Wizarding Teabags? and muggle inventions

[heidi tandy]

No: HPFGUIDX 1520

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, "Sister Mary Lunatic" <klaatu at p...> 
wrote:
> What I find interesting are the contradictions that exist in JKR's 
wizard
> world/muggle world interfaces.  For instance, why should Hogwarts, 
built
> over a thousand years ago, have a thoroughly modern, even luxurious
> (prefects' bathroom) plumbing system, and yet have no electricity?  
The
> plumbing must have existed in some form from the beginning, as the 
pipe
> leading to the Chamber of Secrets was supposedly only known to 
Salazar
> Slytherin, unless he had a devoted and silent minion who was around 
when
> they installed the plumbing in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.



Sister Mary Lunatic [mailto:klaatu at primenet.com] wrote:

> What I find interesting are the contradictions that exist in 
> JKR's wizard
> world/muggle world interfaces.  For instance, why should 
> Hogwarts, built
> over a thousand years ago, have a thoroughly modern, even luxurious
> (prefects' bathroom) plumbing system, and yet have no 
> electricity?  The
> plumbing must have existed in some form from the beginning, 
> as the pipe
> leading to the Chamber of Secrets was supposedly only known to 
Salazar
> Slytherin, unless he had a devoted and silent minion who was 
> around when
> they installed the plumbing in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.

Good thought - and here's a possible explanation:
The Chamber of Secrets is a real place in Hogwarts. When the plumbing 
was installed in the castle a few hundred years ago, it inadvertantly 
tapped into the Chamber, or came close enough to the plumbing that an 
heir of Slytherin (say, Tom Riddle) could enter the chamber from some 
other method, and magically create a tube from the Chamber to the 
Pipes, which would give the Bassilik a way out of the Chamber into 
the pipes. 
Until this point, presume that the entrance to the Chamber was far 
removed from the "heart" of the school, and as no apparating was 
possible, it would've taken Tom a while to reach it when he wanted 
to. So, to make it easier and quicker for him to get into the 
Chamber, he created an enterance in Myrtle's bathroom (tom as the 
devoted & silent minion of slytherin) to the Chamber - an entrance 
only a parseltongue could use (and at that point, he's the only 
parseltongue in school)
We know from what Harry hears that the Bassilik has basically been in 
hibernation for the prior 50 years (did Tom put it to sleep? and 
after becoming Voldemort, why didn't he Imperius someone at Hogwarts 
to release the Bassilik into the Great Hall while it was filled with 
people? great way to conquer the school!)
My big question is, how did Ginny, who isn't a Parselmouth, open the 
chamber? Was Tom, at those points, speaking through her?

The other explanation is, the plumbing has always existed in the 
school, and is actually based on ancient roman indoor plumbing, which 
did exist, and which predates the founding of the school.