So, today was the day. Since I, as a muggle-born, was taken at the age of 9 to live with my aunt who's a witch living in the middle of Manchester, I had heard of the wonders of platform 9 and 3/4, the Hogwarts express, and the enormous castle ahead. Because my aunt lives in the middle of a muggle apartment complex having a muggle landlord, the only magic I've really witnessed is a few charms being done for a clean-up (she's afraid to be seen). However, today she finally introduced me to flu powder. Being swayed into the warm, comforting green breeze was both dazzling and terrifying, albeit amazing! Entering Diagon Alley was a real shocker; never have I seen so much magic. What stunned me the most were the creatures; everything from goblins to nifflers were swarming the shops, and I even saw two bowtruckles. My aunt also taught me the difference between a hedgehog and a knarl (hint: knarls are cuter, but way more vicious).

After getting my essentials, including my wand (which was a really exciting, but surprisingly a very normal experience; nothing too extraordinary happened), I finally reached King's Cross, where it was hard to ignore the funny looks on the muggles passing by my trunk (I guess my aunt dressing as muggle-like as possible toned it down a bit). My aunt had repeated to me the process of how to enter the platform about a dozen times for a week, but standing in front of the brick wall, about to run into it, made me feel looney. And heck, it was a scary run, because when I closed my eyes about a second and a half in front of the wall, my left leg twisted and I stumbled unintentionally into the wall. When I landed, I had fortunately entered the platform, although it took more than a minute to stop my heart from throbbing miles an hour. I've never been steady on my feet but never did I think that I would ever stumble through a wall. This made for a pretty clumsy start, but I'm okay with that.