A brief history of Northern Irish politics as seen by me:
If you're like I was before I came to Ireland, all I knew about Northern Ireland I learned from CNN.  They seem to like to bomb each other, Jerry Adams is always on the news saying something I couldn't understand and they recently had a vote that should fix it all, right?  Of course that's just a small bit.  Here's what I have learned.

For the most part, Gaelic speaking Celts are the native people on the island of Ireland.  Unfortunately for the Irish people they lived right next door to a country that loved to expand it's empire - England.  As we all know, England had it fingers everywhere - Hong Kong, India, South Africa, Australia, America, etc.  Basically anywhere that speaks English as it's first language today is probably doing so because the English conquered it at some point.  Ireland was no different.  The guide book (Let's Go) says that in the 17th century, the English came over to Ireland and started taking farms away from the locals and giving them to English and Scottish people.  This went on for quite some time with Ireland being like Scotland and Wales are today, part of the United Kingdom.  The religious bit comes in because most of the Irish were and still are catholic.  Most of the English were and still are Protestant.  In the early 20th century the Irish became organized enough to have a successful revolution.  In 1921, 26 out of 32 counties in Ireland were allowed to become an independent country, The Republic of Ireland.  The 6 counties in the northern part of the island were the most heavily settled by the British and at that time were not taken as part of the republic.  This was very controversial even at the time, as many people felt that the entire island should be a united country.

It still remains that way today.  The republic has 26 counties, and there are 6 counties in Northern Ireland which are still part of the UK.  Ever since 1921 this has been an issue with people, especially catholics living in the north.  To make matters worse, there seems to have been a lot of discrimination against Catholics.  Since they don't have a separation of church and state like in the US, the government is most definitely religious.  In Northern Ireland the government would be Protestant.  This meant they primarily hired Protestant as police, school teachers, judges, etc.

Since the catholics didn't really feel like the police were on their side, they formed the IRA.  The IRA seems to have two goals.  To unite the 32 counties of Ireland, and to act as the police in catholic neighborhoods.  The IRA armed themselves pretty heavily to defend against the local police and also to do some terrorism against British targets to let them know they are not wanted in Northern Ireland.  This caused the Protestants to form similar militia groups (UVF (Ulster Volunteer Force), UDA, UFF (Ulster Freedom Fighters), etc.)  All of the Protestant militia groups seem to have Ulster in their name.  Ulster is the term used for the region that Northern Ireland now occupies.  The Protestant groups would retaliate to IRA attacks and also initiate attacks of it's own.  There was also a lot of sectarian street violence.  It's a bit like what Americans would think of as gang warfare, but with protection and revolutionary ideals.  The worst of the troubles were in the 1970's, but there have always been problems.

This whole situation is what it know today as "The Troubles."

The recent agreement voted for in both the north and the south is an attempt at a compromise.  It's primarily a joint government agreement.  It's too complex for me to explain right now, but if you're interested, you might want to read about it.  The current problems you'll hear on the news these days revolve around the IRA "decommissioning" or giving up it's weapons.  Everyone seems to be optimistic at this point, but there is a lot of mistrust on both sides.

Anyhow, here's my trip...

You might wonder why the hell I would want to go to a place that sounds so terribly dangerous.  My "Let's Go" book says this under the heading of security in Belfast, "Terrorists and paramilitaries on both sides want nothings less than to injure a tourist.  As long as you stay out of Derry's Bogside and Belfast's Falls, Shankill, and Sandy Row after dark, you're unlikely to see trouble."  I heard someone say while I was traveling there that if you take out sectarian violence, Belfast has one of the lowest crime rates in Europe.

The book also says, "The strife that makes the North infamous hides the land's beauty and appeal from international travelers."  Then it goes on to list all of the cool things you can do and see there.

