Kyra made her way into the courtroom and took a look around. Hmm, First one here it seems. She thought to herself. "Better early than late, I always say." She muttered quietly to herself, as she took a seat and folded her hands in front of her on the table.

Reagan entered the courtroom quickly, carrying an attache in her left hand and a folder full of paperwork in her right. Seeing that she wasn't the first one to arrive, Reagan greeted the woman already present, "Good morning. How are you today? I don't know that we've ever formally met. My name is Reagan Taylor, Senior Undersecretary." Reagan extended her hand to the woman to shake.

Rico strolled into the Conference Room, unsure of this was where he was supposed to be at this exact moment. Er, Evaline had mentioned their conference was first, right?

He nodded at the woman already sitting at the table and then noticed the Senior Undersecretary there too....uh oh, am I in the right place? Rico gulped slightly but took a seat at the table nonetheless.

"Er, this is the room for the discussion about magic carpets and such, right?" He wondered out loud, trying not to sound too clueless.

Kyra stood up quickly and shook the hand that was being offered to her. "Good Morning, Ms. Taylor." she said cheerfully. "I'm Kyra Jennings, Head of Broom Regulatory Control. Its a pleasure to meet you." With that said, she took her seat again, eager to get started.

Chad strolled into the courtroom, nomming on the last of his peanuts for the day. Shucks... he huffed as he crunched on the last one and dusting the salt off his fingers. "Bonjour, Mademoiselle Taylor," he smiled. It had been a while since he had last seen her, and frankly, he missed being a statue in her office.

Evaline rushed into the courtroom where her part of the Conference was being held. She saw Reagan, Rico, Chad, who better keep his inappropriate comments to himself, and another girl from Lorraine's department.

She ran to the seat next to Reagan and breathed a bit easier as the Foriegn minister had not shown up yet. "Phew. Thought I was late," she replied with a small smile and put her folder down with all her info for this meeting with India. "we are still mising some people," she added counting the numbers.

Angelica made her way into the conference room feeling a bit out of place as she had just taken up her position as the new divison head of the Apparition Test Center a few days ago. The brown haired woman glanced around the faces seeing Ms Taylor the senior undersecretary along a few other divison and department heads who had gathered already. Seeing a woman that looked slightly familier Angelica walked over "Hello, Kyra is it, from the Broom divison on level 6?"

Reagan smiled and nodded, "Very nice to meet you, Ms. Jennings. Glad to have you with us." Reagan then took her seat near the middle of the oval table, opening her folder and laying out the two pages of notes that she had written pertaining to the issues to be discussed.

Reagan could smell the peanuts before she'd even looked up from her notes. With a grin on her face, she greeted him, "Ah, Chad! Good morning. Have you come to actually discuss our agenda? Or will you merely be serving as a human statue to spruce up the room?"

Reagan greeted the Department Head, "Good morning, Evaline. Good to see you again. The Minister's portkey is set to arrive any minute, so hopefully those who are missing will make it down here before he arrives. We really only have one major matter to discuss, so hopefully this meeting will run smoothly and efficiently."

A mosquito buzzes by Reagan's face, but before she can swat it away it disappeares.

Reagan's eyes grew a bit wider. Every bug she saw was making her paranoid. A fly landed on her finger last night and she nearly hexed her finger off! She didn't know if the bug she'd just seen was THE bug to look for, but she knew she wasn't going to take any chances. Quickly she scrawled on a piece of parchment paper before sending the memo off:

Quote:

Ms. Greenwood -

I think the Ministry Security team should invest in Muggle mosquito nets for each of the entrances to the Ministry, in addition to the Level Ten entrances. This is a top priority. Thank you.

- Reagan F. Taylor

Reagan had assumed this annoying pest of a woman wouldn't make herself present during these discussions. She detected that the woman had a flair for the dramatic and the show she clearly wanted to make of herself wouldn't be provided by these small group roundtables. But even so, they would be on the lookout, with wands (and bug nets) at the ready.

