BIRTHNAME : matangi mahtam
NICKNAMES :

 TANGI  a shortened version of her given name. it’s also a play of words about how sharp and intense her personality is.

DATE OF BIRTH (AGE) : february 17, 1982 (15)
BIRTHPLACE : newham, london, england
HOMETOWN : newham, london, england

ETHNICITY : british punjabi
BLOOD STATUS : muggleborn

FACE CLAIM : mandeep dhillon
HEIGHT & WEIGHT : 157cm & 56kg

APPEARANCE : 

— tangi's looks are best described as striking, even, severe with features as sharp as her tongue. depending on the situation, her dark eyes are either intense with emotion or impossibly hard to read. what remains constant are the noticeable dark circles under her eyes due to the lack of sleep. she’d be considered more intimidating if it weren't for her short height. being born premature and growing up with limited food made her a small kid, though her years at hogwarts helped put more meat on her bones. physically, she’s very fit and leanly muscled thanks to regular exercise and krav maga training. her long hair is both the pride and the bane of her existence, naturally black in color and roughly thick in texture.

STYLE :

 

 

— self-described as "a diy mix of uk garage, hip hop, and rave with an immigrant twist", her style is influenced by urban muggle street fashion and her cultural heritage. most of her clothes originally started out as tattered hand-me-downs from relatives and thrift stores, but with a practiced sewing hand and loads of creativity, she cuts, alters, and stitches them up together into unique creations. she'll cover up the holes of old bomber jackets with patches of traditional punjabi fabric, and spray paint graffiti quotes onto faded hoodies. she shamelessly flaunts the cheap counterfeit designer duds from the flea market. she favors bright yet rich colors such as green or yellow, and tends to mix and clash busy patterns. even hogwarts’ strict uniform policy doesn’t stop her from personalizing her robes with all sorts of handmade pins. she’s also a fan of big statement jewelry like oversized wood bangles, long chandelier earrings, and her precious serpent-shaped ring.

PERSONALITY :

COBRA MOUTH

enraged, caustic, cunning, decisive

sanctimonious, proud, revolutionary, vigilant

expressive, loyal, persevering, haunted

RABBIT HEART

matangi is a survivor. in the short 17 years of her life, she has beaten the odds as an ill premature baby, has lived through the peak of london’s skinhead terror, and now lives as a fugitive on the run from the snatchers. time and time again, the world has beaten her up and down for things completely out of her control such as her ethnicity and her blood status. despite this, she’s determined to come out of it all alive.

and angry. with a massive chip on her shoulder, she possesses a hair-trigger temper, always armed and ready with a venom-laced sarcastic remark and her middle finger. she forms grudges easily, rarely lets them go, and always makes sure to get even. it’s no secret that she’s pissed off at the world. the real anger lies in how she feels about how she’s been unjustly wronged, how her loved ones have been hurt, how others like her have suffered, and how the world just let it happen. it’s a seething rage that boils her blood and keeps her up at night, thinking that anger isn’t enough. that it’s time for retribution—it’s time for change.

some call her extreme, radical, or plain crazy; she thinks of herself as revolutionary. the world is broken and there are people who want to keep it that way. she wants to break the status quo and change the world into something better. it’s a lofty goal, but she has the ambition to back it up. once she sets her mind on something, she does everything in her power to make it happen. her nurse mother and her teacher father both drilled into her the values of effort and education. as a result, she’s hard-working, unafraid of shedding a little blood and sweat to get the job done. she’ll take the time to read as many books as she can on a subject in order to expand her knowledge. at the same time, if her cunning can get the job done faster, she’ll cut a few corners. the less time she has to spend making sure that smaller tasks and research get done, the more time she can spend planning.

she’s constantly making plans, back-up plans if the original doesn’t pan out, and plan c’s if the back-ups fall through. she’s always brainstorming new ways of doing things that will ensure success. she strives to be prepared for anything and everything—the worst situation, the best-case scenario, an average outcome, whatever. she loathes having no control in any situation and over her life in general, willing to bend and manipulate the circumstances to be on her terms. she hates being unprepared and needing to improvise because that leaves a chance for failure and failing is never an option because the consequence is always some kind of loss. in her experience, it’s usually the loss of life—her life, potentially. she can’t let that happen. she needs to survive.

