Wizarding Times

It was a cool and windy day in Boston. My oldest daughter Stacey, who got me involved with the Harry Potter books years ago, and I were on our way to the Boston Museum of Science. We had purchased our tickets weeks ago to the traveling Harry Potter Exhibit. We were told on the web site, as well as by the museum staff, that no photos of any kind would be allowed. They did say it was a timed exhibit. We were told we would have 45 minutes to an hour to view the exhibit. I must say they never rushed us in any way. We took as long as we wanted in each of the rooms.

The first person you meet is a gentleman with a strong English accent. He is holding a replica of the Sorting Hat. He offers those who wish to be sorted a chance to sit on the wooden stool, place the hat on your head, and wait to be sorted by the Hat. Most of the adults let the younger children go up, since there isn't much time before the doors are opened for you to enter the exhibit. The main doors are similar to the Great Hall's doors, so check them out. You go into a room with screens, with many of the Harry Potter movies playing. You then enter another set of doors into the actual exhibit area.

You are immediately sent into the boys' dorm, where the beds, wall hangings, and furnishings of Harry's and Ron's room are on display. The endtables are there, too. Different sets of clothes and belonging are there, including the school trunks. The Gryffindor Common Room bulletin board is on display. You will find school books displayed, with the titles we are all familiar. Now, if you're into the clothes that the many characters wore, then you are in for a real treat. They seem to have brought clothes from almost all the main characters. So I will name a few that you would be able to see: the first Dumbledore (from the first and second movies) as well the Dumbledore from the third movie on, Professors McGonagall, Snape, Slughorn, Lupin, Quirrell, Lockhart (and a display of all his books and smiling-face pictures), Umbridge, Hagrid and Hooch. They have the clothes that were worn by the Triwizard characters Viktor, Fleur, Cedric and Harry — both their regular school clothes as well as the Yule Ball gowns for the ladies and dress robes for the guys. Even Ron's disgusting dress robes are there. Shoes worn by all the different characters, and even Neville's Yule Ball shoes are present. I am sure there are more.

Some special areas are set up for Professor Snape's Potion class, and all the cauldrons, bottles and jars full of heaven-knows-what. They have the tiny bottle of Felix Felicis on display. An area shows Professor Umbridge's office with the cat plates hanging on the wall, and it contains the desk where Harry wrote his detentions, with the quill and parchment, too. There is a whole area for Quidditch — I love this one. It has in a display case the Nimbus 2000 and the 2001. The box with the quaffle, bludgers and the golden snitch is there. They have the Quidditch robes from the different houses, beaters bats and Ron's Quidditch uniform. The next area is Hagrid's Hut. It has his massive table and chair, dishes, fireplace and cupboards. Throughout the different rooms are life size figures of the many creatures we have come to meet, such as Dobby, Kreacher, Fawkes, Buckbeak and even a dementor — to mention a few. The one item I was surprised to see was the Boggart Wardrobe from Professor Lupin's Defense Against the Dark Arts class. It actually shakes and makes noise like the boggart is still in there!!! You also see clothes worn by Lucius Malfoy and Draco, as well as Malfoy's walking stick (with wand).

Mentioned a wand, did I??? Well, they have them on display all over the place: wands of Dumbledore, Snape, McGonagall, Slughorn, Harry, Ron (and his broken Spello-tape repaired one) and Hermione's, just to name a few. There is a display of Honeydukes candies. My favorite was the original Chocolate Frog Card Box, which we saw on the Hogwarts Express, but not packaged that way for retail sale to Muggles.

But, my favorite display was Professor Snape's Potions classroom. Now you must understand one thing — all over the place, and I mean everywhere, there are signs saying "DO NOT TOUCH"! I must say I did very very well throughout the entire exhibit, but I failed miserably with this part of the exhibit. I looked at his robes for the longest time, looked around and saw only Stacey and I were in the room. I am sure they have closed circuit monitoring everywhere, but I just couldn't help myself. I touched the lapel area of his robes. *sigh*

Now I have only given you a tiny glimpse of what is on display at the Harry Potter Exhibit. There are some things I don't want to tell you about, so hopefully you will see them for yourself. Both Stacey and I really enjoyed it. For the real Harry Potter fan and those who love the movies, too, this exhibit is a wonderful opportunity to see the Harry Potter world right before your eyes. I would tell anyone who has a chance to go and see it to do so.