Belfast, A city with a painful past. How painful of a past I didn’t realize until my husband and I started listening to the audiobook, Say Nothing. We found listening to this book while driving in Upstate NY to be interesting. But when we listened to it while driving around Ireland and Northern Ireland we found it to be very intense. We were listening about the painful past in Belfast and all the violence going on. We were listening to that Irish voice read the book and explain the going ons and the cover-ups. There was so much pain and suffering of the people in Belfast both Protestant and Catholic alike. So many innocent lives were taken as well as some lives that weren’t so innocent. I understand I am an outsider looking in. I am only sharing my thoughts and observations in the blog, so please don’t get mad at me. Before this book, I was not as aware of all the things that happened and how things are still tense today.

While my husband and I were in Northern Ireland last week we went on a Black Cab Political tour of Belfast to see what its present situation is. I can tell you right now we didn’t do that tour for the fun of it. We did it so that we could see for ourselves what happened in the past and how it affects Belfast now. This Black Cab tour was informative and extremely emotionally draining. We didn’t realize that there are still gates surrounding parts of Belfast where people live that still get closed and locked every night and then opened each morning. We saw the “peace” wall that is still up so neighbors can’t be bombed by other neighbors. If you ask me that is not a wall of peace more like a wall of fear. We saw an area where a bar used to stand. Now its walls are covered with pictures of lives that were taken away years ago with one of them being Jean McConville, a 38-year-old widow and mother of 10, from her Belfast home in 1972. We saw 2 memorial plaques with names of people who died. Two of those people had my family’s name McCann which caught my attention and had me wondering if they were distant relatives of mine. At the end of the tour, we stopped at one side of the “peace wall” where people write notes of encouragement/prayer and we were able to write our own little notes on the wall. All the while we were there you could still feel some of the tension in the air from the past. There was seriously a lot to take in, in a short amount of time.

The future of Belfast was discussed with our cab driver. I didn’t realize that there are still relatives alive today who can remember their parents or their brother being killed by the opposing group. And I didn’t realize that some of the people from that group became politicians and made it into the government of Northern Ireland. I am praying for Belfast because I hope that somehow some way their past can eventually stay in the past. As an American/Irish person whose family started in Armagh, Northern Ireland I hope and pray that the next generation of both Protestants and Catholics in Belfast can start talking to each other and become friends with each other and not live in fear of each other. It would be wonderful to hear about that “peace” wall coming down and for everyone in Belfast to be able to get along with each other. Yes, I know I’m an outsider, but there is no reason why I can’t pray for all of that. Northern Ireland has a special place in my heart because of my family origins. Seeing everything I saw from that cab tour gave me new insights on Belfast and its painful past, its present situation and I pray a hopeful future.

Kathleen Smith author of Miscarriages My Story, Brooklyn Raised Livin’ Upstate & Hey You Moments to Remember. Blogs about a variety of things. Has her own podcast Kathleen’s Korner and she is the CEO of BearsWithApps. OH, let’s not forget her YouTube channel