Greetings everyone, my name is James Tong.

I believe this section is for me to introduce myself - so here's a brief intro.

I stay in USJ Subang and have been in magic for 38 years. I have been a pro for at least 10 years before moving into business. After having established a few businesses from various industries, and because magic is still in my blood, I'm back into the art actively - as a personal interest and also performing professionally as well.

Even after being in business I have never stopped practicing and have always caught up with the latest.

For your information my specialties lies in -

1) Complete Manipulation Acts:
- Card Manipulation
- Coin Manipulation
- Dove & Parakeets Acts
- Cigarette Manipulation
- Linking Rings (either 3 or 4 rings routine)
- Canes, Candles & Fire Manipulation
- Thimble Manipulation
- Ball Manipulation (4 balls, 8 balls, 10 balls or 12 balls)
- Parasol Manipulation

2) Props & Illusion Acts

3) Close-Up Table Hopping for restaurants

One of my hobbies is collecting playing cards and I believe I have the largest collection of playing cards in Malaysia.

My favourite 'magical past-time' is developing new techniques and effects. Currently I am in the process of compiling my work in digital formats such as e-books, CDs and DVDs and they will be sold internationally. Most of these works are original developments of mine and many of which I have taught to some overseas magicians. They have testified to my creations as original.

Some of you have met me and had teh tarik with me in Subang.

My latest crazy project is setting up a place that is 100% conducive to Magic - a proper stage setting for stage and manipulation acts and also a hall having 6 close-up tables for close-up magic lovers Hope my contractors can finish this place for me asap so that REAL MAGIC can happen in it all the time. I' sure you will love it - this place is costing me about RM 120K to complete.

Hope to meet up with as many of you to share my thoughts and experiences in magic. I'll try to contribute as much as I can in this forum so as to benefit as many of you as possible.

Regards

James Tong

- Knowing magic is one thing but being able to express the meaning of magic to the public gives you the REAL and TRUE satisfaction out of magic

Welcome James Tong!

wow.... i had a great time reading ya introduction! such a wonderful testimony to all young magicians here. magic will always live in everyone of us :)

i've heard abt you from various people and yeah ive heard abt your playing card collections too! I think it was Eric told me abt u. I wanna be a card collector too but man, its an expensive hobby on top of magic haha.

i see you have skills on manipulating cards and coins, thimbles etc etc.. wow..cool.

Do you do flourishes? or ya manipulation of cards is more towards card productions like jeff mcbride kinda style? i believe its more toward the latter rite? wow.. it would be great to meet u oneday.

i always have great respect especially to local magicians who have the creative mind to create new effects and dare to sell it internationally. wow.. amazinng... RESPECT! :).

All in all it's AWESOME to have you here on MMF James! We hope to gain as much knowledge, tips and guidelines from you. Hope that can get to meet you when i go up to KL or subang oneday!

We look towards ya contributions! Cheers!

All the best in ya magic projects!
Brendan

Hello and welcome. An honour of having you here.

Pls do tell us about of some of your effects. I haven't seen any properly published Malaysian work before(Our Andrew Loh is coming out with a book soon afaik) so pls do point us in the direction where we can have a look at your work. It's great to know that there is already a Malaysian work published before MMF started. ^_^

Hmm.. aren't you the guy wearing The Tuxedo? "The name is Tong, James Tong!" :D

Hello Brendan and Aerox

Aerox, you are right - I am the man wearing the tuxedo introducing myself as Tong, James Tong :lol: In fact I actually do that during my performance when asked to introduce myself and gets tons of laughter over it.

Brendan, I actually have a few different types of card manipulation routines -

1) Card productions ending up with multiple GIANT card fans and Card Castles (not jumbo card size but much bigger in size)

2) Card productions with flourishes such as card fountains, card fanning (most of them are my original creations), etc

3) Card productions with Brian Tudor type of flourishes but only if the performing place is small so that these moves are visible and can be appreciated.

When it comes to magic I like challenges so I don't copy anyone but create some of the techniques myself. While Jeff Mcbride's card production is good to look at and be appreciated I find it too 'tame' - I like something wild and challenging.

One thing that all magicians in Asia Pacific must have in mind is that there is a huge cultural and traditional differences over here as compared to the western countries.

Handling the Asian audience really need different types of skills. Therefore you need different types of techniques to handle different people, different performing areas, etc.

So my advice to all of you is this - don't just learn and practice blindly. Target your audiences first - then only you start to identify the techniques that suit this target audience. And if you want to target different types of audience then you need to learn a lot more techniques.

Categorise your target audience with the selected techniques and then file this info in a hardcover ring file and name it as e.g card manipulation - 6 star audience or 3 star audience or magician. You don't have to be a PRO to do this kind of administrative work. Doing it will help you carve yourself a name in the magic fraternity and also derive the kind of satisfaction, appreciation and recognitio you deserve.

All you great guys here, I will do my best to contribute as many ideas and personal opinions I can to help out.

Nice talking to you all :!!:

James Tong

hi james.

welcome abroad. its real good to have u here... :D

Hello RainKing,

Nice meeting you :D

Cheers

Wow! that sounds great!
when will it be ready??