to survive, she learned how to keep an open mind and adapt. not one situation will be the same as another; thus, she cannot act in the same stubborn way each time. as proud she is of her uniqueness, she can fit in with the crowd if she needs to. this doesn’t stop her from often being considered too intense or just plain weird by other people. as a misfit, she tends to gravitate towards her fellow misfits, outcasts, and underprivileged people. she does so because she feels for them.

though it may appear that she has a bleeding heart for the downtrodden, it shouldn’t be mistaken for genuine compassion. it’s a volatile mix of empathy, resentment, and self-righteousness that drives her. because she suffered under cruel hands approved by society, she views helping people suffering like her as a big -you to the world. it makes her feel morally superior to people who actively participated in oppressing others and those who turned a blind eye to it. because of this, she has developed a “me and my own vs. the world” mentality. her kindness only extends to people she shares common ground with, such as other women, people of color, the working class/poor, and muggleborns. she doesn't spare much thought or sympathy for people unlike her (rich, white, male, purebloods aka those with societal privilege) or for those who go against her beliefs and ideas, often lashing out at them. sometimes they deserve it, but sometimes she does it out of spite. in her mind, she's justified to be an to entitled s. eye for an eye, she'll claim.

still, her main focus remains to herself and those in her inner circle. she trusts very few people with her deepest thoughts and secrets. these people are the ones who managed to worm past all her defenses and planted permanently themselves within her heart. she’s extremely loyal and protective of these few, to the point that it’s downright overbearing. at the slightest hint of danger, she’ll take her loved ones out of the situation completely, regardless of what they want. she’ll keep information from them, outright lie to them, push them away altogether, hurt others, or even sacrifice her own life, the very thing she’s fought so hard to keep, if it meant that they would be safe and happy.

lastly, she’s expressive and outspoken. she can put on a mask of cool detachment and bite her tongue when the need arises. however, she chooses to wear her emotions on her face and say what's on her mind as a way to stay true to herself. she also finds keeping it real rather useful because it gets people to trust her more easily and willingly do what she says. the only emotions and thoughts she truly represses are those of fear, doubt, and helplessness because those leave her the most vulnerable to hurt, manipulation, and despair. with every action she takes, there’s a voice inside her head telling her how she’s wrong and how she’s going to fail. she buries those feelings of weakness and insecurity, hides her trauma, and fakes it until she makes it instead. that’s how she survived this long.

BACKGROUND :

DEFIANT BEGINNINGS

in many ways, matangi mahtam’s life has been defined by defiance. her parents, hasan and achala, were star-crossed lovers of sorts, meeting at university, bonding over a shared punjabi heritage, and eventually falling in love. soon, achala became pregnant. being head over heels in love, the couple decided to keep the child and eloped that very week. neither of their families were happy with the match, citing religious differences, the tense history between their home countries and the unplanned pregnancy as the main objections. promptly disowned yet unfazed by the rejection, the two worked hard to build a life for themselves and their unborn child, taking any odd jobs they could get to make end’s meet. times were hard, but they were never happier.

on february, 17 1982, matangi defied expectations by being born two months earlier than what doctors predicted. alarmingly small and weak, she almost didn’t make it out of the hospital. yet being a born fighter, she recovered with minimal complications, growing up to become an inquisitive and spirited child.

for matangi, growing up in the uk during the 1980s as a south asian girl was no walk in the park. with anti-immigrant sentiments and attacks against ethnic minorities on the rise as the police turned a blind eye, race relations in london were as turbulent as ever. stories of people being randomly assaulted by skinhead gangs because they were black or asian were commonplace. during primary school, she got bullied with her tormentors thinking she’d be an easy target since they thought all asians were weak and passive. it didn’t take her long to prove them wrong as she started to fight back and at times, start the fights. she always claimed that she was standing up for other kids being bullied, but her reasoning wasn’t enough to keep her from getting in trouble.

on top of matangi’s problems at school, it became clear that she was not a “normal” child. at 8 years old, she showed signs of magic. mysterious incidents of cups breaking, clothes shrinking, and furniture floating occured around the mahtam’s home constantly. she would always place the blame on the poltergeists that were haunting their tiny flat. deep down, she knew it was her, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that revealing the truth behind these incidents would lead to more trouble than her obviously lying. so she kept it a secret.

