Note: Prior to studying abroad in London, I spent 10 days in Ireland and Northern Ireland as part of the prequel class “The Pale and Beyond.” We spent five days in Dublin and then five days in Belfast learning about Irish culture and identity. For more about my time in Ireland, check the Ireland category tag on the right.

Like in Dublin, we had our last full day in Belfast mostly free to explore the city and surrounding area. But first, we all met in the hotel lobby to walk over to St. George’s Market. The market takes place inside this huge warehouse-type facility and has tons of vendors selling everything from fresh produce and cupcakes to jewelry and paintings. It was a great place to buy gifts and also grab a quick bite to eat.

The countryside around Belfast

After we left the market, we all had about five hours to spend in Belfast before our final group dinner. Some members of the group walked uptown to visit the botanical gardens and others visited the Titanic museum. I walked around Belfast with a few people and did some shopping before returning to the hotel to relax.

We all met up again that night for our final group dinner at the Crown Pub. The Crown has some very cool stain glass decorations and a lot of polished wood inside. It also has these old fashion areas called snugs. Snugs usually fit about six or seven people in them and are basically big booths with doors you can close so you can drink and eat more privately with your group of friends. But our dinner took place upstairs in one of the bigger private party rooms. We all enjoyed the food and getting the chance to talk with each other.

Stormont Castle

The next day we loaded all our luggage into the coach for our ride to the Belfast airport. On the way to the airport, we stopped at Stormont Castle, the seat of the Northern Ireland parliament. It’s a beautiful old stone building located about 5 miles outside Belfast. The parliament wasn’t in session though, so we just took a few photos before getting back on the bus.

We got our baggage checked and made it to our flight without incident. After a short 1-hour flight, we arrived in London’s Heathrow airport. We had been at Heathrow just ten days before on our way to Dublin, but it felt like months ago. After collecting our luggage, we got on the coach for one last ride into central London. We had one night before the other study abroad students arrived and, though I was sad the trip was over, I was also happy that I would be able to see so many familiar faces as I began my semester studying abroad in London.

Note: Prior to studying abroad in London, I spent 10 days in Ireland and Northern Ireland as part of the prequel class “The Pale and Beyond.” We spent five days in Dublin and then five days in Belfast learning about Irish culture and identity. For more about my time in Ireland, check the Ireland category tag on the right.

Today was spent enjoying the Irish countryside. It really is beautiful out here and it looks like the Ireland you see in postcards: rolling green hills, white waves crashing against stony cliffs and more sheep than I have ever seen before in my life.

It was about a two-hour ride to get to our first destination: the Carrick-A-Rede rope bridge. Once we got there, it was about a 15-minute walk along the ocean and some terrifyingly high cliffs to get to the bridge. The bridge is actually made of sturdy cable now, not rope and runs a short distance between the main cliffs and a small island outcropping. It was not as long or as scary as I thought it would be (though many members of our group would probably beg to differ on that point). It was quite windy the whole time and we all had to put on extra layers.

We had lunch at the Wee Cottage, where the owner shut down the whole place for us. The cottage was decorated with all kinds of knick-knacks and the walls were covered in different types of currency from all over the world. Lunch was homemade soup, sandwiches, Irish soda bread, tea and coffee, and, to top it all off, decadent scones topped with heaps of whipped cream and berries. We were all stuffed.

From there, we walked down the hill to visit the ruins of Dunluce Castle. The castle was inhabited by various Irish and Scottish families over the centuries. It was eventually abandoned because it was too close to the edge, too drafty and had become out-dated. Although much of the original castle walls had collapsed or crumbled it was easy to picture how grand it must have been in its prime.

Our last planned stop for the day was the Giant’s Causeway, an area filled with stacks of these peculiar, flat six-sided rocks. The causeway was created either by giants or by volcanoes, depending on how strong your imagination is. It was about a 25-minute walk to get down to the main area of the causeway and once there, we joined the other tourists in clamoring about on the rocks and getting slightly wet from the spray of the sea. There were also some paths leading up to the cliffs that a few members of our group walked up.

On the bus ride back, we made one last quick stop: at a bunch of trees where they filmed part of the Game of Thrones TV show. Those who watched the show had a chance to get out of the bus and take a quick picture before we continued on our way back to Belfast.

Note: Prior to studying abroad in London, I spent 10 days in Ireland and Northern Ireland as part of the prequel class “The Pale and Beyond.” We spent five days in Dublin and then five days in Belfast learning about Irish culture and identity. For more about my time in Ireland, check the Ireland category tag on the right.

Today, it became abundantly clear how divided this small country still is. As a bit of background, the island of Ireland was split after the southern 26 counties gained independence from England in 1921. The northern six counties are still part of Great Britain.

