So it goes without saying that when we were in the UK, TD was keen to immerse herself in Potterish paraphernalia and places. One can book a tour designed to delight fans by taking them to the set, the Great Hall, Dumbledore's office, Diagon Alley and much much more. Knowing the market well, the organisers of these tours charge an arm and a leg per person and effectively magic away many pounds from your wallet. So we decided to do it the DIY way.
Platform 9 and three quarters is a piece of wall cordoned off at Kings Cross Railway station. There was a long queue of young wizards and muggles waiting to have their photos taken at this particular piece of wall. We offered to wait for TD if she wanted to join the queue, but she was happy to have her photo taken on the outer side of the cordon and use her time more wisely in the Harry Potter shop situated next door. We wandered around, examined the expensive merchandise and marvelled at the power of marketing.
On another day we made the pilgrimage to the Oxford Street Primark. There was a treasure trove of affordable goodies, and TD splashed out with her carefully hoarded savings.
While I was in Cape Town, the travellers did a road trip to Scotland and stopped at the Harry Potter Bridge. (Well, in real life it is the Glenfinnan Viaduct near Fort William.) Andrew, weaving magic of the real kind, had looked up the train timetable, and timed their visit so that they could see the train crossing over the viaduct. TD was most chuffed.
I rejoined my family in Cambridge, and that for me was like entering a magic world. We were lucky enough to be allowed into Trinity (our son's college) and the magnificent dining hall outranks any film set Hogwarts hall. Academics, with their gowns flowing behind them, briskly walking on cobbled streets, magically sends one's imagination into another world. And yet, it is real. This is how the students at Cambridge live - in a town with ancient, magnificent buildings, narrow cobbled streets, magical book shops and plenty of muggles taking photographs.
Marketing magic is a profitable business. Every now and then an email pops in my inbox offering a cure for diabetes T1. These range from ActoBio's cheese producing bacteria to extreme diets to social activities to acupuncture, and they all need elements of magic to work. Mostly people look at ways of managing the sugar/insulin see saw, and the diet option, acupuncture, social activities are very important for keeping numbers level, but a cure? Big pharmaceuticals are pouring money in to research. The same companies that make millions from selling life sustaining insulin are hoping to offer a medicinal cure. There is obviously a mind boggling amount of profit to be made. So while we wait for science to find a way to kick-start a pancreas into making insulin, I will save my magic for the worlds of Harry Potter and Cambridge, whilst still keeping an open mind about a cure for diabetes.
Harry Potter's author, JK Rowling, says it most eloquently: " We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better."
