Downed some sleepytime tea last night at 1 am because once again I was excited about Belfast and couldn’t get to sleep. Woke up at 6:30 and made a quick breakfast of my dwindling food suuply and then matt and I went to the bus at 7:30. We got a round trip ticket to Belfast for 40 quid, which is not bad at all.
We got on the bus. It was actually very full, and we spent the whole ride talking about cow biology, and philosophy, and Catholic beliefs, and euthanasia. I didn’t sleep on the bus. We went through Leinster, which is a very flat place. Very very flat, and not as pretty as munster in the slightest. We went through Cashel, and I saw the rock of cashel on the hill. It was cool, but under construction, so I don’t think I will be doing a day trip there. We then went through a very foggy and cloudy patch and then got to Dublin in the drear. Dublin had like the same structure as Cork, with quays, but the one thing was that it was far larger, the highway seemed a bunch like Minneapolis highways, and there were strip malls and everything all over. There was also an abundance of huge nice offices that were empty and to let, a leftover of the celtic tiger. There were tonnes of these all over. It was sad.
We got to the bus station and it was slightly bigger than in cork. We had some spicy chicken sandwiches but they were not spicy. Pigeons were all over inside the building, and two looked like they were trying to mate. We got in line for the Ulsterbus gold, and got on the bus with no issue. We went through this tunnel that was like 3 miles long- it took us like 5 minutes to get through! I tried to do the breath holding thing but to no avail. When we exited the insanely long tunnel, we were in suburbia. Weird. We went north, and then mountainous areas started to dot the landscape. It kind of looked like the cork and Kerry border country. We crossed into Northern Ireland, and our 3rd country visited so far, and the only way we knew was because our phones told us that we were on the UK network! Funny. There were no passport checks or borders or anything. We drove on.
We got to Belfast, and it sure was a bit bigger than cork. Through the sun and haze we could see mountains to the left. We got off at the bus station, and I realized I didn’t have a map of how to get to the Serenity games to find the map that brandon left for us, to find the way to Brandon's apartment that we are going to be illegally staying in. I knew it was east and on botanical road. The game shop closed at half 6 so I figured we would have time, but now I was nervous because of the fact that we needed to find our damn room and our damn keys and such. We walked east, and I saw a shop that said botanic on it. There were no damn street signs or markings, and the info kiosks were not helpful. We walked towards the botanic shop and then saw a sign for botanic avenue! I was like “We need to find number 46” and matt said “theres 48” and boom! I looked up and saw it! I was very relieved! Bounded up the stairs and got in and I said hi, we are friends of Brandon and she pulled out a manila envelope! Score!!!! I was concerned Brandon would forget to leave his key, but he didn’t! Yay! The shop was small and full of people playing magic. I asked where to print our itinerary, and she couldn’t think of anything. I asked how to get to elms, and this one nerd gave long and complicated directions. Then, a fat transvestite/crossdresser with white makeup, blond hair, boobs, and a dress, and pantyhose gave us a crude map. He or She also had nail polish. Lol. A crossdressser, that was goth. Ha.
We started to walk, and got lost in the botanical garderns, which were really really pretty. I had begun to notice the buildings in Belfast were brick, and a lot nicer than cork. Belfast is not as shabby as cork. We kept walking, and found this gas staion. I went in and asked the girl wehere elms village was, and she said right behind the gas station. Ha! We went there and got in brandons room! Score! He left us a map of Belfast! That was great! And the passkey for getting on the internet! Dodged a bullet there. I shittily planned this, because I assumed there would be internet. I didn’t write down our booking references because I assumed we could look them up. But yeah.Luckily, we looked up everything. So we checked out brandon’s small room, and went to Tesco to get food.
Tesco was small and cheap! Matt found an advertisement for KFC, and we had seen one on the way over! So we got groceries, dropped them off at brandon’s and then went and walked around till we found KFC! We saw the quad at Belfast, and it was gorgeous. It was so pretty and red brick. Made UCC’s look small and ugly. And SJU look like a pile of shit. We got to KFC and ordered the duke. We emulated paddy’s talk all day, and how he says Your man, and we cant figure out the context. KFC perked both of us up. The waiter was named janjo and he was Asian with a funny accent. We got beans fries, and yes they were fries not chips, a chicken sandwhich, a drink, and a piece of fried chicken for 5 pounds. Awesome! Then we found Paddy’s palace where the tour is, and went back and I took the floor and duvet, and mattt took the bed. We were out by 11.