One of the peace walls that separates Protestant and Catholic neighborhoods in Belfast.

But obviously, not everyone in Northern Ireland agrees with result of the split and we spent most of the day learning about the deep divisions and painful history between the Nationalist Catholic population and the Unionist Protestant population.

Probably the most important thing I learned about this conflict is that for the most part, all this conflict isn’t about religion. For many outsiders, including myself, it’s easy to look at the conflict in purely religious terms and wonder why the two sides could disagree on so much when their religions are so similar. But it’s really not about that. Pretty much all Catholics are nationalists (want to unite with the Republic of Ireland) and pretty much all Protestants are unionists (want to stay united with Great Britain), so identifying yourself as a Catholic or Protestant is as much a political statement as a religious one.

Signatures from all over the world cover the peace walls.

Almost all the working class men over about 40 or 50 years old that we met had participated in “the Troubles” in one way or another. The peace treaty between the the Protestant and Catholic paramilitary groups was only signed in 1998, just about 15 years ago, so a lot people still remember the violence and are struggling to move on. Many of the people who spoke with us had served significant time as political prisoners, some joining paramilitary groups as young as 15.

After a brief introduction to the conflict, we split into groups to take walking tours of some of the surrounding Protestant and Catholic neighborhoods. My group walked through the Shankill Road area, a protestant area, first. The Protestant and Catholic areas of Belfast are kept apart by a long high cement wall. There are a lot of murals and public art in the Shankill road area that both celebrate Irish history and discuss peace. The Shankill area is also filled with Union Jacks, almost every house has a flag outside and there are apparently more flags flying here than is London.

A mural on the Protestant side of the wall.

We had lunch and then walked around the Catholic area of Falls Road, which has a lot less public art and almost no murals on the peace wall. You can see that it’s a lot more cohesive than the Protestant area though, which has to incorporate a lot of different strains of Protestant faith instead of just one Catholic faith. We also walked through an IRA memorial garden and visited a giant mural of Bobbi Sands.

The last part of the day was a discussion between two Unionists and a Nationalist. I thought they would disagree on a lot more issues but they were in agreement on many of the questions they were asked. Although both sides concede that the peace walls are still necessary, the threat of violence here is much less than it was in the past. Generations are aging and many kids now will grow up without ever experiencing the violence.

An IRA memorial on the Catholic side of the wall.

The country still faces many challenges though including education, healthcare, equal rights, and assimilating political prisoners back into society. But the greatest challenge may simply be returning to a normal state of community relations. It is still almost unheard of for a Catholic to walk into a Protestant area and vice versa. But, at least from the people we talked to, there seems to be a general desire to get along. And both sides have come a long way. Just 20 years ago, both groups were killing each other on sight. Now, they have settled into an uneasy peace, which will hopefully endure for many years.

A mural pays tribute to the American civil rights movement.

Belfast City Hall

Note: Prior to studying abroad in London, I spent 10 days in Ireland and Northern Ireland as part of the prequel class “The Pale and Beyond.” We spent five days in Dublin and then five days in Belfast learning about Irish culture and identity. For more about my time in Ireland, check the Ireland category tag on the right.

Today, we officially crossed the border into Northern Ireland. It was about a 2-hour bus ride from Dublin along some very beautiful highways. We had all been up since 7:15 a.m. that morning so most of us spent the trip sleeping.

After a quick stop at the Jury Hotel to drop off our luggage, we made our way to the gorgeous Belfast City Hall building. The city hall was completely paid for by taxpayer money, so the residents of Belfast feel a real sense of ownership with the building and they don’t charge for tours either. It’s clear how much tradition matters here, from the paintings of all the Lord Mayors to the ornate council room to the robes all the councilors wear. There are also three huge rooms to host both city and local functions.

One of the city hall function rooms

We finished the tour and then had about an hour or so to walk around Belfast a little bit and have lunch. Belfast is much smaller than Dublin but it still has a pretty built-up downtown area with lots of shops and places to eat. But unlike Dublin, you can see the surrounding green countryside from most areas of Belfast. We ended up having lunch at this diner-type restaurant located a street off from the main drag.

We then got to know Belfast a little better by taking a walking tour of the city. It’s definitely not as touristy as Dublin but there are still quite a number of quaint shops and streets. Like Dublin, a river, the Lagan River, cuts straight through Belfast but this river has caused some problems for the city inhabitants. Up until a weir was built in 1994, the area around the river smelled terrible because of the changing tides that often left the riverbed exposed. The tides are regulated now so the river is never completely drained and a lot more businesses and people are moving into the areas by the river. They also seem to have a bit of an obsession with the Titanic here (it was built in Belfast) and there’s a Titanic memorial and other commemorative places throughout the city.

The Lagan River