Accidental Discovery

Recently, I came across an email about the late Harry Houdini who revealed some of this tricks and thoughts in a book he wrote. He revealed that sometimes he hid the pins in the callus (thickened skin) under the soles of his feet, hence he was able to free himself despite being locked bare-bodied, naked. On one occasion, he hid the pin in his wife's mouth and when they kissed before his act, she passed the pin into his mouth. Finally, there was once there was a big fanfare of reporters camping outside a bank vault where he was supposed to break out from it in 3.5 minutes. He became frantic as he was unable to unlock the vault after 3 long minutes and feared that his reputation and career might be over. He retrieved a handkerchief to wipe the perspiration from his forehead and leaned on the door in a state of confusion, and almost fell through the door which was after all the hassle, unlocked! (in all the excitement with preparation, the bank forgot to lock the door!)
So he said to effect- that, sometimes, you just got to try the simple way to a difficult problem because sometimes, the problem may have been unlocked after all. Hear, hear!

On why i am writing this entry.

Because while doing one of the latest essays two weeks ago, I learned that co-founder of Google  (Sergey Brin) is also a natural lock-picker.

If you would indulge in me for a moment, I would like to tell you about my undiscovered talent in lock picking. If you have already known this, you will not have known how natural this skill is for me and I wonder if I should perhaps practise more.

(1)  Age 13 - at Clementi
It was the June or December school holidays and I was at my aunt's place at Clementi and went out to play with three of my cousins, Xuiling, Simon and Ah Tze. We returned home tired and thirsty and I was in high need of using the bathroom to pee. But my aunt was not home and we were locked out of the flat. It was a 4-room standard HDB flat. Anyway, I was lazy to use the bathroom at the coffeeshop because even if I had relieved myself, we will still need to get into the house to whatever, shower, watch TV, play. And so I went scouting around for some wires and removed some soft carbon wires from the vine plants that needed structure. With that, I peered open the main door lock. (luckily the gate wasn't pad locked)

(2) Age 20 - my friend's house
Her brother kept her credit card because she had overspent and she didn't tell me the truth but just told me her card is in the brother's drawer and the brother is not at home, so could I please unlock the drawer without a scratch. I think I used two paper clips to do the trick.

(3) Age 20 - my boss' office
My ex-boss was a very thunderous woman, one day her secretary forgot to bring the key to the boss' office to work and she was very worried about the impending scolding and was a nervous wreck. In my state of compassion, I told her I would open the door for her on the condition she does not tell anyone. And I think I also used paper clips for the trick.

(4) Age 23?? - Phuket
One of the time we had a non-smoking room and the widows were locked shut. So my friend wanted to smoke and asked me to unlock the windows. (It was those round shaped key holes but I was able to unlock them too) Of course the housekeeper was visibly upset with us the next day.

(5) Age 32? - Grace, our first car.
We couldn't get into the car after it auto-locked and because we were penniless and didn't want to spend unwarranted money on a locksmith, I did what I saw in movies, took a long, looped hard wire to pull up the locks to the car. 

There was once someone asked me to pick the lock to her boyfriend's room because they lost the key. I was VERY upset because I do not like to do it for non-emergency cases. I think that's an abuse of my talent. (LOL allowed here)