March 27th
We woke up at 7:50, and I went to the kitchen and got my cereal. We made ourselves some breakfast, and then matt said something about daylight savings time, because Brandon’s computer switched. It was actually 9:15 in stead of 815. We went, "oh shit". We then ran out of the building. We ran the whole way to Paddy’s palace, and got there just in the nick of time, out of breath and sweaty. Close call. Good save by matt. We were an hour off and if we would have missed the tour that would have sucked terribly. We got on the bus, and the very stereotypical bus driver ranted about a lot of people were missing. We said “I know why”. Nobody even announced the time change! Then, we went to 2 other places and picked people up, to make a full bus. We set off and drove by the leaning tower of Belfast. It was a sunny day. As we drove down the road, the tour guide asked us all of our nationalities. There were Spanish, French, hong Kong, Americans, Canadians, and Italians. He said he hated Italians, and told a story about one time he got arrested in Italy for driving a bus up a one way street. He also said he hated Canadians.
Then, we got near the Carrick a rede rope bridge and there was a biker on the road, clogging it and making him almost hit her. He said “God damn cyclists! I hate cyclists.” He was very funny and coarse. He kept asking us if we were happy and then not being satisfied with our answer, because it wasn’t loud enough. We got to the rope bridge, and then matt and I went down right away and got to the main stuff. We were so happy! We could see Iona in the distance, and Scotland, and it was still mostly sunny. Got to explain to Matt about Columba and iona. That was cool, being able to apply my knowledge. We walked by these cliffs, and got a huge whiff of the salty briny ocean air. We got to the bridge, and I took matt’s picture on it. We crossed, and it was cool looking down, even though it was only like a 50 foot drop. On the island we got a great view of everything, but we couldn’t really climb. We walked back, taking our time, and making fun of all the stupid people that were just getting to the rope bridge. We came to the main place, and pissed like a Russian racehorse. Then we explored down by the other cliffs. It was so perfect, we decided county Antrim was the best county. Even though it was British.
We were right back to the bus, and got on. But people were dragging ass getting back. The three damn Spanish girls were actually eating a snack at the food stall! The driver got really really pissed, and swore, and said feckin tourists. He went outside and hurried everyone in. He was mad and said we were 30 min behind schedule, and said the dumb girls had to buy everyone lunch. He then sang us Tell Me Ma about Belfast girls, on the way to the Causeway, and told us the story about the formation of it. He said the heating and cooling thing was bullshit, and it was actually an irish giant and a Scottish giant that everyone calls angus because it’s a stereotypical Scottish name yelling curses at eachother over the sea. The Scottish giant built a causeway over to Ireland so he could kick the irish one’s ass, but when the irish giant saw him, he was scared because Angus was 3x his size. So he went into his house, and his wife dressed him up as a baby. Angus came to the irish ones’s house and had tea with his wife while he waited for the irish one to get back home from work, but when he saw the baby, he thought who the hell could produce a baby like that and got so scared he ran back to Scotland and tore up the causeway. Much better explanation.
We got to the causeway and John said that everyone should go in for lunch. When I said matt and I brought our own, he said in a high inflection “Iiii Don’t Care!! Why do you have to be antisocial and abandon us”. That is why Paddywagon was awesome, because you can do your own thing. Matt and I went right down to the causeway, and it was crawling with people. The columns were so cool to climb on though, and we saw some good pools in some. The tide was out, and so that kind of sucked. But the waves were cool. The desktop picture i have shows the causeway at sunset, which would be awesome to see, but we made do with what we could. We walked up a hill to see the organ, and it was cloudy by this point in time. Indian people were taking picutres by it. Then we walked back, and had lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwhiches, and drank water from the sink. Then, Matt saw a Somali guy washing his feet in the sink. They apparently do that but we don’t know why.
We got back in the bus and went towards Derry. The bus driver was being funny and brash again, and when some people were opening up a plastic bag, he said “will you stop that rattling!” And then he told us about how Ireland and Scotland got in an argument about whisky, and the irish distill 3x and Scottish distill 2x. So after a legal battle, they said the irish kind is spelled “whiskey” and the Scottish kind spelled “whisky”. We came to this old dun lace castle, and got a photo opportunity, but that was all. Back on the road, Matt and I talked about girls names we like and hate. The bus driver asked if anyone had gotten engaged on the causeway, and nobody did, and he was disappoint. He said that in 2 months of the tour, 10 couples got engaged there. But he kept calling it the cliffs of moher. He sang Galway Girl. And then he told us that he had gotten complaints about being rude, and that he was having an off day because he broke up with his girlfriend last night.
