sleight of hand. Within minutes, we had gone from nervously scrambling for an act to enthusiastically practicing card tricks at our restaurant table, determined to make our ridiculous last-minute idea somehow work.
By Thursday morning, Lidya and I had finally mastered our first trick. Our plan was simple: finish the documentary, then dedicate the rest of the day to preparing for Onesies. Unfortunately, our hard drive had other ideas. We spent the entire morning desperately trying to revive it, hoping it would cooperate just long enough for us to finish editing. At 1pm, the hard drive officially gave up on us (RIP), leaving us with five hours before the talent show and an act that was far from performance-ready.
With nothing more than a deck of cards and our enthusiasm, we settled onto the floor of Conference Room 6 and practiced. We worked through trick after trick, celebrating every small victory, whether it was finally pulling off a clean sleight of hand or correctly predicting the other’s card. Once we could consistently fool each other, we recruited our first audience: Yasmin. Curious and wonderfully observant, she immediately began dissecting every trick. More often than not, she correctly figured out the method behind the illusion, forcing us to refine our technique and eliminate the little tells we hadn’t noticed. In hindsight, there was no better person to practice on. If we could eventually fool Yasmin, we figured we had a fighting chance with everyone else.
As Onesies drew closer, Lidya and I had each perfected two tricks: one more challenging and one that was simple. Because my first trick required arranging the deck beforehand, I had to perform first. As the moment approached, I became uncharacteristically nervous. We’d only learned these tricks the day before, and I couldn’t help but wonder if we were about to completely embarrass ourselves. After Kehnde finished her beautiful song, Lidya and I took a deep breath, walked onto the stage, and committed. The room was buzzing with energy, and somehow all of the mistakes we had made during practice seemed to disappear. Our classmates leaned in with genuine excitement, gasping at every reveal and enthusiastically playing along. At one point, Allam was so eager to support us that he started insisting we had picked the correct card, even though not getting it right on the first try was actually part of the trick. Between everyone’s laughter, encouragement, and willingness to suspend disbelief, what had started as a panicked last-minute joke became one of the most unexpectedly joyful moments of the program.
When Jonathan announced that Lidya and I had won second place, I was genuinely stunned. We had spent the previous 24 hours frantically learning card tricks from YouTube and practicing on the floor of Conference Room 6. So, I suppose the roadmap to becoming an award-winning magician in a single day is surprisingly simple: learn card tricks from YouTube, borrow a deck of cards from Emaan, squeeze practice in between studying for a final and editing a documentary, and most importantly perform for an audience kind enough to cheer you on through every trick.