Aah, so I am in the right place, Rico thought, relieved when Evaline showed up. He smiled at his boss and then reached in his pocket for his neatly folded sheet of notes, unfolding the parchment and smoothing out the wrinkles from where it was folded. Eh, it wasn't the most organized piece of paper...and it did have a few doodlings on it...but it would work. As long as he could still read his own handwriting, all was good.

Rico looked up and folded his hands on the table, ready to start. He raised an eyebrow when the Undersecretary swatted at something he couldn't even see. Mosquitoes weren't in season here, were they?

Chad laughed gently, shaking his head a little. He had missed this woman, dearly. "Oh, Mademoiselle, you tickle my funny bone," he mused, still chuckling a little. "Besides, who says that I can not do both? You know I make any room look good," he smirked as he ran a hand quickly through his hair, "I think it is my hair. C'est bon, non?"

Evaline smiled as she finally sat down after looking to see who was here. "Alright. Thanks for warning me, a person popping out of no where would have probably scared me." she replied with a lighthearted chuckle. She was obviously very nervous.

She breathed in and out once more and nodd. Luckily they did only have one thing to discuss, but it was an important one that would have a lot of debate. "Right. Well I hope nothing does disturb the smoothness of the meeting," she added for effect.

She heard Chad's voice try to be funny. He really needed to learn.

When Angelina stepped into the courtroom, she felt relieved to see that she wasn’t late.Well she should have arrived earlier, but the room seemed to be pretty empty.. if you considerate the people that should be in there.. a relatively large group of people were missing.
The ministers were missing, and the roundtable discussions couldn’t begin without them .

Caring a small folder with some notes on her right hand, Angelina gave a polite smile at the people that were in the room while she walked towards the chair next to Reagan. “Good Morning Reagan.” She smiled to the brunette woman on her right. “I hope things run more calmly today.." she spoke, hoping there wouldn’t be more surprises.

Once Angelina placed her folder on the table and sat down, she could finally observe more carefully who the other people that were inside the room were. She saw Evaline next to Reagan and smiled at the woman, the French liaison she had met at Evaline’s office was there as well, two other women she didn’t know and on the other side of the table she spotted Rico.
Not really knowing if he had seen her or not, since he seemed petty em.. determinate, yes that seemed to be the right word, to unfold some piece of parchment and make it look new, she simply gave him an honest smile and a slight small wave.

Twiddling his thumbs a bit, Rico looked up once he was all organized. Right away, he recognized the annoying French accent of that liaison he could never remember the name of. Chad, wasn't it?

But boy did his peanuts look good....Rico could really go for something nutty right now. Or coffee...where had he placed that cup from Pablo? Probably left it at the conference...shoot...

Speaking of coffee, there was his favorite coffee-lover, Angelina. And she's smiling at me! Rico's face lit up like a little Christmas tree and he waved back to her, wondering what she was doing there. Not that he minded, of course - it was always nice to see a friendly face. And she had a very important job, he remembered that.

Now only if their little conference would start...

Katherine slid into the room silently and sat next to Rico. All eyes that fell on her were given an apologetic smile. Major family matters had kept her from the office for a while, but she was back and running.

Glancing around to see any sign of the meeting started she crossed one leg on top of the other and waited patiently.

Bhanuprasad Balasubramanium entered the conference room, looking around at the others who had already arrived.

"I am most sorry for my late arrival." He said, bowing politely to the group at large before moving to take a seat. The slight man found the chairs to be a little deeper and lower than was comfortable for him, so he performed a quick levitating charm on himself and hovered, fakir-style, a few inches above his chair in his seat. Ah, so much better. He folded his legs under him in the lotus position and waited for the conference to begin.

Bao Li strolled into the room without his Ministry-appointed security and took an open seat near Reagan (he liked sitting by the pretty women). "So no one answer my question again - who that ugly woman sitting on British Minister lap?" the Chinese Minister inquired and looked directly at Reagan. "You in charge. I can tell. Smart and beautiful woman."

He obviously didn't care that everyone was nervously sitting around the table and waiting for the discussion to begin.

Rico slowly tore his eyes away from Angelina and turned to smile at Katie. At least some members of his department were turning up...that was a good thing. And better late than never.