Mon 12/28/98
After I dropped Megan off at the airport for her trip back to the US, I bought a train ticket to Belfast.  The round trip ticket was £26.  The train ride was a little over two hours, but it was quite nice.  The train is so much more comfortable than the bus, that's for sure.  Going through the hills just outside of Belfast, I was surprised to see a little snow on the hills.  It was probably only about a half an inch, but it was the first (as so far only) so I've seen this season.

After I arrived at the train station I stopped at the ATM to get some money.  Since the north is British, they use British money (the pound sterling as opposed to the Irish Punt).  I walked to the hostel I'd booked the day before and checked in.  It was called Arnie's Backpackers, located on the south side of the city.  It was a little place with only 25 beds, but the good thing is that it's only £7.50 per night!  The hostel is booked bull, but it's nice and quiet.  There's even two fireplaces with coal fires burning all day.  I was planning to stay two nights in Belfast and three nights in Derry.

Since the winter in Ireland only gives you about 7 hours of daylight per day, it was dark by the time I was done with all that.  I walked around the pedestrian shopping area, but the shops were all closing down, so I went and got some fast food for dinner.  Belfast has a nice pedestrian shopping area which covers several blocks.  It's a bit like Old Town in Ft. Collins (for those Coloradoans), but much bigger.  You'd never guess that it was made pedestrian only in an attempt to deter car bombs!  But in general, I didn't really feel that the city had any more tension than any other big city.  I went to see the new Jackie Chan movie and then back to the hostel to turn in early.

Tues 12/29/98
After I got up, I had some breakfast and checked the answering machine back home.  There was a message from Megan saying that she's made it to Chicago safely.  I was planning to give myself a tour of the city, but it was raining pretty hard and didn't look like it was going to stop, so I joined a bunch of other from the hostel who were taking a "Black Taxi tour" of the city.  The black taxi's were started during a bus strike a while back.  They seem to be much cheaper than traditional taxi's (which they also have).

Here are four black taxi's waiting for passengers in downtown Belfast.

Some of the black taxis act as an alternative bus service in the west side of Belfast.  The west side is the working class part of the city and is also infamous for it's role in the troubles.  Those alternative bus type taxis are also sectarian.  They either go exclusively to the catholic neighborhoods or exclusively to the Protestant neighborhoods.  There are also black taxis which are just hackneys.  That's the kind we had for our tour.  So me and five other people from the hostel squeezed into the taxi and got a narrated tour of Belfast's west side neighborhoods and Belfast castle.

The Falls Road and Shankill Road at the main roads going through the segregated neighborhoods in Belfast.  Falls Road run through a catholic neighborhood and Shankill Road runs through a Protestant neighborhood.  We started our tour in the Falls area.  The reason that these areas are interesting is not because they're particularly dangerous or the people look different or anything, but because of all of the political murals and graffiti.  Most of my pictures are of the murals.

The first thing I noticed is that each neighborhood has markings on the curbs to let you know where you are.

This show the curb stones painted green, white, and orange - the colors of the Irish flag.  This means you are in a catholic or nationalist (a term for people who want a united Ireland) neighborhood.

There are also yellow gate/blockade things at the transition points between catholic and Protestant, or sectarian and neutral areas.  These are usually open, but can be closed to stop traffic in times of trouble.

First I'll show the Falls murals.

A mural stating "Free Ireland" in the Falls area.  Note the flag colors on the left and the writing on the right.  See the next picture for a close-up of the words.

This is an interesting mural showing many different people and flags.  Each seems to represent an oppressed person or group.  I only know Nelson Mandella on the far right.  The Irish flag you see, and I think I heard that the flag painted on the chimney is an Aboriginal flag from Australia.

This mural commemorates the 1916 Easter Rising.  One of the significant revolts just before independence.

This shows an RUC leaving the Falls area.  This mural is painted a block away from the one above.  Notice that you can see the previous mural pictured in this one.
The words at the top is Gaelic for "Leave our streets"

The Gaelic language is one thing that the Irish find a great amount of cultural identity in.  It is what they consider to be their native language.  Sometimes it is referred to as the language Irish.  Unfortunately, most Irish people these days don't speak Gaelic, only English.  Even though it is taught in the schools in Ireland, children who don't use it soon forget.  I've heard that in the western and south-western part of the country there are many people that learn Gaelic as their first language and English as their second.  But since about 1/3 of Ireland's 3 million population lived in Dublin city, it's a small percentage that live in the west and south.

