extra canon for safe house/MAGIC DISHWASHER

[Grey Wolf]

No: HPFGUIDX 46543

Pippin wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Grey Wolf" <greywolf1 at j...> wrote:
> [Re-Englishing the original], which for your convenience I 
> reproduce here:
> 
> Harry-
> I'm flying north immediately. This news about your scar is the 
> latest in a series of strange rumours that have reached me here. 
> If it hurts again, go straight to Dumbledore -- they're saying he's 
> got Mad-Eye out of retirement, which means he's reading the 
> signs even if no one else is.
> 
> I'll be in touch soon. My best to Ron and Hermione. Keep your 
> eyes open, Harry.
> 
> Sirius
> UK hardcover GoF p 199
> 
> 
> > 
> > However, even more intriguing is that very first comment: " a 
> series of   of strange rumours that have reached me here". We 
> know that Sirius is in some tropical paradise, with huge 
> multicoloured birds. What kind of  rumour would arrive there? <<
> 
> 
> Er...how about the newspapers? The disappearance of Bertha 
> Jorkins and the disturbances at the World Cup were both 
> reported in the Daily Prophet. Sirius also could have heard from 
> Dumbledore himself or from a Muggle newspaper about the 
> disappearance of Frank Bryce in Little Hangleton. He'd be able to 
> correlate that with the date on which Harry felt his scar hurt, 
> which no doubt was the deciding factor in persuading him to 
> return.
> 
> Pippin
> reminding Grey Wolf that much of intelligence work is realizing 
> the significance of "white world" published information.

Hey, thanks for quoting the original passage. I try to remember to ask 
for the originals, but I still forget more times than not. Translating 
from a translation always has major disadvantages, but is all I can 
work from (for now). I did quite a good job, from what I see, though 
(pats his own shoulder).

Now, I don't really have the time right now to look into this with the 
time I'd like to (besides the fact that I should be going to bed in a 
few minutes) since I'm pretty busy right now in RL, so I'm going to ask 
for some help from the list: I'd like someone to check when those news 
came into the open as compared to when Harry receives the letter. I 
don't think they are "it" (see below), but I still would like to know 
all the facts.

Now, there are two problems with newspapers. One is, as always, that 
Sirius is in hiding, so he wouldn't be attracting unwanted attention by 
subscribing to a UK newspaper (and Bertha's disapearance and Frank 
Bryce are not going to figure in a newspaper from whichever country 
Sirius happen to be in). I already said that the World Cup disturbance 
are top contenders for the rumours, but I feel that shouldn't be all. 
The other is that RL newspapers tend to arrive quite late to tropical 
countries, and so seems to do the owl post Harry sends his way. Which 
brings me to the problem of timelines (and what I requested the help 
for).

You see, we have to consider that by normal channels, Sirius lives at 
least 15 days, and probably more, behind the UK WW, simply due to the 
distances involved. I'm speaking from my own experience when I say that 
in tropical countries getting access to relatively modern newspapers is 
frankly impossible, and the less relation the country has with your 
own, the worse the lag is (and Sirius won't be in a country that is 
friendly with the UK WW, I should imagine). Now, from that I understand 
that Harry's scar's news might have arrived sooner than the World Cup 
disturbances or at almost the same time, and these wouldn't qualify as 
rumours if he had gotten hold of a newspaper (about the only way to 
arrive faster than Harry's owl). And even if it had arrived by 
word-of-mouth, that would've been *a* rumour, not plural as indicated. 
As I said, I'm not trying to know what the rumours were, just use them 
as basis for another thread of MAGIC DISHWASHER and the safe house in 
general.

Now, the other ideas: Frank Bryce, Bertha Jorkins and other possible 
news, could someone please check how long before/after the letter were 
published, and compare it to how much time it took for Harry's letter 
to arrive to Sirius and back (the tone of the letter suggests that as 
soon as Sirius received it he started his trek to England)? I'm not 
sure about this, but I think you'll be able to see that he must have 
left before most of those things saw the light, even in England. This 
is only a hunch, though, so I'll leave to those that are awake while I 
sleep to piece toghether their own theories, if they want.

Hope that helps,

Grey Wolf