Welcome....

A very best intro and advise..........that i have read.


good luck.

James:

I've heard about you. Wanna hangout at Chatters Cafe USJ12 one day?

Thats Cool........ huh... so big arr u r plan..... yeah no doubt about that...... like waht eryanic said, when will it be ready?? ^_^

30210162,

Why not? I can make time to hang out there and talk about magic. Perhaps others can jon in too. Just let me know when (would appreciate if I can have at least 2 days advance notice)

Cheers

Hello eryanic and Mirul,

My contractors are rushing up the place as soon as possible - I'm trying to get it operational by October or sooner. It depends on them actually as I gave them a detailed blueprint on what exactly I want.

I will announce to everyone here in MMF when it is ready and hope to see you guys jam and hangout there.

Cheers :lol:

Hi James Tong,

A very warm welcome you to join with us here. Wow, after reading your intro, I am really impress of your involvement in magic. ^_^

Yeah, please kindly let us know anything or events, which will be taking place in the near future. Hope to meet you soon. :)

Andrew

Haha James Tong,

Wearing a tuxedo and don't like to copy other ppl things, you are just like..................... Guy Hollingworth! :lol:

His motto in magic similar with you, also don't like to copy other people's stuffs.

Hey, if you ever come to Melaka, please meet us (Andrew & Brendan), as only both of us in Melaka.

Looking forward of your magic stuffs in the near future. :)

Andrew

Hey, now I know, are you the magician that appeared in TV 14 years ago???? :huh:

When I was 5 or 6 years old, I used to watch TV in the morning, and I saw magicians around the age 16 to 20, he used to wear a tuxedo performed his magic, if I am not mistaken, it was in TV2 or TV1, are you the magician I am referring to???? :unsure:

Andrew B)

Hello Andrew,

I have been in and out of Melaka many times - for magic actually.

As for performing in TV - yes I have done it a couple of times that many years ago. But I am not sure that person you have seen is me - too long a time to recall.

I have actually performed no less than 1000 shows in all kind of environment - some place you would like to perform again while others are not too conducive to magic. And because of this kind of experiences when performing all kind of routines - I can conclude that when anyone wants to pick up magic it is important to target the kind of audience you want first.

I'll let you know when my next trip will be and we can meet up.

Cheers

Hey James!!! nice to see u around here. wellcome wellcome... I am Peter. Had mamak with u the other day with eric, wee, buiyen. nice to see u here. how are classes thus far???

Hello Peter,

Nice to chat with you here again.

My classes are growing - 3 different types of classes are now being conducted.

1) For people who want to do magic as an art form.
2) For people who wants to be Professionals later on
3) For people who wants to use magic in their marketing career.

Hope to have teh tarik again with you.

Cheers

Just out of curiosity, which class do you see yourself in?

Welcome to MMF James :) Hope you're gonna have a pleasant stay here!

Cool.. yeah James, do let Andrew or I know if u coming down to melaka.

Will be cool to chat abt magic, card manipulation and card collections with u!

CHeers!
Brendan

Hello eryanic,

To wet your curiosity about which class I think I'm in - here's how and what I would classify myself as.

1) A magic performing artist - when it comes to expressing myself through a magic performance.

2) A professional entertainer - when it comes to performing a public show

3) A businessman - when it comes to marketing and selling myself and the performance

4) A magic inventor - when it comes to taking magic and myself to the next higher level

5) A good audience - when I just want to enjoy and appreciate a magic performance

Erynic, I actually play all those roles inter-changeably all the time.

Cheers

Hello Brendan and Andrew

Yes, I would definitely inform both of you before I make the trip down to Melaka. We can meet up and have a good time talking about magic and playing cards till the wee hours.

Cheers :D

ROFL, Andrew, the James Tong I was talking about was from the Jackie Chan movie: The Tuxedo. :P

Hi James,

Glad to see you drop in here. Ever thought of coming to Sarawak? There are a few of us here in this forum who are from Sarawak, espcially Miri. Sarawak is really lack of magic performance and stuff like that. I cannot seem to recall if there is any magic performance held in Sarawak. Even during annual dinner or in restaurants, I never heard of anyone performing magic.

You mentioned about using magic in their marketing career? I don't quite understand on what you meant by that. Anyway, it's really great to have new experienced members in this forum,

Cheers,
Jeremy

That's a politically correct answer, James
hehe

Hello Jeremy,

Nice to meet you. Yes I can consider going over to Sarawak and create a 'magical heat' there - just as I have done in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.

I will be in touch with you to let you know of my plans - please pm me so we can discuss about my Sarawak trip.

As for using magic in one's marketing career or marketing a business - it is a totally different skill set altogether. You need very explosive short close-up effects and also those that allow you to promote a business product, service or ideas within seconds. Many business professionals are learning from me how to use magic to increase their sales or business profits.

Cheers

Glad to hear that you are planning to come to Sarawak, Hope you will come to Miri. NICE! Will PM soon!!...

Woaah,haven`t been readin the thread for sometime already.Great to have a celebrated magician like you in the forum.Hope to meet up 1 day.

Regards,
David Lai