"I am thinking aurora borealis, otherwise known as the northern lights as well. I hope thats what we are looking for tonight cause from pictures I have seen of it are breathtaking", Oichi responded smiling.

Well... yes, this was a good time of year to spot the Northern Lights, and that would be pretty fascinating from this latitude, but since everyone had already suggested that answer, Vivi wracked her brain for something else. What else happened around this time of year?

She propped her chin on her hands and stared a hole through the top of her desk before an idea occurred to her. "Oh, Professor... are we viewing the Lyrids meteor shower?" Well. It was that time of year, even if visibility might be generally miserable.

Well...technically speaking stargazing was simply looking at the sky and whatever sights there were to see there. But if they were going to observe something today then it meant something different, right? Or maybe Professor Burbage was just implying that they would not be requiring the use of telescopes and binoculars. Which would support the idea of viewing the Aurora Borealis since you could very well see that with the naked eye.

With no further suggestions herself, Kurumi simply nodded and turned her attention back to her parchment for note taking.

Ehh...huh?

Sierra had no idea what they might be looking at. She sort of leaned forward, though, and observed the sky for a few silent moments. Nope. The answer didn't just fall right out of the sky, although it'd be really helpful if it did.

She looked around the patch again and listened as her classmates chimed in. "Err...the Northern Lights?" she suggested, her hand raised. Sounded good to her. At least, that's what the popular opinion seemed to be. What were the Northern Lights?

When Eliza saw the notice about the night lesson, she was immediately excited for it. She loved to look at the night sky and being in the tower would make it that much cooler. Even if she didn't have many facts about constellations or the cosmos memorized, that didn't mean she couldn't just enjoy them, right?

As she sat at one of the desks provided and listened to the guesses about what they might be doing, she wished she had her camera. The Northern Lights?! I've always wanted to see those! She had seen beautiful photographs of them before, but had never actually seen them in person yet. She'd seen a meteor shower with her dad before, but the northern lights would be so different than that. She tried not to get her hopes up too high, but it was really no use now that she'd started picturing all of those misty colors in the sky. She pulled her overcoat tighter and nudged her chin and nose underneath her navy Ravenclaw scarf.

Jory was beginning to feel less sleepy now. And he should as Astronomy was one of the best and most interesting classes.

He gave some thought into his answer before raising his hand. "Maybe the Northern Lights, Professor?'' he said. It was the only thing he could think about right now.

"Whaaaat?" Daichi asked groggily as one eye opened up to look at Kurumi who had just poked him in his side. His other eye opened as well as he lifted his head off the table a bit and looked around. "Class hasn't even begun.." he whined as he rested his head back on the table. "And no, i can stay awake..." he said at her offer to poke him awake when he fell asleep. He wasn't a baby right?


As he heard the professor's voice , he lazily lifted his head again and sat up straight. He looked at Kurumi for a second and held a thumbs up to show that he was fine. Only to let another yawn escape.

At the small riddle , Daichi was just staring in front of him. Any minute now he could fall back to sleep. Fighting the urge to lay his head on the table and sleep, he tried to think of an answer. And the more he thought the more he felt his head nodding in an attempt to stay awake. He hated being a fifth year...

GROAN. It was late in the night and Kat stayed up all day doing her other homework and assignments. She did care if she got eye bags for staying up late doing al her assignments, but it was all worth it. She got house points for them and it made a big difference to her house. Catching up with those points is all Kat could do.

... Kat did not come from Scotland. She came from Canada but was raised in London. The only time she goes to Scotland was for school, to go to Hogwarts. And to think she's been in this school for three terms, she does not know what happens every April in here? Kat, you are such a loser.

But... didn't... didn't she skim through her Astronomy book this summer? Or maybe hear it from her father that there was the Northern Lights every April. In Scotland. Maybe, that was what they were going to witness tonight! "Will we witness the Polar Aurorae tonight, Professor?" Kat asked. "Polar Aurorae is another term for the Northern Lights." At least, that's what Kat heard.... or read.

Marion leaned back against her desk as the student’s started to guess on what they were doing on this very night. Some got it right on the first try which made her wonder if her clue was too simple. Other’s had interesting guesses which could lead to entirely different lessons then the one she had planned for them tonight. And then there was Mr Katharsos who was seemingly sleeping in his desk.

