A Saturday Night With Mojitos, Basketball Coaches, and a Restaurant Owner Doing Shots Makes For Magic

It's been almost a year since I've eaten at Dao's Fusion in Stratford. I discovered the Thai restaurant when my writing friend Sonya Huber introduced it to me several years ago and since then I've used it as a venue for entertaining friends, hosting parties, and enjoying delicious food with exceptional company.

Last night, I returned to the restaurant with a teaching friend, a division one basketball coach, and his wife. The occasion was simply to get together for good company and Sweet Thai Basil shrimp with a side order of scallion pancakes.

As always, the food was exceptionally good, but new to the occasion was that the restaurant owner, Tek, had a few shots. With his Taiwanese roots, he had an Asian gene of letting alcohol get to his head a little too quickly. It was a slow night in the restaurant and he came to our table to entertain us with magic tricks and a sense of humor I've not seen from previous visits. In all honesty, he was a hammered hoot and even with his slurs, long interludes of storytelling and excuses for his accidental insobriety, he managed to succeed with card tricks that dumbfounded us and a rubber band trick that not one of us could figure out. He was hilarious and his humor (and the occasion) was one for the record books.

Yesterday, Chitunga was on a quest to make our lawn the nicest one in Stratford and somehow I thought I could do a little more than I probably should have. When he left for work, I knew I needed to rest so I could be in good spirits for the evening at Dao's. I expected awesome food - which I got - but I didn't expect to see a side of the owner I've never seen before. Between his elaborate excuses about why a restaurant owner shouldn't be drinking, he kept dazzling us with elaborate magic tricks. His performance, a little tequila and rum induced, was absolutely hilarious and will have me cracking up for weeks to come.

But I'm still trying to figure out the rubber band trick he did. I couldn't see how he made the illusion happen and I am totally perplexed.