at first, hasan and achala didn’t know how to deal with their daughter’s acting up. eventually they discovered that art of any form could soothe the savage beast within her. they would paint with her, sing songs to her, and read endless amounts of fantasy books with her. despite all the turbulent confusion around her, matangi grew up loved.

during the summer of 1993, matangi received the news that would change her life forever when a strange adult in strange clothes knocked on the mahtam’s door, called her a witch, and handed her an acceptance letter to hogwarts, school of witchcraft and wizardry. thinking it was some elaborate prank. her parents were about to call the police when matangi confessed that all the strange “ghosts” incidents were actually her doing. she saw hogwarts as her chance to finally get an explanation for her unusual abilities, begging her parents for permission to attend. after being promised that hogwarts would help matangi control her powers and provide funds to cover her entire schooling did hasan and anchala finally relent.

HOGWARTS, 1ST YEAR

the eventful trip to diagon alley gave matangi her first taste of the wizarding world and left her hungry for more. when dementors hitched a ride on hogwarts express, some of her enthusiasm about hogwarts was literally out of her. when the headmaster announced that these terrifying creatures were going to be there year-round because a convicted murderer was on the loose, she wondered if she had made a huge mistake.

adjusting to life at hogwarts proved to be more difficult than she expected. everything about the magical world mystified her. even after months of pre-reading the required textbooks to catch up, she still couldn’t wrap her head around certain concepts such as house rivalries and blood purity. during the start-of-term feast, she mistakenly blew up at an annoying 1st year who incessantly bugged her about her family and blood status. she practically screamed at him (and to the entire school) that she was muggleborn. and then she was sorted into slytherin.

the consequences for her outburst were immediate--right after the feast, a few purist slytherins gave her an unsanctioned lesson on the meaning of “mudblood”. the bullying continued on for weeks, escalating until she got back at her tormentors with a prank nasty enough to let everyone know that she was not a mudblood to be trifled with. while that helped scare off the bullies, it did nothing help her popularity. as a result, she made more casual acquaintances than friends that year, usually with muggleborns in ravenclaw and hufflepuff. she avoided other slytherins for obvious reasons, and disliked most gryffindors for ironically being pompous and judgmental as their so-called rivals were. her only real friend was hazel onayemi, a muggleborn hufflepuff who shared her love of art and music. classes made everything worth it. after years of hiding, it felt amazing to use magic every day without shame or fear. her first year ended on a relatively good note with her realizing that despite all the drawbacks, she belonged here at hogwarts.

HOGWARTS, 2ND YEAR

no longer feeling like out of place, during her second year, she walked through the halls with a confident swagger and a determined gleam in her eye. recalling her troubles with quills last year, she brought with her some muggle pens, which she disguised as quills. instead of constantly re-dipping quill nibs, she could take notes and finish assignments in record time. after giving a pen-quill to hazel, other students took notice. so she began selling them, unashamedly charging halfbloods and purebloods for them.

another highlight of the year was the triwizard tournament. hazel roped her into supporting both harry potter and cedric diggory as the two hogwarts champions, becoming even closer friends with her as the year went on. but as time proved to her again and again, nothing good ever lasts. the image of cedric dead on the ground was something she would never forget. she cried when dumbledore announced that cedric had been murdered by voldemort. she cried because a boy was killed. she cried because this meant that she and other muggleborns could be killed as well.

HOGWARTS, 3RD YEAR

matangi returned to hogwarts with a foreboding feeling that this was going to be a horrible year. the sorting hat’s ominous warning of deadly foes coming to their school only cemented her fears. judging by how the new DADA professor took the “ministry-approved” theoretical approach, she feared that no one would be prepared for that day.

despite all her instincts screaming at her to leave, she stayed at school for the sake of her education. there was also the fact that her patients needed help paying the bills and she had the best prospects of making money here. seeing how popular her modified muggle pen-quills were, she sold more muggle items like school supplies, junk food, casual clothing, popular toys, magazines and more. her smuggled muggle goods business was going strong until umbridge found out. she never did find out who snitched on her, but she did learn how painful detention with the devil in pink could be.

as the year became progressively worse with umbridge and her inquisitorial squad ruling the school, a desperate sense of restlessness and helplessness grew in her. though little things, like hanging out with hazel or reveling in umbridge’s suffering from the weasley twins’ rebellious pranks kept her grounded, it was the news of dumbledore’s army that left her feeling vindicated. by the end of the year, she believed deep down that harry potter was right about voldemort returning and began preparing for the worst. when she got back to london for the summer, the first thing she did was sign up for krav maga classes to learn how to defend herself without magic, just in case.