Marion eyed him thoughtfully for a long moment before she decided to deal with him later. Straightening up she beamed out at all her wake and alert students. "Very good daaarlings. We are actually going to see the Aurora Borealis lights before we break the class for the night if we are lucky since it’s supposed to be visible to the naked eye this time of year in Scotland and it looks like the weather is with us with a clear sky." She hadn’t seen it before herself, so it wasn’t just the student’s that was hoping to be treated to something spectacular.

Letting her eyes drift over Alexa, Genevive, Laura, Minerva and Pao she continued. "Meteor showers are even rarer then the aurora borealis lights. I’ll keep it in mind for future lesson topics as well as your interest in observing constellations and the colours of the heavens."

Now back to the lights. "Aurora Borealis is referred to as Northern lights by some since they appear in the northern hemisphere close to the North Pole. If we lived on the southern side of the planet, though we’d be calling the lights, Aurora Australis since those lights are closer to the South Pole."

"The lights are named after a roman goddess called aurora. Before I share with the class why the name is misleading can someone please share the roman myth about aurora with the rest of the class?"



Leaving her desk Marion walked over to where Daichi Katharsos was sleeping with his head resting on the desk. "Daichi?" she called. "Daichi dear wake up! Class is not the right place to be sleeping son." If the boy didn’t wake up then she'd have to resort to more direct methods.

Sarah did not know about Roman godesses - she did not believe in Myths either. The very fact that myths were mentioned set her off the track completely. Aurora was a name from a fairytale - was it a nice name? Sarah did not know. She never knew much about the mythology side of things because she did not like hearing rubbish. Yes, Sarah could be very opinionated sometimes!

Okay, hmm. So they were going to see some lights in the sky. Must be some pretty amazing lights, since the skies were usually illuminated with light anyway. Sierra eyed Daichi out of the corner of her eye. What was he sleeping for?! Her brown eyes traveled from the professor to Daichi and then back again. Daichi, don't make me go all prefect on you, she thought to herself.

She adjusted her position then raised her hand high in the air. "Aurora is the goddess of the dawn," she said. "Roman mythology says that she renews herself every morning then flies across the sky. She supposedly does this to announce the arrival of the sun." Kind of pointless, really, since everyone could just see the sun rising anyway. If they wanted to, at least. Sierra, however, chose to sleep in when she could.

Pao had to be one of the nicest, smartest, coolest kids he knew. And the big grin? Alec grinned widely at the little boy. Really, he had to find a way to hang around with the first year a lot more. Although... Alec doubted that he wanted to be hanging around with a weird third year when he could be hanging around with cooler kids his own age.

At least Alec had ice cream and sweets he could offer!

"Thanks mate!" he said, grinning and giving the little Keeper a thumbs up in return, "Yours was good too, you know!" And a meteor shower would be SO much fun to see!



Well... Northern Lights was easier to pronounce so... he could still continue to call it that, right? Right. He wasn't even going to try to pronounce the Aurora Borsomething word. Hopefully, it would be easier to spell if they were going to have to take notes and such.

...

Australis was easier to pronounce, actually. Pity.

Oh, but they were talking about the word... 'aurora'. Well, mainly the Roman Goddess. This was... interesting. Alec rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He was sure that he had heard something to do with aurora... years ago. Something... something...

"Erm... Professor?" he asked, raising his hand slowly, "I think... she was the goddess of dawn and... and..." Think, Summers, think! "She'd fly around every morning just to let everyone know that the sun in coming?" You know, a bit like a rooster.

Kurumi jabbed Daichi in the side when he started nodding off again. Sure, the fifth year could say that he would stay away...but actually doing it was an entirely different story. Attention back on Professor Burbage when she began to move things along. She had to cock her head to the side slightly at the mention of Southern....side? Side of the planet? "Hemisphere....planets don't have sides...," Kurumi whispered under her breath as she wrote down some more notes. Had to be flat to have sides, technically speaking.

Astronomy NEWT studies were clearly driving the Gryffindor insane.

