I love Harry Potter. Like, REALLY love Harry Potter. I pride myself on how much I love Harry Potter. I am a Slytherin, I have a 13', sycamore wood, dragon heartstring wand, and I was recently sorted into the North American house of Thunderbird. I know crazy, random facts about Harry Potter and the world of magic. So this past week, I had the opportunity to put my HP love to the test at a trivia contest.
I also love Salt Lake Comic Con, and they partnered with Weller Book Works in SLC for a book release party for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. This is the full script of the play currently being performed in London. It's the story of Albus Potter and his journey through Hogwarts as the child of the great Harry Potter. There were lots of activities for this release party, but I originally decided to go because I bought a SLC Comic Con/Slytherin t-shirt, and it could only be picked up at the party, but other events included a Costume Contest, a wildlife exhibit featuring snakes, lizards, and other creepy-crawlies, and lots of fun food trucks. But the ultimate activity for me was the "Are You Smarter than a Death Eater" trivia contest.
This contest was announced five days before the party, and it was at that moment that I knew I had to go. It was a team event, so I hurried to find the biggest Potterheads in the state of Utah. Of course, everyone I know decided to go out of town this past weekend, so I was stressing out, because I almost couldn't find anyone, and it was so frustrating to think that I wouldn't be able to participate simply for lack of teammates. But then I contacted Adam.
Adam is one of the only friends from foreign language housing with whom I still stay in contact, and he's also the friend that first introduced me to Comic Con. He was actually planning on going to California, but because of money(and me contacting him:) he decided not to, and he found our remaining two teammates, Hayley and Cameron. On Saturday night at 9pm, I picked them all up. We headed to Salt Lake, quizzing one another on all aspects of Harry Potter.
We got there, and the worst possible thing happened. They told me the contest was full. Here's the situation. On their Facebook page, they had said that sign-ups for the trivia contest would be held from 11:00-11:30pm in the Panel Room. Only ten teams would be allowed to participate. That's why, despite the party starting at 9pm, we arrived at 10:00. I figured there would be a line to sign up, so I thought that by getting there an hour before sign-ups started, we could get in line, and everything would be fine. There was even a fire scare, where the fire alarm went off, and everyone had to vacate the building,but my team and I stayed super close to the building so we could run back to the Panel Room and maybe get in a good position to get in line at 11:00. Once we got back inside, we sat in the Panel Room, and thought everything was okay. But we wanted to be sure. So I went out to the Information tent, and asked about it. The woman I talked to said that all of the slots were full. What. The. Heck. Turns out, they opened up sign-ups at 9:00 when the party had started. And this is where Stubborn Hannah comes out. I am a rule keeper. I got there in time to sign-up at the assigned time, and I was being punished for being obedient. If we had gotten there, and a line had already formed to sign up at the original time, I would have understood. But they changed the rules without any notice, and that just wasn't going to fly. There was no way I was leaving without participating in that contest. I had the dream team, and I had dragged them all the way up to SLC late on a Saturday night specifically for this contest, and there was no way in this world that we were giving in. They said sign-ups would start at 11:00, and I got filtered through four different people before I finally got to the woman in charge of the contest. I convinced her to open up four more spots(one would have been fine). There was actually another girl who had walked up when this whole thing was transpiring, and she was as confused as I was. She's the reason they opened up four spots instead of one. The organizers told me to follow them over to the sign-up table and we would be signed up. I was almost holding on to the woman we were supposed to follow, because I didn't want anything happening that would separate me from her and jeopardize me entering my team for the contest. Once at the table, we were to give our team name, and the names of our team members. I hadn't had time to think of a team name, so I quickly chose the Hippogriff Squad. Simple. Classy. Harry Potter themed. We were in.
The contest took an hour and a half. It was comprised of four rounds of questions. Everyone had to turn their phones off. If anyone was caught cheating, they and their team would immediately be disqualified. Oh, and the prizes? 1st place was VIP passes to Comic Con, 2nd place, Gold Passes, 3rd Place, Multipasses. All I wanted were Multipasses. It means you get in to Comic Con for all three days.
These questions were hard. They related to all aspects of the fandom. Some sample questions were...
What curse did Bellatrix put on the items stored in her Gringotts vault?
How many times was Nearly Headless Nick hit in the neck with a blunt axe?
What actors portrayed Albus Dumbledore?
Name the Weasley children in order of birth.
What are the North American houses?
