By: CNJ
PG-13
3: Magical Classes American Style
Harry:
"...so, if we all watch,
this wormwood juice will turn bright orange in a matter of minutes.
It's the kind most used by medics to relieve pain on a broken bone," Ms.
Bane told us the next day in Potions. All of us...Hogwarts students
among the Shankspell students gathered around the huge cauldron in the
middle to watch the dark grayish-green potion brighten to orange.
We Hogwarts students had gotten temporary schedules and were split into
different classes. Cheria, Neville, and I were in this one.
So was Lira Goldmeyer, one of the students my friends and I had met at
dinner yesterday. As we waited, I stole a glance around.
So many different faces. The uniforms were somewhat similar to Hogwarts,
but the robes were plaid designs. The background color was brown,
but each house had a different color cross-design for the plaid stripes
themselves. Libertrar students, I could see had green for their cross-color.
The two other houses had either red or blue; I want to say that Hudson
had the blue color.
"Heyyy, here it comes; it's
turning!" A merperson crowed. We peered in and sure enough, a bright
orange spread over the liquid. Not only was it bright orange, but
it was a clear, crystal orange, not opaque. It actually looked lovely.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hermione:
"...so that's how the women's
suffrage passed in Muggle America," Nora Sanchez finished her point in
Muggle Studies.
"It sure was a long clumsy
process," Todd Mercurio added. I nodded in agreement. It sounded
rather ridiculous that the muggle American government had to go through
two-thirds of state legislature government just to get this important amendment
passed.
"But consider it was 1920
when things were less advanced," Brinmirth Long added. I was enjoying
this discussion on the law that freed muggle women in the States and enforced
their voting rights. We'd studied the same things back home in the
UK and the muggle parliament of Britain back then hadn't been much better.
I voiced this out loud.
"So what year did witches
in England get the vote?" Nora asked me.
"Eighteen sixty-five," I
told them.
"Wow, that's better than
American witches..." Barbara Maroni put in. "We didn't get the vote
in the American magical world until eighteen eighty-six, same year that
the Statue of Liberty went up."
"Odd irony, isn't it?" Parvati
mused. "Lady Liberty's a muggle site, yet muggle women still didn't have
the vote."
"It was ironic," the teacher,
Ms. Searles added. "So ironic that muggle women's groups gathered
by in boats to point out this irony." We were all quiet a minute
as we thought this over. In both American and British magical worlds,
the vote was put straight to the people, both wizards and witches and of
course, it passed. It had been the first vote witches took place
in.
"When my grandma was growing
up, many Quidditch teams still excluded girls and women," another American
student put in and we were off in a discussion on that. I remembered
how back in our second year, Harry, who was the first of us to join Hogwarts
Quidditch had been very surprised that the Slytherin team had no girls
and that in our third year, Cho Chang had been the only girl on the Ravenclaw
team. I smiled softly as I remembered also that Harry had completed
a term paper last month on the women's movement in the muggle and magical
world. He'd let me, Cheria, Ginny, and Ron read it and it really
had been a great paper.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ron:
Will you get a load off the cheesy tie he's wearing, the note Ben Bosentra tossed my way said as we watched the display of animigus throughout history. I peered at Mr. Hathway's tie, but didn't see any cheese on it. Cheesy... Ben was grinning my way, so as Mr. Hathway droned on in this sleepy monotone, I tossed a note back. Sorry, where's the cheese? I'd written. It's funny-looking with the moving dots, but I don't see any cheese stains on it. Ben kind of snorted, then wrote back, Oh, maybe you don't use that term...Americans mean stupid-looking or bizarre when they mean cheesy. Oh, I nodded. So cheesy means tacky, I penned back. Ben grinned and nodded and we both laughed quietly. As Mr. Hathway droned, he glanced our way, but luckily didn't seem to see us with the notes. He didn't seem to notice half of what was going on actually. Two rows behind me, two witches played a silenced game of exploding snap while a witch and wizard at the back of the room made out quietly. Interesting lot of students and teachers here. The History of Magic teacher reminded me a little of Professor McGonagall with her bunned-up black hair and no-nonsense manner and their Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher looked a little like our former Potions teacher, Snape, but he wasn't the huge crabpit that Snape had been; he'd been more positive and had a swell sense of humor. Cheria and I were sharing this Transformations class with mostly Hudson students. Across the aisle, Cheria showed me a couple of moving pictures of a Quidditch match. She passed them to me and from what I gathered, the teams were mostly Hudson vs Libertrar matches. The Hudsons stomped the Libertrars into the ground in four out of five of these matches. Way to go, Hudsons! I penned back to Cheria as I passed the pictures back to her.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Harry:
After two interesting, enlightening
days at Shankspell, their spring break began. Of course, everyone
whooped and bellowed once our last class ended and the whole hall lit up
with talk of going into Gridley Alley tonight. From what my friends
and I could gather, there was Gridley Alley and Yorkshire, which is adjacent
to Gridley Alley.
"All of you Hogwarts students
are welcome to join us," Crystal Garcia told us as we headed back to the
dorms to dump off our books.
"How're students selected
for their houses?" Hermione asked her.
"A sorting necklace," Crystal
told her. "First-years and new students put it on and the necklace
reads into their heart arteries which then connects into the brain and
decides which house they get into."
"Wicked..." Cheria grinned.
"At Hogwarts, new students have to put on a sorting hat. We have
four houses...you might have heard...Gryffindor, Slytherin, Hufflepuff,
and Ravenclaw." I smiled softly as I remembered that first year being
so worried that I'd be put in Slytherin.
"The Hudsons and Libertrars
have had a fierce rivalry going for ages," another girl put in, who'd been
walking alongside Crystal. I think her name was Nora Sanchez if I'm
not mistaken. "Hudsons are known for being outgoing and bubbly, yet
competitive and ambitious. Libertrars are very free-thinking, creative
individuals in general. The Grenswiths keep to themselves mostly.
They're more inward and are good planners." I've noticed that it's
been mostly Hudsons and Libertrars that have intermingled with us.
"It's like the houses back
at Hogwarts," Ron told them a little about what each of our houses are
famous for. Once we got to the dorms, we put down our books and got
ready to go. Their password system is similar to Hogwarts; you say
a password to a moving portrait to get in. The portrait just moves
upward like a muggle garage door instead of opening sideways like Hogwart's
portraits do. The Libertrar dorm has the Statue of Liberty model
on theirs. I had to grin as she peered down at us, asking password,
please... then lifted her torch even higher as her portrait disappeared
upward.
"Wait till you see Yorkshire,"
Nora told us with a grin. "There's also several magical sites around
the city as well along with the muggle sites. It'll blow you all
away."
More later!