He said they were only going out for 2 weeks, and they were by the place he first made love. They hadn’t done the deed with her yet, and after playing around a while he thought he would try to go for it. She didn’t seem willing, but then eventually they were both excited. But she asked some questions, as most girls do, but these questions made her seem unsure of things. He was telling her about what his ex’s mom her mom told him and she told him “we are through” and walked away. He told us, “do you want to know what her mom said? She came up to me and said "Baaaaaahhhh!!!” Everyone laughed really hard.
He said “Yeah, we were through, but my mom told me that there are plenty of fish in the sea…or sheep in the field. Welcome to Ireland, where men are men, and sheep are scared!” Matt and I lolled so much, it was the best quote ever. He said, now, ill put on for ye some traditional irish music. He played lyrnrd skynrd. Haha! Then he played a cd of a band that sang a really good song about Stompin’ mary showing her legs to some man. We drove though “The mountains” and he told the Norwegian person who laughed at that “This is my country and these are my mountains. Feck off”. He then told us about the story behind the word Feck. He said the irish invented it to replace fuck, and said “Nuns even say it. When I was in school, a nun said “John Furlong put your hands on your desk you little fecker!” Nuns are coarse.” Matt and I zoned out for a bit then.
We got to Derry, and he explained that the loyalist unionist Protestants call it Londonderry after the people who built the town, and the republican nationalist Catholics call it Derry, after the columcille monastery. He talked about a guy named Hume who negotiated peace talks and stuff, and was voted the best man in Ireland. We got to a statue and it was two men holding hands, in like a united we stand pose. We went to a tourist place, and they had free brocures. I stuffed my backpack full while matt took a dump which was so bad it made everyone avoid the restrooms. We then went outside and met our tour guide.
Rory spoke Italian and Spanish and conversed with the people from there on our trip. He then led us up to the city wall, which was built on an island that they have since paved over. He talked about how the conflict has been started in the 1800’s and gone on till the 1980’s. He then told us that he lived in Bog village in Derry, the Catholic and nationalist part. He said the people in the nice suburbs are protestant and you see lots of union jacks, and then showed us the only prod part by the wall, a place where the streets were painted red white and blue and the sign said Londonderry is oppressed. He said there are 500 prods surrounded by 75,000 Catholics. Nice. Then we walked along and saw cannons! He talked about this church being fortified with 6 foot thick walls and cannons on the roof. Then he showed us a cemetery where the Catholic ira members are buried. We then got to this plateau thing with paint splotched on it. He said there used to be a 90 foot tall tower with a statue of this british oppressor on it, that all the catholics had to wake up and look at every day. Seriously, you could see this area from all the hill around the bog town. So in 1972, a few guys went up, climed up it, and strapped bombs to it, and blew it to hell!! Awesome!! Rory said the prods were enraged…and the catholics partied. The best part is, is that they never built it back up!
Then we walked down into the bogside and saw these murails, as rory said. One had this woman banging a trash can lid, because that’s what the nationalists would do if the loyalists went into their neighborhood. One had a gas mask guy, and A Molotov cocktail in his hand. They were so cool. Paddy said that Derry was the most nationalistic city in northern Ireland, and i can see why, with a huge area of bogside. Matt and I loved Derry, because the history was so real. There are some forts and stuff wehre it was only a training base, or some ancient battle was fought there. Then there are places like Derry, where the conflict and tension are still there. I liked the graffiti, because there was a purpose behind it, unlike the cork graffiti. Derry was the real thing. Rory showed us the bloody Sunday memorial, and talked about how the Irish prisoners would not wear the uniform, and thus went naked and got beat. So they stayed in their cells, and pissed on the floor and smeared shit on the wall. For 5 years they lived in their own shit, and Margaret Thatcher would not let them go. 10 died. I hate the British.
As we left Derry, we were held up by fire-fighters rushing to a scene. They had all gathered around this building. Later on in subway, we heard on the radio about there being like a bomb threat in this one building! It’s interesting when something you saw makes the news!
Then we went back, and matt and I took a picture of the hand statue, and we drove back to Belfast. The driver had a singing contest, and only a few people sing. The Canadians didn’t even know the words to their own damn anthem. He sang a song about irish girls with brown hair, and said the redheads break your mind, blondes break your soul, and brunettes are easy. Then we fell asleep, and the clouds cleared in time for the sunset. We got back to Belfast and I was indecisive about food, so we ate subway. I almost didn’t have enough money, so matt was not happy with my incompetence. We went back to elms, and tried not to get caught and reported. We figured out that we needed an email recipt in order to go on the tour tomorrow, so matt was not happy. We looked up a city library that printed, because no internet cafes would print. We then looked up the place we were supposed to be tomorrow for the tour. We were both really tired. We heard people moving about in the halls, so we looked up the Belfast class schedule and sure enough they had class tomorrow.
