My time in Ireland has also extended to the northern region of Ulster, and more specifically Northern Ireland, a constituent country of the United Kingdom. Months prior to this visit, I was enthused to learn out from my mom that much of her ancestry derives from the Ulster region of the Irish island, but admittedly, this information paled in relation to the notion that parts of Belfast were still segregated by religious and political identities. This notion, unfortunately, rendered a preconceived attitude that I was not to look forward to our visit to the Belfast but for its historical context to the Troubles. For the most part, this assumption was correct, but Belfast still has at least some redeeming qualities in its downtown, riverfront area.
To the contrary, our two tours in the loyalist, British-supporting section of Belfast and subsequently the republican, Irish-supporting section of Belfast were two bleak, depressing, and unpleasingly partisan accounts from two incredibly insightful but biased tour guides. While any given tour guide in any given field will likely be biased in a limited sense, the fact that both the loyalist tour guide and the republican tour guide were dyed-in-the-wool and unapologetic in their biases was incredibly off-putting and correctly renders a sentiment that there was no good side in the Troubles; the damage done has left the island of Ireland into two different countries with two different Belfasts and two different tour guides.
In terms of general interest, the first tour in loyalist Belfast was the more eye-opening tour of the two, if only because the facts of the attacks were new to me on this study abroad trip to Ireland (the Irish republicans would probably not wear some of the attacks on Protestants as a badge of honor, hopefully). While the heart-aching results of the actions of the IRA against relatively innocent Protestants in Belfast were objectively devastating, the Protestant memorials at the places of the attacks were acting more as propaganda than as an actual memorial for the dead. The former site of the loyalist pub was infuriating in its propaganda, even for someone who does not historically ally with either loyalists or republicans. If your constructed memorial contains more information about the misdeeds of Gerry Adams or Tony Blair more so than information about the lives of those lost in the attacks, then you are making a mockery of well-meaning memorials across the world who commemorate those who perished too abruptly.
Part of the propagandizing efforts of the pub in Belfast destroyed in a devastating bomb by the IRA. Apparently, if you bomb any building for any political context, you are essentially ISIS.
The mural above was possibly the most infuriating artifact of propaganda I have ever seen (again, from someone who has not taken sides in the matter of the Troubles). Not only is it incredibly tone-deaf when factoring in the mass "slaughter in Paris", but the fact that they are using the dead to make partisan statements on the IRA being akin to the actions of ISIS underlines that this memorial is not for the dead, but for retroactive agenda-setting on a conflict over two decades removed. Now, both acts of terror epitomized the concept of evil in human form, but the memorial also bypasses the purpose of a memorial. The rest of the first tour was also a form of propaganda, with obvious love-kisses sent to the Crown of the United Kingdom with devoted appreciation for King Charles III, heartfelt dedication to the long-lost Queen Elizabeth, and the fact that it appeared that there were more Union jacks flying than there were constituents of Belfast.
Large memorial to a larger-than-life Queen in the loyalist section of Belfast. I wonder if Meghan Markle and Prince Harry will get the same treatment when they inevitably perish as well??
Typical street scene of the loyalist section of Belfast. It seems that only American car dealerships can compete with the amount of flags being flown in a small area.
I thought the transition of the first tour guide to the second tour guide was most telling of the Troubles and its continued, looming shadow over the city of Belfast to this day. The first tour guide emphasized that while he wishes the division of Belfast would rightfully end, he acknowledged that he did not visit or make any efforts to visit the republican section of Belfast. The second tour guide, in his lengthy, interminable introduction to the republican section of Belfast, echoed the same sentiment of the loyalist section of Belfast. To me, these accounts sold an impression to me that the division of Belfast and the segregation of loyalists and republicans is still prevalent mainly because the two warring factions make absolutely no effort to extend a hand or an olive branch. This sentiment, easily, was the most vile lesson to learn on this excursion to Belfast; two halves of Belfast seem eternally divided in politics and religion yet still cannot find any reason to come to a mutual understanding. How sad.
As for the second tour itself in the republican section of Belfast, I believe the rest of the tour was interminable and quite loquacious on behalf of the tour guide. While some of the stories told were harrowing, such as his real-world connections to the Troubles and the deaths of his brother and best friend, many of his speeches were monotonous in tone and took away from some of the sights to be seen. It appeared that based on the territory trekked through on the republican section of Belfast that they would appear to be less nationalist or patriotic than the loyalists, only if this was because the loyalists made their allegiance clear with the endless Union jacks being flown.
The "Wall of Peace" dividing loyalist Belfast (pictured) and republican Belfast on the other side of the wall. "Peace" must mean abstaining from any contact whatsoever from the opposite side of the wall in Belfast dialogue.
The panel discussion following the two partisan tours was a much more immersive, intriguing experience than the preceding tours given the discussants' histories in relation to the Troubles. A British Army soldier who became disillusioned with the Troubles and did not return to the United Kingdom, a non-republican who joined the IRA for a quest of violence, and a republican who ended up serving over 16 years in prison for murder joined forces to give three vastly different accounts on the three-decade-long conflict that was a cancer on the Irish spirit. The British Army officer and his exploits is almost biopic-worthy for its incredible story and biographical timeline, yet his explanation for staying in Belfast after his disillusionment with the Troubles was simple enough in the fact that he had met a girl in Belfast (very Hollywood indeed). From battling heroin addiction to homelessness even when he had joined the British Army to escape a life of poverty, his subsequent bounce-back to functioning society and academia was a massive fist-pump. It gave me the sense in the grand scheme of things that hopefully tougher times in life will be temporary, but one must grind out their work ethics to escape on the other side. While I could not think of any insightful, thought-provoking questions, I was glad some of my classmates poked the conversation further than expected, which expanded the discussion in a more rounded-out sense.
While I thought the areas we walked in explicitly with the leadership of our two tour guides were depressing in tone and too partisan for tour guides, I appreciated the downtown, riverfront area of Belfast in which the class and the professors indulged in a solid dinner (and three pints for myself and gin and tonics for everyone else it seemed). A night out on the tiles in downtown Belfast was in store, and while I drank more than I should have, it was still fun to go out with a select few of my classmates and forget all of life's troubles.
Beer garden in downtown Belfast. Fun times and plenty of alcohol were had.
Overall, the time in Belfast was not as exciting as advertised from my personal standpoint, as I found the tours conducted by both the loyalist and republican to be self-serving, biased, and downright boring -- the antithesis to what any tour should be. The critical messages conveyed concern the ongoing clouds of hardline division over the city of Belfast: the division in Belfast is rampant not because of any violence happening today, but because the violence of yesteryear in the region has instead led the people of Belfast to go out of their way to completely avoid having to deal with one another. In this sense, connecting the tours to my American roots, this seems eerily similar to the Deep South United States in the Jim Crow-era, where Southern whites went out of their way to avoid any encounters with African-Americans by creating laws that would physically segregate the two populations from one another. The sentiment also echoes the same sentiment written in That's That to an extent, in which narrator Colin Broderick continuously employed an anti-loyalist sentiment and the history of his hometown of Altamuskin and surrounding communities and how Protestants had their own ways of life and Catholics had their own ways of life when concerning daily life. I believe that the lessons learned in the Belfast excursion are incredibly important but relatively easy to understand: problems cannot be solved by doing nothing at all. If we strive to create a world that is inclusive and less divisive, much like what Irish rock band U2 chanted on their hit song "Where the Streets Have No Name", then we must reach out to those who we disagree with and learn how to compromise with others -- it just might make the world more functional and accepting of others.
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