To add to our count of modes of transport (to date: plane, walk,
travelator, train, taxi (modern), taxi (London), common-or-garden car, and boat),
today we took a Belfast public bus (they are pink!).
Aunt Sandra’s Candy store (which is also pink) is in a
shabby little row of shops along Castlereagh Rd a couple of kilometres east of
the central city. It turns out it’s not much like Candyland – it’s two small
shops joined together, with a candy store in one and they put on a Willy Wonka-styled
show in the other. To give him his credit, the guy who does the show is very
good – dressed up in a waistcoat and big silly hat, telling yarns and making various
shaped lollipops that become quiz prizes – but it’s aimed at younger kids than
mine. (Having said that, Levi is as big a sugar fiend as any, so he was happy
to sit through it and answer a quiz question to get rewarded with half a cup of
molten sugar set in the shape of an Oompa Loompa’s foot – pink, of course!)
After the candy show we wandered back down the road to the
bus stop, and noticed a big UFF mural at a corner on the end of a row of shops.
This wasn’t in a “Troubles tour” area, but obviously just another of the
squares in the political checkerboard that is Belfast.
It was a lovely day today, much milder than yesterday, still
chilly but not bitterly cold so it was quite pleasant to be out. When we got
off the bus back in the central city it was really busy, people everywhere.
There was a fair of some sort in the grounds of the City Hall, mostly food and
craft stalls. I’m not sure if it was a normal Friday, or busier than usual
because of the mid-term Bank Holiday weekend, but one way or another the city
centre was humming.
Our other big outing of the day was to the laundromat to
catch up on a bit of washing. It turned out to be very interesting: I got
talking with the proprietor and another customer, first about the reason for
our trip (the guy was sure he’d read of William Bald somewhere), and then on to
the Black Taxi tour and what it’s like to live in Belfast. It was fascinating
to get an insight into their views, as Joe and Josephine Bloggs citizens of
Belfast (both aged in their 40s I’d say). Both were Protestants, but he’d grown
up in a Catholic area, and said that he actually thinks the Catholics are on
the side of right as they were the oppressed ones. I was a bit surprised that
he espoused that view out loud, and asked is he mindful of what he says
depending on what company he’s in? He had to think about it a bit, then said
yes he guessed so, but seemed not to have really considered it; then later on,
he started another sentence with “Not that I’d say it to some people… oh! Yes,
obviously I do mind my p’s and q’s!” (It was that he finds the Orange bonfires
etc quite distasteful, as an overt display of dominance and implied threat.) The
woman was very moderate too, remembers what it was like as a child in the 70s, and
said she’s very pleased her own daughter has been brought up with integrated
schooling. (Unlike herself, who didn’t know any Catholics until she was an
adult and started working in the city.) Both of them thought the
peace/ceasefire is secure, as the vast majority of people have no appetite to
go back to how things were (“oh we just couldn’t go back”). You’d have not been
able to get into the street the laundromat is in, because all through the
central city there were gates closed at night to protect the shopping areas
from bombs being planted. An army / police officer travelled on every bus,
walking up and down and checking some people’s bags. They recalled being patted
down at the barriers, and the huge amount of security to get through to reach
the airport to go on holiday. There was general agreement that taking people as
individuals, rather than seeing everyone just as part of a group identity (a “them”)
is what builds and maintains tolerance. (Notwithstanding that, they still both found
it worthy of comment – and with a slight air of pride, from which I inferred it’s
not entirely common – that “I have both Catholic and Protestant friends”, “My
daughter has Catholic friends as well, some of them are even better friends
than the Protestant ones”.)
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