He turned his attention to the door when the Indian minister arrived, followed shortly by the Chinese minister. Rico nodded to both as they took their seats; he really wanted to say some sort of greeting but there were more important people there to do that. And he had a feeling that neither minister would agree with him on the magic carpet issue anyways.

Instead, Rico settled down in his chair a little and crossed his arms while he waited for it to start. He couldn't help but start to chuckle at Bao Li's description of Clara Belle though....oh boy he was spot on. Rico had to cough into his fist to cover his laughter at the minister's words.

Katie kept her jaw from dropping, and managed to keep her face expressionless. A smile cracked when Rico covered his laugh. Nudging him lightly with her elbow under the table, she let a smile show. That wasn't exactly appropriate to laugh at, but it didn't matter really.

"Please excuse me, but are we quite ready to begin?" Bhanuprasad Balasubramanium asked the room. He recognized the importance of the conference, but he also had personal obligations to which he must attend... all the wasted time was making him edgy.

Reagan stood and smiled when the Minister of India entered the room, "Welcome, welcome. Thank you for joining us. We're just about ready to get started." Reagan wondered for how long the man would be polite. These discussions often resulted in people getting excited and sometimes angry due to the passion for their positions.

Reagan pursed her lips together so as not to let a giggle escape. When she had composed herself enough, she greeted Bao Li, "Hello Minister Li. To answer your question, the woman who was sitting with the Minister," unfortunately on his lap and making our Ministry look foolish, "was his wife, Mrs. Clara Belle-Cooper. She's the co-editor in chief of the Daily Prophet, our news publication here in Britain." Reagan paused before clarifying the Minister's confusion about her, "And I am Reagan Taylor, Minister Cooper's Senior Undersecretary. Thank you for your kind words and thank you for joining us."

Reagan nodded and explained to Minister Balasubramanium, "Yes, we are ready to begin. Thank you for waiting so patiently, sir."

Reagan sat herself up straighter in her chair and glanced at her notes before beginning, "The matter that this group has assembled to discuss pertains to India's request that flying carpets be made a legal form of transportation here in Britain and in other countries in which it is currently banned. Minister Balasubramanium, would you like to make your statement for this change to the group?"

Evaline stood up as the Minister from India walked into the conference room. She bowed her head for respect and smiled at him. "Very nice to meet you. Please sit," she replied after Reagan had introduced herself.

She sat back down and opened up her folder as Reagan talked to the Minister first and asked him to purpose his arguement. She listened intently.

"And very good to meet you as well," Minister Balasubramanium said, nodding politely. "Yes, I am most pleased that you have all chosen to be joining me for this most important discussion. "

Rather than standing, he simply levitated higher in his position, not bothering to unfold his legs from the lotus position as he addressed the group.

"Our position is quite simple: there is no reason why flying carpet devices should not being authorized for magical transportation in your countries. They are very much known to be safe and our carpet craftsmen are well regulated to ensure highest quality carpets of only the finest fibers, highest threadcount and guaranteed magical safety measures in place including braking charms and even hover charms. Historical incidents that resulted in bans, including a lack of fireproofing charms, have been resolved in our current manufacture and current models are being very good for carrying of multiple persons or even wizards with cargo. Further, problems in steering and control resulting from carpets exhibiting free will as magical objects has, for most models, been eradicated with proper usage and care. We feel that this trade relationship being reopened is most beneficial of our communities mutually. Thank you."
[/B]
He lowered himself back down until he was just over his seat, folding his hands neatly in his lap. Truth was, his country needed trade relations reopened and badly; times were hard in India and harder still in the wizarding subculture. His people were suffering and the economic boost of carpet exports was vital to their survival. Most of the problems with carpets showing free will and revolting against owners had been resolved, as he had mentioned... the only problems existed when people abused their carpets, beating them to clean them instead of using gentle methods, not repairing tears and fraying, and so on. There was also the problem of woolen carpet shrinkage, which hadn't been totally resolved, but he wasn't going to delve into that unless confronted. They needed this trade agreement.