Even as he nears 80, Uri Geller is still telling stories we may never know are true, from bending a spoon before Salvador Dalí to hypnotizing Michael Jackson and refusing to use his powers to win the lotteryAt one point in his life, Uri Geller decided to found a country, with an anthem and even a soccer team. He bought an uninhabited island in Scotland for £30,000 and offered people the chance to become citizens of his new country for just one dollar. All the money was meant to be donated to Wolfson Medical Center.He did not stop there. Geller says he even appointed U.S. President Donald Trump as president of the island he owns, a decision he now regrets. “He is unpredictable,” Geller says in an interview with ynet. “Even I can’t read his mind.”8 View gallery Uri Geller (Photo: Dana Kopel)Geller says he negotiated hard for the island. “I saw an ad in the newspaper saying the island was for sale. The price was around £60,000 or £70,000. I offered £30,000 and said, ‘Take it or leave it.’ They said no. They wanted more. I hung up and said that if they changed their minds, they knew how to find me.”8 View gallery 'Even I can’t read Trump's mind' (Photo: IMAGO)And did they?
“Yes, after a few months they came back to me and said the seller had agreed. Believe it or not, the owner of the island was an Israeli-Brazilian Jew.”The plot only became more tangled. “It turned out there was treasure buried underground on the island by the Egyptians. I read several books that confirmed the treasure story, but the Scottish government did not allow me to dig there.”Geller will celebrate his 80th birthday in December, and he is not resting for a moment. Soon, visitors will be able to see another side of him, one that has nothing to do with bending spoons. Beginning June 25, he will lead tours of an exhibition of his paintings at the Ramla Museum, in cooperation with the municipality and under the curation of Dr. Lior Alon.“I started painting at a very young age,” he says of his beloved hobby. “When I paint, I fantasize. I think about things like flying into space and put them on paper. My first painting, when I was 10 or 11, and I know I’m bragging, won a prize. Later, when I began bending spoons, I met some of the most famous painters in the world, like Andy Warhol and Salvador Dalí.”How were your relations with Dalí?
