We’re back at Penn State entertaining the students!

Marquis at the HUB

Penn State does entertainment right. Josh, John, and Dave do a great job of taking care of us and giving the students lots of fun and interesting things to do on the weekends.

Josh in the middle.

We have a group of students that come to every show that we do at Penn State. It is nice for us to see them again and makes it feel like we are seeing old friends. We love to startle them and see the look of awe on their faces.

“Man, this stuff never gets old.” Alex K., Student

We were fortunate to also be there with Louis Paul…Balloon Man on Campus. He does amazing balloon sculptures that are really works of art. My favorite was the alien. Christian’s favorite the monkey on the banana tree. He had a constant line of students wanting one of his balloon sculptures. He even has students call him ahead of time and request a balloon art prior to his arrival.

Christian & Louis

You can see what Louis does at his website BalloonManOnCampus.com.

Many of our fans ask us what it is like being entertainers. Traveling all over the United States, performing in eclectic locales, and meeting all kinds of interesting people has its ups and downs. The following is a closer look at going on tour with Christian & Katalina.

As the tour starts we were happily looking forward to the warm spring weather that was due to come. Ooops! Winter gives us one last blast and we find ourselves driving in a blizzard. We ended up pulling over and getting a room 150 miles short of our destination. We had to get up very early the next morning – doesn’t Katalina look happy?

After a few days on tour, the weather started to get better. One of our next shows is in New York City. We always enjoy our time in New York because of the abundance of culture, food, and fun. However, we had a long wait to get into the city. As you can see in the picture the traffic was backed up for miles. But only on our side!!

During our stay in NYC, I quietly slipped away into one of the magic stores in the Manhattan, but Katalina finds me. We were helped by a really fun, cool guy named JP. He was a blast and showed us a very nice coin routine that fooled us both. In the end we picked up a few items that might make it into one of our shows in the future.

Here is another magic trick . . . trying to figure out how to get all the equipment in the van. We always get people who want to help us, but it is like a puzzle and you have to know just how to put it back. So usually you end up just doing it yourself. Here I am making an adjustment to one of the ATA cases that was giving us a problem. Katalina is helping by taking the picture.

But, here is what it is all about. After a great show, we have some fans that want to see just a little more. They were a great crowd and you can see Thomas standing to the left, he is the one with great taste that brought us out. He was a fantastic host and a lot of fun.

Enjoying a great audience and meeting with all the interesting and fun people make all the traffic jams, blizzards, and broken equipment worth it. We are looking forward to seeing you in the very near future.

I love New York City. You can find anything and anybody here. As many of you know, my background is Hungarian and I have been to Hungary many times. The first time when I was 2 months old! We used to take the trolley cars and subways all over Budapest. That was the main mode of transportation and I loved it. And if you have ever been in Europe, public transportation is amazing!

Being on the subway in New York City was just as great. The variety of ethnic diversity is wonderful. The interesting thing is that most people get on the subway, sit down, and either read or listen to their IPODs. With all of the people around you, there is surprisingly little conversation. …That all changed when people had a focus of attention. There was a really drunk guy next to us. He was basically harmless; except that people worried he might throw up soon because he was so drunk. As soon as he went near one girl, she bolted as far away as possible. Everyone was watching him and you couldn’t help but start a conversation with people around you. Some people tried to help him, which was really nice and kind. Unfortunately, he was speaking a foreign language, possibly Russian or Polish, so nobody understood him. This common excitement opened up the lines of communication and we ended up talking to a bunch of people. It made the subway ride so much more enjoyable.

We went to one of my favorite places in NYC – Greenwich Village. I love the little boutiques, the ethnic food, and the interesting places. We had Cuban food and Thai food the last 2 times we were there, so this time it was Indian. You must try a Mango Lassi if you have never had one. It is spectacular! I love the vegetarian dishes: dal and aloo ghobi and Christian loves the curry dishes. We both like the nans and the basmati rice. An overall great meal.

Unfortunately, only one day in NYC, but we are excited to be off to State College, Pennsylvania and Penn State University.

“So I’m probably never going to get a full nights sleep ever again in my life. This show was some of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen in my life! I am in complete awe forever. Come back very soon…my mind wants to be tripped.” Melissa Cappelluti, Student, Keuka College

Jen was a fantastic host and made us feel right at home. Before the show we enjoyed a meal at the college. Clarence the chef, made us a fantastic omelette. His culinary skills were a show in itself; he was funny and delightful.

It was quite cold that night (12 degrees) and we were surprised on the great turn out of students who braved the frigid temperatures to have a good time.

After the show many of the students hung out as Christian performed some mind blowing close up card magic. At the end of the night (midnight) Christian showed the remaining students how to perform a very cool trick.

One of the highlights of the show for us was listening to one individual in the front row who’s only response to the show was, “Come on, no way”, repeated many times. Thanks for the great time everyone, we enjoyed tripping you out!

Our two college shows in North Carolina in one day were fast and furious. We had a local police officer show up for one show. He was great fun and one of your biggest fans. In part of our show Christian talks about how bad people are at lying. The police officer laughingly agreed that people are bad liars.

This picture shows a student trying not to lie. Unfortunately, he was not successful!

This student was stunned. She did not believe what Katalina was doing was possible. She challenged Katalina with what she thought was an impossible task; she held up an object and not only asked what the object was, but what symbol was on it. Of course, Katalina was able to tell her the information, while blindfolded.
We had three people run out of the room….but even though they were freaked out, they came back in because they enjoyed the entertainment and could not stop watching. They were fun shows and we had a great time afterwards talking with the students and answering their questions.

We are sad to say that our Florida tour is over! We had an exceptional, thoroughly rewarding time. And we are not saying this just because we enjoyed 80 degree weather and avoided the 2 foot high snow at our home in Indianapolis! It was really because the people who attended our shows were so wonderful. Christian was in high form bantering back and forth with audience members. At one show, we had a 96 year old woman come up on stage and she was amazing. Sharp as a tack, quick witted, and just full of life. What an inspiration!Thank-you to all of the resorts and we hope to see you again very soon!

We were also very thrilled to meet up with an old friend, Janna.

Janna, Jordan, Taylor, and Katalina

The last time we saw her and her husband Tony was in Germany. Tony is currently a Major in the Transportation Corps of the US Army and is deployed to Iraq. Janna and her two adorable girls were visiting her parents in Florida. She is currently at Fort Drum, NY and she was very happy to leave the blizzard that was going on in her neck of the woods. We had a great time catching up and we hope to see her, the girls and Tony when he returns from Iraq.