This mural shows famine victims.  Most people have heard of the Irish potato famine.  As you can see from the mural, in the mid 1800's there was a famine which not only caused a huge number of deaths, but was also responsible for the large emigration of Irish to America and Australia.  Since Britain was in power at the time, some Irish blame them for making the famine worse.  It's said that the English would take the good food and livestock and leave the rest for the Irish to try and survive on.  I've heard that before the famine there were 8 million people in Ireland.  Today there are still only 3 million.
I like the celtic design around the border of this mural.

Another mural depicting the famine.

One of the more significant murals was this one.  It commemorates the ten people that went on hunger strike in 1981.  These ten people were catholics in prison and were striking to have themselves declared as political prisoners.  The first one to die (and the most famous) was Bobby Sands (upper left).  He was elected to parliament from a catholic district while in prison, but died 66 days later from hunger.  All ten people eventually died from the strike.

This was painted just to the right of the mural showing the ten hunger strikers.

This is the Sinn Fein office in Belfast.  The person in the picture is Bobby Sands.  The more the catholics had problems, the more people joined the Sinn Fein political party.  Gerry Adams, the leader of the Sinn Fein, grew up in the Fall area in west Belfast.

Most of the Protestant murals seemed to mention Ulster, be more likely to portray violence, and usually show the red hand.  According to Let's Go, "The Red Hand: the symbol of Ulster (found on Ulster's crest), usually used by Unionists to emphasize the separateness of Ulster from the rest of Ireland. Symbolizes the hand which the first Norse King supposedly cut off himself and threw on a Northern Irish beach to establish his primacy."

Another Protestant mural.

This mural pictures two men with guns ready to commit an assassination.  The number on the door which you cannot see is the house number of a prominent Catholic man who was killed in a similar manner before the mural was painted.  The guns that the two men on either side of the door are holding are an AK47 and an Uzi.  I was told that these types of weapons are actually the level of firepower that each side would have.

Another overtly violent mural. (for god of course)

These are the people that I took the tour with in the black taxi.  As you can probably tell, nobody wanted to be standing out in the cold rain for this photo.  Megan will be happy to note that I am wearing my sweater.  The two next to me are Americans.  The other four are Australian.  We're standing in front of Belfast castle.  Not an awesome castle compared to others I've seen, but it was quite livable.

After the taxi tour, he took us all back to the hostel.  I headed back out to see the city in the daylight.  I went through the shopping area downtown and walked through the Botanic Gardens, a nice park near the hostel.  It was raining the whole time, so I didn't stay out too long and definitely got soaked in the process.

There seemed to be quite a few Americans staying at the hostel.  Usually it seems I meet mostly Australians when traveling.  Since it was raining, we (the Americans) had Dominos pizza delivered to the hostel.  After dinner, 9 of us got taxi's for about £1 per person to a pub out in the docks area (Roeterdams).  It was my kind of place - not very crowded, a coal fire burning in the corner, and some locals playing traditional Irish music.  The two German (Frank and Alex) guys who are also in the same room as I am were out with everyone.  I found out that Frank will be going to Derry tomorrow the same as me.

Wed 12/30/98
I checked out of the hostel, had a sandwich downtown for lunch and then caught the train to Derry.  The ticket was £10.50 for a return ticket and the journey was 2 1/2 hours.  The train to Derry was quite nice.  I got to see quite a bit of the countryside and it even went down the coast for a while at the end of the trip.  I do like watching the ocean.  When I got to Derry, I walked to the hostel and checked in.  Frank was already there and getting ready to make dinner.  I decided I wanted some Chinese food, so I walked downtown and got take-away.