HOGWARTS, 4TH YEAR

matangi started this year by reopening her muggle items shop but more caution than before, insisting on screening new clients to avoid snitches and only during hogsmeade weekends. meanwhile, she began seeking out other muggleborn students, tutoring those younger than her and doing favors for those her own age or older. she talked to them, listening to their stories, worries, and complaints about anything and everything. she asked them what they plan to do about voldemort’s return. 

her reasons for doing this were simple: muggleborns needed to stick together. though voldemort and his death eaters were targeting wizards of all blood statuses, she knew that muggleborns and their families were going to face the worst of his terror. the parallels to what was happening in the magical community to what had transpired in london were too obvious for her to ignore. it was only a matter of time when things would erupt into an all out war. due to her being a slytherin with an infamous temper, most students were wary of her. still she managed to gain the trust of a select few, creating a small but tight-knit network of muggleborn students.

the day of dumbledore’s death was the day that all her fears were confirmed. she mourned for the headmaster, having always respected him. what really shook her to the core was that one of the greatest wizards in existence was now dead. she wanted to believe in harry potter, the boy who lived and the chosen one. but she couldn’t shake off the doubt of how one boy, barely older than herself, could possibly defeat a near god like voldemort.

HOGWARTS, 5TH YEAR

during the summer of 1997, matangi’s world completely fell apart with one bad thing coming after another. first, achala injured her back, losing her job at the hospital. then, underfunding caused hasan to be laid off from his school. tangi became the family’s sole breadwinner, forcing her to take as many odd jobs as possible and even dip into her savings to pay the bills. though her school supplies were always taken care of, the last thing on her mind was buying new spell books or cloaks. she was more worried about her parents getting evicted from their flat, even considering taking a gap year so she could work instead.

then came the news that all muggleborns were required to register their family history with the ministry and that for the first time, attendance at hogwarts was mandatory.

tangi may have stopped going to muggle school at 10, but she still knew enough about muggle history that compulsory attendance and registration meant something sinister was going on. the moment she stepped off the hogwarts express onto hogsmeade station, greeted by the sigh of ministry shill everyone, she knew this was going to be the worst year ever.

TRIVIA :

— COMMUNITY  tangi's rag-tag group of muggleborns both an information network and social club of sorts for herself, hazel and the select few that she's deemed trustworthy. they exchange news and knowledge, whether it be magical or muggle, in order to each other informed and prepared for the worst. when they hang out together, it's time spent practicing spells, gushing over muggle books/comics/music or complaining about dumb parents or purebloods. ironically enough, she left out hermione granger, arguably the most famous muggleborn of hogwarts, and anyone else associated with her. while she admires the older girl, she also resents her. call her petty but she can't stop being mad about how other students, especially hermione as a fellow muggleborn, knew about voldemort coming back thus were gaining life-saving knowledge and skills, but didn't think to share it with other students (like herself) whose lives were also in danger. in short, she's salty.

— ART  doesn’t matter if it’s a drawing, a song, or a poem—she loves all forms of art. she enjoys painting graffiti-style art and designing her own clothes. she’s even dabbled in creating music, taking inspiration from wizard and muggle musicians alike. she loves working with her hands and expressing herself with something tangible, creative, and beautiful.

— SNAKES  despite being raised in a secular household, she considers snakes as sacred. her mother’s religion believes that snakes are divine symbols of duality—eternity and materiality, life and death, time and timelessness. she constantly wears a snake-shaped ring as a token of protection. her patronus is an indian cobra. she thinks they deserve respect and hates the bad rep that western culture gives them.