They announced who was in first place at the end of the first three rounds. It wasn't my team. We had eureka moments. One such was the question about the actors who portrayed Dumbledore. We could remember Michael Gambon, but we couldn't remember the other. One teammate, Hayley, said she had it on the tip of her tongue. I had absolutely no idea, but I turned to her and decided to start listing off random names. The first name I said was Richard, which happens to be the first name of the other actor. She knew the last name, and we were good to go. But it wasn't enough. There were teams who got every single question right, and by the end of the third round, two teams were tied for first place, and they weren't the Hippogriff Squad. The fourth round began, and we did very well. I think we maybe got every question right, but I didn't think we were close. We had missed a few questions earlier on, and it seemed like we weren't going to win. I was just glad that we got to participate, considering we almost didn't. And it was really fun. We got to see awesome cosplayers and hear an interesting panel. It took them forever to tally the final scores.
First place went to the team with the girl who was next to me when I insisted they let my team participate. I was happy for them. At least she got something out of it. The guy in charge then said "Second place... the Hippogriff Squad."
You know that moment in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire movie when Harry has just entered the lake, and Neville thinks that he killed Harry Potter and then Harry leaps out of the lake and everyone erupts in cheers? That was NOTHING compared to how we reacted! WE GOT SECOND PLACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WE GOT GOLD PASSES TO COMIC CON! I know that being a sore winner is bad, but at that moment, we didn't care! We couldn't believe it! Who cares about just having fun! We won gold passes! The first place team barely made a sound when they won, but we sure made up for it. I think we may have all been in a little bit of shock the rest of the night, because it was so unexpected. We had no idea we were even close, but something must have happened to those other teams in the fourth round, because they didn't place. We thought maybe fourth or fifth place, but second?!! It seems like a dream. We were so excited! We were each given a certificate for a Gold Pass, and the actual voucher would be emailed to us later. So we snapped this awesome picture.
I also love Salt Lake Comic Con, and they partnered with Weller Book Works in SLC for a book release party for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. This is the full script of the play currently being performed in London. It's the story of Albus Potter and his journey through Hogwarts as the child of the great Harry Potter. There were lots of activities for this release party, but I originally decided to go because I bought a SLC Comic Con/Slytherin t-shirt, and it could only be picked up at the party, but other events included a Costume Contest, a wildlife exhibit featuring snakes, lizards, and other creepy-crawlies, and lots of fun food trucks. But the ultimate activity for me was the "Are You Smarter than a Death Eater" trivia contest.
This contest was announced five days before the party, and it was at that moment that I knew I had to go. It was a team event, so I hurried to find the biggest Potterheads in the state of Utah. Of course, everyone I know decided to go out of town this past weekend, so I was stressing out, because I almost couldn't find anyone, and it was so frustrating to think that I wouldn't be able to participate simply for lack of teammates. But then I contacted Adam.
Adam is one of the only friends from foreign language housing with whom I still stay in contact, and he's also the friend that first introduced me to Comic Con. He was actually planning on going to California, but because of money(and me contacting him:) he decided not to, and he found our remaining two teammates, Hayley and Cameron. On Saturday night at 9pm, I picked them all up. We headed to Salt Lake, quizzing one another on all aspects of Harry Potter.
We got there, and the worst possible thing happened. They told me the contest was full. Here's the situation. On their Facebook page, they had said that sign-ups for the trivia contest would be held from 11:00-11:30pm in the Panel Room. Only ten teams would be allowed to participate. That's why, despite the party starting at 9pm, we arrived at 10:00. I figured there would be a line to sign up, so I thought that by getting there an hour before sign-ups started, we could get in line, and everything would be fine. There was even a fire scare, where the fire alarm went off, and everyone had to vacate the building,but my team and I stayed super close to the building so we could run back to the Panel Room and maybe get in a good position to get in line at 11:00. Once we got back inside, we sat in the Panel Room, and thought everything was okay. But we wanted to be sure. So I went out to the Information tent, and asked about it. The woman I talked to said that all of the slots were full. What. The. Heck. Turns out, they opened up sign-ups at 9:00 when the party had started. And this is where Stubborn Hannah comes out. I am a rule keeper. I got there in time to sign-up at the assigned time, and I was being punished for being obedient. If we had gotten there, and a line had already formed to sign up at the original time, I would have understood. But they changed the rules without any notice, and that just wasn't going to fly. There was no way I was leaving without participating in that contest. I had the dream team, and I had dragged them all the way up to SLC late on a Saturday night specifically for this contest, and there was no way in this world that we were giving in. They said sign-ups would start at 11:00, and I got filtered through four different people before I finally got to the woman in charge of the contest. I convinced her to open up four more spots(one would have been fine). There was actually another girl who had walked up when this whole thing was transpiring, and she was as confused as I was. She's the reason they opened up four spots instead of one. The organizers told me to follow them over to the sign-up table and we would be signed up. I was almost holding on to the woman we were supposed to follow, because I didn't want anything happening that would separate me from her and jeopardize me entering my team for the contest. Once at the table, we were to give our team name, and the names of our team members. I hadn't had time to think of a team name, so I quickly chose the Hippogriff Squad. Simple. Classy. Harry Potter themed. We were in.
