Panda Express

It was off to Hogwarts again. Harry had enjoyed himself immensely this summer, as he was able to avoid staying with the Dursleys at all. How this happened, he would never know, but he spent his time at the Burrow with his favorite family in the entire world, the Weasleys, and nothing could get any better than that.

He was getting used to the Weasleys' chaotic ways when it came to going off to King's Cross Station in London. He just went through the motions of grabbing trunk, Hedwig's cage and other belongings, and followed behind Mr. Weasley's lead. Little did he know what would happen this time around as he journeyed towards Platform 9 ¾.

The station was particularly crowded that morning. In the hustle and bustle of everyone milling around the trains, Harry was separated from the nine Weasleys that were heading towards platforms nine and ten. Harry became very dizzy, for many people bumped into him, changing his direction, and nearly knocked him down. Hedwig let out a loud squawk in protest to all the excess movement. He was lucky that the Muggles that surrounded him were too busy to spin around and stare at his snowy owl rolling around in her cage.

Harry brushed himself off and began walking towards what he thought was platform nine and ten. He walked through the barrier, but when he reached the other side, he saw a sign that said Platform 5½.

"Oh no! I'm at the wrong platform!" Harry thought to himself as he realized he was not standing before the Hogwarts Express. Instead a large, black train with a panda painted on the side was blowing its horns. He turned to exit the barrier, but it was too late. The train slowly began to move. He had no choice but to jump on board, or otherwise he would have been stranded, and he would have felt very lonely if he had chosen the latter.

He jumped on board to find an odd sight. Many Asian witches and wizards were wandering around the train. They all stopped in their tracks and pointed at Harry when they saw him. Since when was there a section of Britain that was solely for the Chinese Wizarding World?

Harry was snapped back into reality after contemplating this scenario to realize how stupid he must have looked, as he was the only white boy on the train and didn't understand anything that was going on. They screamed and pointed until one boy approached Harry. He spoke in very broken English, but it was enough for Harry to understand.

"Who is you?" the boy asked.

"H-Harry Potter," Harry stuttered. There were many murmurs amongst the students as they noticed the lightning shaped scar on Harry's forehead.

"Us know you," the boy said. "Me Chow Mein. You is on Panda Express outside Beijing."

"I'm in China?" Harry thought to himself, very puzzled. "How do I get back to Hogwarts?" he asked.

"When we go to school, we help you," Chow said. "For now, eat food." Chow held a bowl of Chow Mein in front of Harry.

Harry looked out of the compartment. He saw a big panda walking down with a trolley handing out food.

"Sit with we," Chow said, pointing at an open seat in their compartment. One tall boy gave Harry and Chow a dirty look, obviously in protest. He was not fond of Harry, and he did not want him, the stranger, sitting with them for lunch. The two boys began to argue. Their voices became louder and shrill, and they proceeded to attack each other with chopsticks. Kung fu Chop Suey!

Luckily no one was hurt; they only looked sour at one another. One of the boys had a black eye. Chow and the other boy did not speak a word to each other for the rest of the train ride.

Harry looked out the window at the beautiful view and conversed with the Chinese students who, after being translated to by Chow, were awestruck by what life at Hogwarts sounded like. At one point Harry stopped mid-sentence to watch a panda with a gun being chased by an angry mob of Chinese men.

Harry took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. "Did you see that?" Harry asked Chow and his friends. Chow just shrugged his shoulders and smiled. Harry had trouble looking at the kids in the eye, as he was unsure if their eyes were opened or closed. So was the oddity of the facial structure of Asian people- the slit eyes.

The train stopped a few hours later, and Harry was surprised to see that their methods of travel and cultural system of the Wizarding World was very similar to those ways in Britain. Harry felt rather stupid to have thought otherwise; they were all the same species, Homo sapiens, why should they be any different?

"Harry Potter," the headmaster said, grinning brightly. He was very old, but not nearly as aged as Dumbledore. "You wonder how you got here. I have answer," the man said. "I spoken with Dumbledore. He tell me that you went on wrong platform. We have platform for commuters in Britain. Everything okay now, we will send you home, after our feast."

"Thank you," Harry said.

Harry had a great time during the feast, although he didn't understand a word that anyone said. He had an embarrassing moment when the headmaster could not contain himself and announced to everyone that he was sitting at the table with many students. Many hushed voices had been buzzing beforehand, but the school went into an uproar of cheers when it had been made a public fact that this celebrity was in their presence. Harry could feel his ears grow hot.

Harry's interesting experiences did not end at that feast. Afterwards, the school had a small show of fireworks and dancing Chinese dragons in the sky. At the end of the performance, the headmaster called Harry forward, and helped hoist him up onto a dragon.

Harry looked a bit shocked at the large, feisty being that he was sitting upon the back of. He was no stranger to fascinating and odd creatures, but he had never come across one as exotic as this dragon.

"This dragon take you to Hogwarts. Everything be okay, he know where he going. Us wish good fortune to you, Harry Potter," the headmaster said. As Harry flew off into the sky on the large Chinese dragon, fortune cookies rained down. Harry managed to grab one after a few minutes (what a great Seeker -cough, sputter, sputter, cough, cough-) and he cracked it open and read: "Panda: Eats Shoots and Leaves."