March 28th
We woke up and ate our Tesco apples and dry cereal for breakfast. We didn’t wanna go arouse suspicion, and so we walked out and headed to the library. We walked through town, passing by the nice red brick buildings that were able to identify with the street signs. We got to the city library, and found some pence to print off our ticket. Belfast is so organized and nice, and everyone’s accent sounds a large bit Scottish. We made our way to the place where the bus tour departed from, and got there a little bit early. We were the only two people on the tour so far, and handed our ticket to the guy, and asked about sitting on top of the bus in the open air area. It was pretty awesome to be up so high. An Asian guy and his friend also came out, but they left for the inside halfway through.
The tour started by taking us by the leaning tower of Belfast, which leans at an 8 degree angle. Then we headed east, seeing this statue of a fish and the “thing with the ring” sculpture that was modeled after its texas counterpart. We headed towards the shipyards, and passed this new arena. The guy said it was for ice hockey, and we went YEAH! He said that Belfast had gotten a team of irish guys, but none of them could balance on skates! So they imported a bunch of guys from MN and the usa, and made a team that was originally called the Belfast bombers, but they thankfully changed that. We drove by the two largest loading cranes in the world, the big yellow things. As the bus went faster matt and i got the cold wind. We were going at highway speed, and it was really cold, but really fun.
We then saw the spot where the titanic was built. It was very awesome! The boat was 855 feet long, and it took us a while to drive by the area. Apparently they are reconstructing it or something. We saw the HMS Con-something, the oldest ship still in the fleet. We headed more east, and saw an IKEA and groaned. NI seems to have the whole british Americanization thing. Then we passed into the suburbs. I would live here. They are like the british suburbs, with ivy on the red brick walls, and nice lawns. And Victorian style chimneys that actually burn stuff. Then we came to Campbell college. It is where CS lewis taught. They offered some guy a position teaching “belfast’s cream” which he turned down by saying “You are right, they are thick and rich. Goodbye!”. Witty humor transcends all generations.
Then we got to Stormont Estate. We were really far out of town! Matt and i would never had gotten this far out of town by ourselves. We pulled up to the gate, and a policeman came all the way up to the bus to make sure we were not bringing bombs up on to the bus. This was a Parliament building after all. We drove up this long road, and got to the building. Apparently they designed it to be 365 meters long, and the arcitecutre mirrors 24 and 7 and that stuff. And there are 366 trees in the yard, because it was finished on a leap year! But google earth has deduced that it is actually .7 meters short. There was a sick statue with a guy who looks like he should be holding a fireball. I wanted to have a gas line coming out of that hand to create that effect. Then we had a nice ride back to the city, and saw graffiti that said “awesome pussy” and other obscene stuff under a bridge. The tour guide said that Belfast’s shipyards got bombed by the Luftwaffe, and some buildings in town got strafed! Wow!!
We pulled back in for a 15 min smoke break. But during this break, lots of people came on the bus. We saw this Church with Celtic cross is made out of stone from every county in Ireland. We then went around and saw buildings like city hall, and then went to the Catholic part of town where there was a peace wall. It was a huge freaking wall with spikes on top. There must really have been some hatred here. There were murals galore all over the walls, and you could tell the people here still hated the British. There were bomb attacks here, and there was one building where it was burned and bombed out, and they just left it standing! The guy said other interesting facts, but it was overshadowed by these two guys sitting in front of matt. The guy just talked and chatted and pointed things out the whole time. We really wanted to kill him. Eventually, the lady behind me said “will someone please tell that guy to shut the fuck up”. But the tour was done. The first half was better.
We quickly walked to Serentiy and dropeed the key off, and then went to the bus station. We waited for a while, and made pb and j sandwhiches as we waited. I couldn’t help but think about me having to do this in April, which has been growing on my mind. We caught the bus and started the long journey home. I wanted to sleep, but matt kept me up the whole freaking time with his jabbering. We got to Dublin, had our paninis at the station, and then got on the 4pm bus to home. Matt still didn’t let me sleep. There were these two French ladies next to us that asked us how long the bus ride was. One of them was gorgeous, and had the most perfect nose i had ever seen. There was also this annoying as hell lady in the back that jabbered the whole time. We got back to Leeside at like 2030 and i thought jeez, i am so worn out, i hope i don’t get this worn out during the camino walk.