Kurumi then glanced up at the woman when she asked about the Roman goddess and her hand went promptly up. "Aurora is the goddess of dawn in Roman mythology and was said to fly across the sky to announce the arrival of the sun," she began before taking a pause. The woman hadn't asked...but it seemed sort of unfair to leave the god out of the equation as well. Boreas that is, being the god of the north wind and therefore translating the name Aurora Borealis to 'northern dawn.' "She painted the sky with the colors of the sunrise...much like how the Northern Lights seem to paint the night sky like the sunrise." At least that is how it appeared to those naming the natural light display.

Look! Meteors showers! Just like Sophie had thought. She grinned at her fellow classmates that said it out loud and listened as professor Burbage said things about Aurora Boreal- wait, Aurora Australis.

Wait, huh? They were the same thing, right?

Oh, no. Borealis was the Northern one. So that was the one they'd be looking at tonight. Okay, cool! Sophie nodded her head and sat up straighter. She was getting eager to see the said thing, since she had no idea what to expect.

And she knew absolutely nothing about the roman myth the professor had mentioned, so she just kept quiet. Again.

Minerva listened, oh she was wrong..cue frown..She never liked being wrong. Shrugging, she focused on what they would be doing. Northern Lights.. That was interesting.. She knew they were real, but never saw them so they stayed in fantasy world in her mind along with the north pole. Yes like some of the Christmas movies would show those pretty lights meaning they were at the North Pole. To actually get to see them made Minerva a little excited.

Listening to the question Minerva put up her hand, "Professor she was the goddess of dawn or morning. They believed that she flew around the sky and produced each morning for people to wake to." Minerva then sat and listened to everyone else respond to the question as well, but her eyes stayed at the sky not wanting to miss the pretty colors at all.

So he hadn't guessed correctly. Rats. He threw a glance over at Kurumi, hoping that she hadn't noticed his incorrect answer, but maybe DID notice his enthusiasm for learning and spending time star gazing... Pao snapped his thoughts back to the present. Class. Listen, Mancini!

But anyways, this Bore-y-allis thing sounded cool! And he had a super cool Seeker next to him, which would make it even that much better. Meteor showers are more rare? Shoot, that means we wouldn't have a lesson on it for a looooooooong time. His lip pooched out in a pout.

He was a bit disappointed. How on earth was he supposed to take notes on this stuff? If she wasn't going to put it on a board or something, he was going to spell it COMPLETELY wrong. Pao didn't like having incorrect notes. Cue more pouting.

AND MORE pouting! He didn't know the myth about the Roman goddess Aurora! Seriously, he was a first year. He hadn't learned this yet. And it bothered him that he couldn't give the answers based on logical deductions like he could in other classes. He sighed, feeling inadequate. Hopefully the next question would be something in which they took a wild guess like the first one.



At least Alec was here. Grinning at him. Making him feel a bit better. AND a thumbs up? "Gee, thanks!" Pao's self-confidence was going up with every little gesture the awesome third year made.

Pao had no idea if the whole rooster impression story was right, but it sounded neat to him. He gave the older boy a wink. He should hang around Alec more, especially since there were hardly any first years in his House this term.

Ella was a bit cold...well more like really cold but she was kind of ignoring the fact because they were going to see the Aurora Borealis lights! How cool was that?! The third year was really excited because she'd never seen anything like that before. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce.

Aurora...hmmm. What did Ella know about the myth of Aurora? Well only the very little bit she'd learned from her Granddad when he used to tell her stories. Raising her hand, she smiled a bit thinking of the man. She really missed him. "Professor, Aurora is the goddess of the dawn and erm...well she used to ride ahead of the sun and um...sprinkle dew around the earth."

Wait, theres a Roman God named Aurora as well. Thats so cool! I have no idea about her but I can't wait to learn some. Oichi listened as her classmates answered and was astounded to think this God had a legend that Aurora got up earlier than the sun brought about sunrise and life each day. Man, thats facinating, I better write this down, it is not likely a good portion of the class is wrong. Oichi then did just that.

