Did you ever dream of spending some time in Hogwarts and learning how to become a proper wizard? Did you ever want to participate in competitions to bring victory to your favourite house?
We did. And that’s why we started our journey as wizards by deciding to join this Harry Potter-themed IMW in Bucharest’s mountains.
The journey started with us arriving at gate 9 ¾. We were fully packed with everything our super cheap flight tickets allowed us to bring, which definitely wasn’t a lot.. e.g. to be able to bring our magical creatures to wear for the themed night, we had to wear them at the airport. Which was actually a pretty exciting way to start this trip.
While we were preparing for our travels, some students were already working hard in Bucharest on a hands-on Machine Learning project during the week. Which was a separate workshop, happening before the weekend.
Because of time reasons, we decided to only join for the fun, relaxing and exciting weekend. And to make it even better we arrived two nights earlier to experience even more. Upon arrival, we joined the infamous international night, on which everyone brings traditional dishes & drinks from their country. There we met the lovely people from Bucharest for the first time, as well as the workshop participants.
The next day we went to check out the beautiful old town of Bucharest, while the workshop participants worked hard on finishing their projects. In the evening we met them at their farewell ceremony. There we mostly enjoyed getting to know the people with a couple of beers. 🙂
On Friday, the journey to Sinaia started. That’s the IMW location, where it’s said to be real magic in the air…
In Sinaia, we started with some games to get to know each other and afterwards, in a stony ancient-looking basement, we had the honour to be part of a very special Welcome Ceremony to Hogwarts. After mastering this, we were allowed to enjoy the rest of the night as magical creatures.
The next day we made a trip to an old traditional Romanian castle. It was very lovely with so many small thoughtful details, if you don’t believe us, check out the pictures. 😉
After returning from this trip we started with the sorting ceremony, in which the sorting hat decided upon our houses. We had many funny, competing and bonding games this afternoon. We even saved Dumbledore’s life! At least at this time of the story… Back to the competition: in the beginning, Hufflepuff was leading but after a while, we realised that it was more about the fun and bonding than the competitions…
At least up until now. After getting ready for the Harry Potter-themed night, we entered this dungeon of missions again. Our next competition was Quidditch Pong. It was quite challenging, but after a long battle, Gryffindor and Hufflepuff managed to enter the finals. The game for the finals was more about precision, calmness and acting fast. In the beginning, Gryffindor was clearly leading but unfortunately [yes this is the author’s opinion – the other two Zurich participants might disagree…. but that happens] towards the last moments of the game Hufflepuff managed to get the lead. Gryffindor tried to keep up but in the end, Hufflepuff won the house cup. As could have been expected from their house values, they decided to share their victory gifts with us. <3
After the event it was super hard to say goodbye to everyone. Yes, a weekend is a very short time, but even in that short time, you manage to meet people who you definitely want to see again!
Luckily we were smart enough to have decided to stay a night longer which made the goodbye easier. We were hosted by two lovely Bucharest members and spent the night together with the other participants who decided to stay longer.
Sadly all good things come to an end, but luckily the Autumn Congress is approaching fast. It’s the perfect place to meet everyone again!
If you feel like you want to experience something as fun and exciting as we did, feel free to contact us and become part of this amazing family of travel and adventure addicts. <3
contact@eestec.ethz.ch or just check the calendar and show up to one of our member meetings.
