[HPforGrownups] Re: Muggle Parents of Magical Children

[Alexander]

No: HPFGUIDX 40776

  Greetings!

> darrin_burnett wrote:

d> Ah, but what about Muggle parents who have no desire, for
d> whatever reason, for their children to be brought up as a
d> witch or wizard?

  I think the solution is the scene at the Hut-on-the-Rock,
where Hagrid says that if Harry wants to go to Hogwarts,
then no muggle will be able to stop him. Thus, I think it's
the child who makes the decision to go or not to go (surely
if child doesn't want to go, nobody will be able to force
him to).

d> Say, Dudley started to display Magic ability. Vernon and
d> Petunia would sooner be turned into ferrets than to have
d> him go to Hogwarts. I have a hard time believing all
d> Muggles are overjoyed to find out their children have
d> this potential.

  I would be overjoyed. It's just cool! Actually, I would
soon know Hogwarts schoolbooks better than my child... ;)

d> And we know that Wizard parents have the option of
d> sending their children to other schools. Lucius nearly
d> sent Draco to Durmstrang. It is possible some UK Wizards
d> -- especially Slytherins -- would not want their children
d> anywhere near Dumbledore.

d> Are Muggle parents FORCED to send their children to
d> Hogwarts?

  That's interesting, but I don't think it's the case. How
many British children of age 11 do you know who can attend
Beauxbatons and learn there? That is, who know French well
enough? And to go to Durmstrang they probably need to know
some Slavic language (most likely Russian).

  BTW this leaves me to wonder what school do German
children attend? There were no Germans among Durmstrang
students - all were Slavic in origin. So Germans probably
have a school of their own, just not so big as the other
three.

  BTW, about Karkaroff's name: in Russian "kar-kar" is the
sound emitted by crows and ravens (corresponds to "caw-caw"
in English). Ending "off" is just standard second name
ending and conveys no meaning. So Karkaroff is "raven",
whatever this means...

d> Darrin
d> -- If my parents tried to stop me, I'd turn them into
d> ferrets.

  My mother would probably disapprove, but my father would
say "yeah!" (he's a Potterfan as well... ;)

  But what question bothers me most of all, is just HOW did
muggle-born wizards learn magic in Russia? Parents have
choice what school to send their child to, that's no
trouble, but sometimes they will need a document from the
school that says that their child is learning there (such
docs are required to get some other docs, this comes
especially important when dealing with real estate - Russian
laws limit real estate operations if there's a child living
in the place). So there probably must be some "fictional"
school that works as muggle cover for Durmstrang. And to
keep this fake school secret, officials' hands must be
"greased" with money... ya, so Durmstrang actually supports
the corruption in Russian government!!! ;)

  I also wonder what marks do Durmstrang students get into
their muggle fake-school certificates? Especially for
subjects like physics, higher maths, biology etc...

--
  My IMHO: Rowling would do a great favour for the world, if
she would just sit down and re-write the books, eliminating
all the stupid mistakes, troubles and inconsistencies.

Sincerely yours,
Alexander Lomski,
Gryffindor/Slytherin crossbreed,
always happy to throw weird ideas into community.

Thursday, July 4, 2002, 23:07 local time (GMT+2:00)