I went to the pub that night with Frank and a couple of other Americans.  We went to the Strand Bar and then to Peadar O'Donnell's where we met up the the rest of the crowd from the hostel.  Frank and I had some good conversation and since he was leaving in the morning, I got his email address.

Frank and the other Americans I went out with last night took off this morning.  Too bad I didn't get a picture of them.  I bought myself an Irish Times and found a spot that served Omelets and decent coffee.  After that I gave myself a tour of the city walls and the murals around town.

Derry is a walled city.  In the early 17th century, a wall 18 ft. high and 20 ft. thick was constructed as a defense against invasion.  Now the walled part of the city only makes up a small area in the center of Derry.  The walls are still maintained and you can take a walk around the old city on the top of the walls.

A view of the city walls and the grassy area beyond.  Cannons were mounted around the top as defense.

A view of the walking path on top of the walls.

A mural outside the Bogside, the main catholic neighborhood in Derry.

Derry is interesting for two reasons.  One, is the fact that Derry is the largest city in Northern Ireland which is predominantly catholic.  That probably helped to contribute to it's claim as being the spot where much of the Troubles began back in the late 60s and early 70s.

"No Sectarian Marches" painted on an apartment complex.

This is referring to the annual march that the Protestant "Orangemen" take each year in various towns in Northern Ireland.  This past year the marches in Portadown were pretty highly publicized when they were told they couldn't take the same route they used to.  The marches often lead to violence, especially when the Orangemen would march through catholic neighborhoods.

This is a lookout tower for the RUC.  It's surrounded in a cage and has cameras and microphones mounted on top.  This is a pretty common site both in Belfast and Derry.  It's very intimidating looking.  Also very "big brother" looking.  Technically, I wasn't supposed to take a picture of this.  They don't' allow pictures of  police or military installations for some reason.  I think because they're so heavily fortified, it looks bad.

A couple more self-explanatory murals in the Bogside area of Derry.

This mural is so well painted it almost looks like a photograph.  It depicts somebody in the middle of a riot wearing a gas mask and holding a petrol bomb (Molotov cocktail).

Another extremely well painted mural depicting an injured civil rights marcher.

This mural shows a woman banging the lid of a trash can on the ground in order to warn the neighborhood that the RUC was coming.

The Bloody Sunday monument.  Bloody Sunday (which U2's song 'Sunday Bloody Sunday' was named after) was a protest in Derry in 1972 where 14 people were shot and killed by the British military. Here's the inscriptions on the mural:

• "Their epitaph is in the continuing struggle for democracy"
• Then it lists the 14 people killed and their ages.
• "Who were murdered by British Paratroopers on Bloody Sunday 20th January 1972"

This sculpture was unique because it promoted peace.  Two people reaching out to each other across a gap.  Very cool sculpture, but unfortunately it seems to get lost in the middle of so many other negative images.

I'm not much into the big parties on New Years Eve, so I wasn't too excited about going out that night.  I stayed in and played cards with some people at the hostel until about 11:30.  Then we went to the pub for an hour with Bill, an American guy working in Belfast, and then came back to the hostel after that.  That was fine.  I didn't feel like being around a bunch of crazies that night anyhow.

Fri 1/1/99

I was planning on heading back to Dublin today.  Bill was heading back to Belfast also, so we decided to catch a taxi to the train station.  Taxis in the north here seem to be much cheaper than in Dublin.  It would probably only be a couple of pounds to get to the train station.  There's only one train today that I can catch back to Dublin.  It's a limited schedule since it's a holiday.  Unfortunately when Bill called the taxi they thought they needed to pick us up at the train station instead of the hostel, so the taxi never showed up and we ended up missing the train.  Oh well, I guess I'll stay another night in Derry.  At least it's pretty cheap to stay here.  Most things were closed that day and since I was planning on being home, I hadn't bought any food.  I ended up just eating at KFC for my only meal of the day.

I ended up having a pretty good time that night.  Nothing special, just more playing cards and then out to the pub again, but good Craic.