The contest took an hour and a half. It was comprised of four rounds of questions. Everyone had to turn their phones off. If anyone was caught cheating, they and their team would immediately be disqualified. Oh, and the prizes? 1st place was VIP passes to Comic Con, 2nd place, Gold Passes, 3rd Place, Multipasses. All I wanted were Multipasses. It means you get in to Comic Con for all three days.
These questions were hard. They related to all aspects of the fandom. Some sample questions were...
What curse did Bellatrix put on the items stored in her Gringotts vault?
How many times was Nearly Headless Nick hit in the neck with a blunt axe?
What actors portrayed Albus Dumbledore?
Name the Weasley children in order of birth.
What are the North American houses?
They announced who was in first place at the end of the first three rounds. It wasn't my team. We had eureka moments. One such was the question about the actors who portrayed Dumbledore. We could remember Michael Gambon, but we couldn't remember the other. One teammate, Hayley, said she had it on the tip of her tongue. I had absolutely no idea, but I turned to her and decided to start listing off random names. The first name I said was Richard, which happens to be the first name of the other actor. She knew the last name, and we were good to go. But it wasn't enough. There were teams who got every single question right, and by the end of the third round, two teams were tied for first place, and they weren't the Hippogriff Squad. The fourth round began, and we did very well. I think we maybe got every question right, but I didn't think we were close. We had missed a few questions earlier on, and it seemed like we weren't going to win. I was just glad that we got to participate, considering we almost didn't. And it was really fun. We got to see awesome cosplayers and hear an interesting panel. It took them forever to tally the final scores.
First place went to the team with the girl who was next to me when I insisted they let my team participate. I was happy for them. At least she got something out of it. The guy in charge then said "Second place... the Hippogriff Squad."
You know that moment in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire movie when Harry has just entered the lake, and Neville thinks that he killed Harry Potter and then Harry leaps out of the lake and everyone erupts in cheers? That was NOTHING compared to how we reacted! WE GOT SECOND PLACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WE GOT GOLD PASSES TO COMIC CON! I know that being a sore winner is bad, but at that moment, we didn't care! We couldn't believe it! Who cares about just having fun! We won gold passes! The first place team barely made a sound when they won, but we sure made up for it. I think we may have all been in a little bit of shock the rest of the night, because it was so unexpected. We had no idea we were even close, but something must have happened to those other teams in the fourth round, because they didn't place. We thought maybe fourth or fifth place, but second?!! It seems like a dream. We were so excited! We were each given a certificate for a Gold Pass, and the actual voucher would be emailed to us later. So we snapped this awesome picture.
From left to right: Adam, Hayley, me, Cameron, and Skye(Cameron's puppy)
We talked about it the whole way home. It was such a team effort. We couldn't have done it individually, but as a team, we ROCKED it. Cameron had also bought the book on his tablet, and we read it on the drive home. No spoilers :)
M certificate is currently hanging next to my pictures of me with Chris Evans and Oliver Phelps on my wall, and I got the email a few days ago. But that wasn't all. On Sunday, Adam texted me and told me to check the Harold B. Lee library page, and lo and behold, there was this.
Adam has some good connections, and one of them is the Director of Communications for the library. Hippogriff Squad for the win. We're Harold famous! The rest of the team was tagged in the comments.
The past Wednesday and Tuesday were also Adam and Hayley's birthdays, and they write for this on-campus magazine called Leading Edge. They posted this.
Can we just all appreciate our team name?? I love the Hippogriff Squad! This is the gift that keeps on giving.
Anyway, it was a super fun time, and it's crazy to think that the two teams that almost didn't get to play won first and second place!
I love Harry Potter, and I'm grateful that years spent dreaming of Hogwarts and magic payed off. I'll be with Harry until the very end.
I'm going to Comic Con!!!
Good job Hannah sticking with it! Seriously, you never know if they're going to change up the rules for those kinds of things, but you just gotta stick to your guns and demand you get it!! Good job Hannah Banana!
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