Chris Zhang vividly remembers the first magic trick he ever saw.

“A magician performed at a summer camp I went to when I was small,” says Zhang who grew up in the territory of Ürümqi in northwest China. “He took a rubber band and vanished it – I had never seen anything like that before.”

Intrigued, Zhang soon found himself visiting the magician’s shop asking to see more tricks. He says he was astonished by what he saw. “He showed me a deck of cards, the cards were all different. Then, he turned all the cards into the two of clubs, every single one – I was so shocked!”

Zhang was hooked. He started buying magic tricks and worked hard to learn the secrets behind them. He honed his skills and performed often for his friends, encouraged by their amazed reactions.

Now a skilled magician, Zhang is bringing his unique ability with him to McMaster.

“Some people love playing the piano, some people love playing sports, I love magic,” says Zhang a first-year student in the Faculty of Social Science who plans to study economics.

Zhang moved with his mother to Canada three and a half years ago. He says it was his passion for magic and performing that helping him adjust to life in Canada.

“It was tough in the beginning,” says Zhang who attended high school in Ottawa. “I didn’t speak a word of English. Everything was new to me – a new language, a new culture, new people – it wasn’t easy.”

“Magic helped me a lot,” he continues. “It helped me build my English-speaking skills. I spent about a year doing street magic – I knew couldn’t perform in Chinese, people here wouldn’t understand me. So, before each performance, I would write down my script and try to memorize it and my English became a lot more fluent.”

In the meantime, Zhang also performed for his class and at school events. He even started a magic club at school and began teaching others his secrets, “so I could share the happiness with them and they could share it with their family and friends,” he explains.

He also volunteered to perform at senior’s homes in Ottawa, something he particularly enjoyed. “I like to see the smiles on their faces,” he says. “I think seniors enjoy magic more than young people.”

Zhang says magic will continue be an important part of his life at McMaster. He’s planning to join the McMaster Magicians club and to continue to perform at senior’s residences. He also hopes to perform on stage for a McMaster audience.

His goal is to eventually complete an MBA and one day pursue a career in business or commerce and, while he has no plans to become a professional magician, he says he will continue to perform.

“I want to keep doing magic part-time, to keep what I enjoy doing separate from my work,” he says, adding that it’s the response he gets from audiences that drives him to perform. “I love the reaction,” he says. “That’s why I don’t give up and I want to keep trying.”

Watch video of Chris Zhang performing slight of hand: