Muggle Questions Was: McGonagall the snoop

[Steve <bboy_mn@yahoo.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 50557

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Debbie <debmclain at y...>"
<debmclain at y...> wrote:
> <kristen at s...> wrote:
> > ... If wizards and  muggles are largely intermingled ..., how 
> > come none of the wizards knew how to  dress like muggles at the 
> >World Cup? :)
> 
> Kristen - I completely agree!! This is something that has been 
> bothering me for quite some time. I'm sure there is something in the 
> archives, but apparently, my searching skills are nil there. 
> 
> If wizards live around muggles, why don't they know it's "policemen" 
> and not "please-men"? Why is Arthur Weasley the head of the Dept. of 
> Misuse of Muggle Artifacts, and not a, sorry, mudblood? Is it that 
> undesireable a job, that even they don't want it? 
> 
> ...edited...
> 
> Now an ignorant question...Hermione mentions that magic and 
> electricity don't work together. I'm assuming she means just at 
> Hogwarts, right? Otherwise, wouldn't muggles find it weird that some 
> neighbors only use candles?
> 
> -Debbie

bboy_mn:

Actually this has been touch on recently. To read more search this
club for the word 'chinatown'. I doubt that it would have occurred to
you to search for that word. Most of these post were written by me,
and I try (I really will) and give you a short version.

I think wizards treat the muggle world as a foreign country and a
foreign country that they are not particularly comfortable with. Think
about Chinatown in any city (Los Angeles, London), here is a small
enclave of China right in London. Many of the Chinese who live in or
near Chinatown never learn to speak English. They essentually live in
this little pocket of comfortable China are rare venture beyond it,
and when they do go into the non-Chinese world of London, they do so
with great discomfort. They aren't familiar with the language, the
customs, the way people dress, and act. It's a confusing frightening
place for them, and they enter it only as a last resort. I have met
Korean who have lived in L.A. for decades. And while they are
successful businessmen, and own all the modern conveniences; nice
house, fancy car, modern applances, there English is very marginal.
They shop at the Korean grocery store, only do business with other
Koreans, and only eat at Korean restaurants. The live in a little
pocket of Korea within the boudaries of L.A. (250,000 Koreans in L.A.;
 bigger than Minneapolis.)

This is how I see wizards, people living in a foreign country that
they are not very comfortable with. They don't understand that
language, they don't understand the customs, routine things are done
in strange and unusually ways. I'm sure, the muggle world seems like a
very dangerous place to them. Plus, wizards don't have to leave the
house to travel. They just pop (apparate or Floo) directly to Diagon
Alley to eat, socialize, and shop. Diagon Alley is their 'Chinatown';
their comfortable escape from a strange and foreign world. 

Just a thought.

bboy_mn