When walking into the Knickerbocker this weekend, I wasn't exactly sure what to expect. Right around this time last year, I'd seen posters and heard stories of this man coming to campus and reading people's minds. I was curious, and this year I was fortunate enough to see the "Mentalist" in action. At first I was skeptical, but honestly, how Christopher Carter does it is beyond me!
Christopher made it clear right away that he wasn't a "psychic," but is instead an incredibly skilled observer in body language. He also utilizes his psychology and "people reading" skills. These skills have all clearly come in hand since he achieved the "Entertainer of the Year" award in the campus activities industry,
The show in the packed Knickerbocker started off with some warm-ups. A seemingly simple card guessing game ended with him correctly guessing all the cards.
He then began to take it up a notch by trying to guess if someone was lying. A group of girls were told to write the name of their first childhood crush on a piece of paper without Carter knowing. Of course, he flawlessly guessed all of them without even a glance on the paper! Carter said that people "broadcast their thoughts" in ways that they don't even know they're doing.
Moving forward, he had two new volunteers completely blindfold him with layers of duck tape to the point that there was no way that he could possibly still see. He then had one of the volunteers write a completely random word on the whiteboard (which was "corn") and of course, Carter managed to write the same exact word below it while blindfolded. While this was happening, the other volunteer went to find a random amount of money. He got it right, that it was a $20 dollar bill, and guessed its serial number!
Then, Carter had us all write a random fact about us, a random number that was important, and an important question that we needed the answer to. Keep in mind that he was still blindfolded. As the cards came up, he figured out all of the information on a couple of the cards and interacted with the right audience members who wrote the card which was completely mind-boggling.
Next was hypnotism. He asked for someone who had been hypnotized before to come up, and he did a rapid induction so she went under quickly. He then projected an image into her mind. After he woke her up, he flipped pages of a book and asked her to pick one. He asked her if she had a number and a word she remembered and it was page 255 and "prisons." Then, he showed her that page 255 had been torn out, and the envelope she sat on was the missing page with the word circled. Somehow, he subconsciously made her pick the missing page.
To describe the Mentalist's amazing show is one thing, and to see it is another. Carter's hysterical delivery of each mind trick was a perfect combination that made the show great. Everyone left the show wondering what his secret was, and he left the skeptics asking how he did it. I think I can speak for all of us by saying that Hope College's Students Activities Committee (SAC) will be hypnotized into bringing Carter back next year!