— HUSTLE  even though she thinks money is the root of all evil, she can't deny that it's a necessary evil. she can’t survive without it. at least, there’s the thrill of the hustle to make exciting.

— IDENTITY  being born a wizard in britain to a muslim pakistani father and a hindu indian mother who happen to be both non-magical basically destined her for a life-long identity crisis. she’s constantly trying to make peace between the many conflicting areas of her culture and find her place in both the magical and muggle worlds.

— GIRLS : she finds girls to be amazing, and not just in the "girl power" way that the spice girls preached. she can see the aesthetic appeal of boys. however, she doesn't find them as powerful, complex, beautiful, pretty, and lovely as she finds girls.

— STATUTE OF SECRECY  she understands why the magical world stays isolated from the muggle World. she just thinks that such isolation will bite wizards and witches in the one day, believing that their society as a whole is too reliant on magic and have an "-backwards" view on just about everything. she thinks that muggles are just as "magical" as any witch or wizard. look at how they traveled to space and cloned sheep! she reasons that Muggles will eventually figure out about magic anyway, so the magical community might as well let it happen on their terms first. she believes that together, both worlds can bring out the best of humanity. more selfishly, she wants the statute of secrecy gone because she’s tired of keeping secrets from her muggle family and friends, wishing to share with them the wonders of the magical World.

LOVE INTEREST : hazel onayemi
FACECLAIM : adelayo adedayo
BLOOD STATUS : muggleborn

PERSONALITY: 

THERE'S BRAVERY

artistic, idealistic, perceptive, hard-working, impractical, kind, sensitive, shortsighted

IN BEING SOFT

— hazel is a dreamer. she’s got her head in the clouds, but it’s only because she’s busy thinking of creative ways to better the world. she believes in the inherent goodness of wizards, muggles, squibs, giants, goblins, house elves, veelas, werewolves, centaurs, etc. really, she believes that everyone or everything that lives and breathes is special and precious. she’s very caring of others, knowing when to lend a comforting shoulder or some encouraging words for those who need it. she goes out of her way to help people in need, and does her best to liven any sour moods with some funny jokes. she works hard at everything she does, always giving her all. she enjoys creating art with her strengths lying more in writing and singing. her idealism is a double-edged sword. while there’s always room for optimists in this world, her rose-colored expectations can be unrealistic at times. it also doesn’t help that she tends to think and act more in the moment than considering possible future consequences, making some of her well-intentioned actions end in unintended disasters.

LOVE STORY: 

— it started with some dj jazzy jeff & the fresh prince. with her reputation as “the hex-happy 1st year with a temper that no one should cross”, matangi spent most meals sitting alone as the other students avoided her, sneaking out from the great hall with a tupperware full of food so she could eat in an empty corridor, away from judgemental eyes. her only company was her trusty walkman, which managed to run off the school’s magical atmosphere as she noticed colin creevey’s muggle camera could. this all changed when a hufflepuff girl happened across her hidden corner of solitude and then asked, “is that ‘boom! shake the room’?”

stunned by the sudden appearance of a stranger and the unexpected question, all matangi could say was “yeah, it is. how’d you know?” the other girl laughed, “well it’s only one of the best songs ever! of course, i’d know. plus, i heard your singing it down the hall. you’re quite good!” not giving matangi a chance to respond, the girl sat down next to her. “i’m hazel onayemi, by the way. i noticed that you forgot to grab dessert on your way out, which is an utter shame, so i brought you a custard tart!”

the moment that hazel offered the pastry to manthangi, a life-long bond was formed. they became best friends, spending nearly all their time together. they bonded over everything and anything--music, art, the struggles of being muggleborns and 2nd generation immigrants, goals, dreams and more. they partnered in every class they had together and during weekends, they’d go paint the town red in hogsmeade. it was hazel who helped matangi open herself to others, and it was matangi who helped hazel learn how to stand her ground.

at some point over the years, feelings of friendship blossomed into something more as matangi and hazel began to see each other in a different. suddenly, it wasn’t enough to be just girlfriends. they wanted to be girlfriends. but with a dark wizard apocalypse breaking out and becoming either fugitives or prisoners of war, there wasn’t any time for love confessions. now matangi is determined to find hazel, save her, share how she truly feels and never let her go.