Oh so they would be viewing Aurora Borealis.. or at least attempting to. This revelation greatly interested the boy, having never seen it before, and he lifted his eyes to the sky at the mention of it. Ethan vaguely heard the professor mention something about the Roman goddess Aurora.. what did he know about her? He searched his mind for a moment..

Ethan had studied Roman mythology some, but was more focused on studying spellwork for his OWLs at the moment, and not much was coming to the surface. Something about goddess of the dawn.. flying across the sky ahead of the sun.. announcing the new day.. everyone had already said that. And as it was not Ethan's style to simply repeat what someone else said, he simply watched for any sign of lights in the sky.

Laura looked at the Professor and smiled. "Professor isn't Aurora the goddess of Love or something like that and she did something if I remembered correctly?"

So she was a bit disappointed that they wouldn't be seeing anything crashing to the earth but this seemed good enough; they were having story time.

Nothing like a good story to get her all settled in for bed.

She got into a more comfortable position on her chair and prepared herself for what should have been an epic story--most roman stuff was epic, right? Weren't the the ones with wars and swords and funny outfits?? Listening to her classmates filling in the missing parts of the story woke her up just a bit more. Good thing too 'cause the Professor didn't seem too happy about Daichi falling asleep.

At some point during the lovely bedtime story she felt the need to interject--she used to do that with her father all the time. "Professor...how did she managed to fly ahead of the sun? Isn't it always there?"

Someone please tell her this wasn't one of those classes where they tried to spoon feed first years a bunch of lies in the hopes of proving just how gullible they were.

Say what? The whole northern lights thing was a guess and she mainly went with it because everybody else seemed pretty confident in that answer. The whole goddess Aurora chick was another story. She really wasn't sure what she supposedly did. This whole flying around the sun or chasing it or whatever seemed like total nonsense. It sounded like some muggle story to her.

Still she wanted to be involved so instead of giving an answer she listened intently to everything that everyone had said and made notes on her parchement.

It hadn't been the professor's voice that had brought him back to reality, but Kurumi's jab to his side. He said up straight with a startled expression on his face as he rubbed his side. Groaning, he turned to Kurumi to ask what was up with that when he noticed that someone was standing at his table. Looking up, he saw the Professor and only caught the words sleeping and son.....

wait.... "I'm your son , huh?" the look on his face was completely dumbfounded as he rubbed his eyes again before he looked around and realized his was in class and caught the attention of Sierra who was giving him a look he could not read. Mweh maybe she was tired as well and was just looking funny right now?

Despite having been half asleep, the Slytherin's brains seemed to have picked up some information unconciously. Such as Northern...Northern thingies and Aurora and he knew only one Aurora... "She's a sixth year Slytherin" he said as another yawn escaped and he stretched his arms in the air. Fully convinced that this was the answer.

Eliza squealed inside when it was confirmed. Yes!!! Northern Lights! She started looking at the sky all around her, hoping to see some sort of sign that they might show up soon. Aurora and Roman myths? Nope, can't say I know any. She really needed to brush up on her mythology apparently. She always liked the little stories and explanations by ancient civilizations, trying to say how things worked by giving names to everything. She wrote down on her parchment about Aurora being the goddess of the dawn, flying through the sky like a welcoming committee for the sun. Tough break she got, having to wake up so early every day. Of course she knew they were only myths and that there really wasn't a woman who did this, but she still got a kick out of her own joke.

If it hadn't been for Daichi asking Professor Burbage if he was her son, Beezus wouldn't have stopped her eyes from widening some more. They were what?! They were going to watch the Aurora Borealis?! ASDFGHJKL!! This was officially the best lesson they had for this subject! But of course, once they tackle about meteor showers, just as the Professor had said that she'd put into consideration, it would be the bestest. Yet for now....the Southern Lights had already caught most of her peer's attention. It was pretty evident from her classmate's faces!

She did giggle loudly at the Duck Boy and stopped only upon hearing the question

Aurooooooora? Beezus knew who the goddess was and how the myth about her went. But given that many had already presented the answer to the Professor's question, the Ravenclaw merely stayed listening and jotting down a few notes, her head filled with vast, spiraling excitement, enthusiasm and vibrance with the phenomenon they'd be witnessing soon. And yes, she was practically flailing inwardly.