Krum and Hermione

[Allyse at my-deja.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 20540

Natalie wrote:

> > >What does it say for Krum's home/school life if Hermione is what 
> he will
> > >miss most? He must have no close friends or family members. That 
> could
> > >certainly explain why he seems to be sullen and bitter most of 
the 
> time.

And Dave wrote:

> > But the same question could be asked of Cedric -- What he'll miss 
> most is
> > a girl he only started dating a couple of months prior???

I would suggest that the judges took the thing that the contestants 
would miss most *at that time*. Krum, who is stereotyped as a 
Durmstrang student and far away from home, surely cherishes his 
friendship with Hermione; Cedric, who walks the corridors hand in 
hand with Cho and is, perhaps, in the first throes of young love, 
would sorely miss this new relationship. (By this, I mean that if Cho 
is his first "serious" girlfriend, it is an element in his life he's 
never experienced before, and is therefore the thing he'd least like 
to have disappear.) Harry, who only made up with Ron three months ago 
after a protracted fight, would miss that rekindled friendship more 
than anything else. And Fleur, whose personality is not conducive to 
making friends at Hogwarts, might be feeling so lonely that she would 
like nothing better than to be together with her family, as 
represented by her sister.

I think we can agree that Ron will probably not be the most important 
thing in Harry's life for the next several decades (if he lives... 
<eg> Don't lynch me, I love Ron too!), and that Krum will not pine 
for Hermione for the rest of his life. But *at the time* of the 
Second Task, those people were, quite possibly, the things that the 
champions would "most miss."

Allyse