Monday, June 26, 2006

If only we could apparate.......

Apparate: A spell used by witches and wizards to travel from one place to another instantaneously. This is the term used when the witch or wizard appears. -- Courtesy, Harry Potter glossary

Saturday morning... post brunch... sticky summer... 20min walk to the bus stop... You know how it is... You just wish you could be transported to the spot of desire in the blink of an eye. Thats when I thought of apparation. How it would be if we could apparate from one place to the other. Instantly. My roomie and I were walking to the bus stop and she being almost as Harry Potter frenzied as I, I mentioned this to her. And within seconds.....

These were some of the initial consequences I could think of...
1) Ofcourse all sorts of transportation would be decommisioned - Bus/train/road/air travel wasnt ever required once you could just wish to be someplace and find yourself in it!
2) The economy of the world would crash - Think of it.. It would be enough for any one family to have a single house in one place. Example - If you had a house in India... why would you pay rent here in the US? You could simply apparate from the university to your very own home for tea/a nap/dinner/TV and what not? This is just one of the simple consequences. Think of everything you do/buy on a daily basis and you'll realize the magnitude of things that will get affected.
3) Accidents!! - There would millions of apparation accidents that have to occur with people vanishing all over the place. If the concentration levels aren't so great, it would result in splinching! (Splinching: Injury caused by careless apparation where the wizard/witch leaves behind body parts and are not transported in whole to the destination of choice) With this, we can be rest-assured to find eyes/ears and what not in all sorts of places!
4) Ministry of Magic - It would be ludicrous to suggest that one could apparate without a governing body. Ofcourse a ministry would evolve to help set things right, if not to regulate things from going wrong!

Ok ok... I am sure most of this just flew right over some people's heads.. But those were just the practical consequences I thought of.. Imaginatively there could be a lot lot more! It then occurred to me that with the possibility of apparation, it wasn't right to want to apparate from anywhere-everywhere! So, I thought up some basic guidelines that apparation would have to comply with...
1) Age restriction - Apparation strictly allowed only at the age of 16 - we don't need kids splinching all over the place!
2) Minimum and Maximum distances - Ofcourse this is essential. Think about it... If there were no restrictions, given the lazy bums that people are, they would apparate from the bottom of the stairs to the top! There has to be a minimum of 250 miles distance (~4hr driving distance) and a maximum of say, 3000 miles (I'm guessing india will be in this range.. hehe) from place to place. For everything else, use the fully developed transportation system! Lets not crash the economy more than we should!!
3) Apparation contracts - It would be illogical to suggest that once you reach one place, Rule 2 still applies and you could simply add on the distances by multiple appearances. Thats not only unfair, but stupid as well. Like we have wireless provider contracts (T-Mobile, Verizon, blah blah), there should be apparation contractors with different schemes. Ideally, a person should sign a year's contract for a stupendous amount of money (which would include a training in apparation, and a choice of 5 destinations they would want to apparate from 1 central location they choose)
Example: For me, Central Location(current): Cincinnati, OH
Five Destinations: (1) Chennai, India (Duh!)
(2) New York, NY
(3) Paris, France
(4) Egypt
(5) Australia
Everything else, I can pay n travel!
3) Contract renewal - Every contract needs to be renewed... once again at a stupendous fee.. but you get to choose a different central location and a 5 different destinations (if you want to!)

I could go on and this really set my imagination on fire! So I request whoever reads this to come up with their central location and their 5 destinations... will make interesting revelations about yourself, if I daresay!

Back-to-imagination-mode..
Jaya

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

He he...

Yea...cud save us lot of pollution due to all sorts of mobiles...

But..u know what Jaya, crowded cities like NYC, Chennai, B'lore shud be given exceptions over that Max and min distance condition.

Mm..my 5 destinations frm Cinci wud be...not necessarily in that order:

1. My dentist in India... he he he
2. West Coast
3. African Safari
4. Rome
5. Singapore

Anonymous said...

Hey...an important question....can we apparate just anywhere... I mean....it would be not so good to apparate in to forbidden places would it ;)
Hope you got my point!!!

Anonymous said...

Dilip, U can apparate to a place...Like yr house in Delhi.. probably outside your living room door... Get it? No bathrooms etc ;)

Anonymous said...

AWESOME IMAGINATION!!!!bravo!!

Anonymous said...

what if u want to apparate to moon ...is it possible?

Anonymous said...

ahh..then i wudnt have to cook at all.
just drop in home for amma made curd rice..

Anonymous said...

Hey Anonymous,

Moon off-bounds... gravitational issue. :)

Rads - Definitely amma samayal dhaan... make the imagination work for u! ;)

Anonymous said...

Well ya, ur 5 destinations are quite revealing i shud say....paris, france ha....hmmmmm...well i didnot get y u have NY. can tell me later though.

Anonymous said...

3000 miles will get you from Boston to San Jose.

India needs to be in 10000 mile zone.

What will happen to Passport, Visa regulations.

To think about it there will be No terrorists. WoW No BUSH.

Shall we take one time vacation in Venus. You gals can choose Mars.

How about honks and somari ootle solitu vanthutya in apparation world ..

Ooooops my imagination is going wacky ...

Anonymous said...

Sachin- U know NYC is one of my favs thats why... And Paris, France - why not???

Vish - No passport checks and no terrorism in the apparation world. And no BUSH at all.. Well, when u r travelling at the speed of light (maybe more), ofcourse there'll be all the 'ootla solitu vandhutiya' n all.. But that'll be fun and maybe I'll write a blog 'As I apparate' to bring in focus all that... Keep the imagination flowing... :)

Anonymous said...

the answer isnt so convincing but thanks for giving one

Anonymous said...

Bad boy Anonymous :(

Anonymous said...

Age restriction is problematic clause. What is kid says he wants to see pappas office???/ Can pappas apparate the whole family???

I see Australia on ur list!!!! so u mean to say things on ur list are not worth paying to visit???

Anonymous said...

What*if kid says....

Anonymous said...

Pramod, Papa's office must be easily commutable by papa... So Pops is gonna have to take the kid the way he goes... And kids DO splinch... So not allowed!!!

Anonymous said...

have you read The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy? Douglas Adams calls this as 'teleporting' - essentially having your atoms ripped apart in one place and put back together somewhere else. the funny thing is people who'd be teleported would feel awful after their atoms had been regrouped and there'd be protest marches everywhere against teleporting. the protesters would be singing a chorus song which one'd find to be an amazingly imaginative typical adams piece!

Anonymous said...

Umm... Lazy Cat, me not into Sci-Fi yet... Will try n read up on that though... Sounds interesting.. Thanks for dropping by and keep visiting...

Anonymous said...

well, it's more satiric in nature than sci-fi, altho' it does involve a galactic perspective of things.

and, no thanking plz, the pleasure...is mine.

Anonymous said...

you had an anonymous guy !! Now here is an anonymus Gal ...

I think its pretty kewl to apparate ( though a little late on the blog) ...

Cincinnati
to
Cal ;-)
India(anyplace..the rest i can buy domestic flights)
Spain,

I would like to though open a "apparation bus" which would cater to kids....though howmuch ever I say I donot like them much, I would still like to earn a buck or two apparating them around !!

anonymous with lots of hints !!

Anonymous said...

Well... gotcha babe ;)

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