Ireland Reflections 2020–Back to Belfast

A speaker at the Irish Language Center in BelfastAfter some longer days of travel, the group took a welcomed short trip to Cultúrlann – the Irish Language Center – in Belfast. For 3L Margaret Spring, this “was one of the most rewarding experiences of our trip.” She recalled the visit “reminded me that no matter how much a culture tries to be erased, it will not and cannot happen.”

Nim Nannan accounted “Culturlann is a great representation of the Irish’s determination to preserve and promote their language and culture. When a people are colonized, one of the first things the colonizers do is restrict the colonized sense of culture and identity to prevent the promulgation of both in future generations as to quickly assimilate them into their own. The founders of Culturlann formed the community center in direct opposition of this agenda by the British government.” She added, “the founders started both Irish language schools and a community center without government support and both continued to flourish as future generations took up the cause.”

After having the opportunity to explore the center and speak with current Culturlann director – and product of the Irish language school – Ciarán Mac Giolla Bhéin, the group piled into one of the classrooms to meet with first with two former IRA combatants who were now involved in both local politics and peacebuilding.

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Ireland Reflections 2020 — Border Tours & Fermanagh

While Tuesday gave us a pretty clear view of the Troubles from the perspective of the Catholic community, Wednesday was the opposite and brought us face to face with the pain of the Protestants in Northern Ireland.

A quick two-hour bus ride out of Belfast led us to the office of the South East Fermanagh Foundation (“SEFF”) for our first stop of our Fermanagh day. There we were greeted with warm biscuits, cups of tea and the Director of SEFF, Kenny Donaldson, and his fellow staff members.SEFF was formed in 1998 to help support innocent victims and survivors of the Troubles in South East Fermanagh. Bridget Smith noted, “The messaging of SEFF was clear:  ‘Terrorism knows no borders.’”  As Brighton Tropha said, “Kenny Donaldson informed the group about all of the services that SEFF offers to victims and survivors of the Troubles, including counseling, complementary therapies, as well as community outreach and advocacy provided by the Advocacy for Innocent Victims project.” She added, “The most moving part of Mr. Donaldson’s presentation was when he turned the group’s attention to all of the quilts lining the walls of the room. The quilts each represented a different memorial message, but each were made up of dozens of hand embroidered patches – representing innocent terror victims or terror attacks resulting in the loss of innocent lives – bringing together victims under a banner of innocence.”  The quilts (shown above and below) were quite amazing.

It was during our time with Kenny that we also had the opportunity to hear from other individuals who are members of SEFF, and one that stuck out for most of the group and in particular 2L Michael Becker, was a man named Ernie. Becker recalls, “Ernie told us about his experiences during The Troubles and centered it around one specific story that changed his life forever. As a result of a bomb attack on the school bus that Ernie used to drive children in his neighborhood to school every day, Ernie’s son took his own life. Ernie told us about how he had taught his son how to drive the bus once he was old enough, how his son would help him out driving the bus and with the kids, and how that morning his son started up the bus and did the daily check. Ernie’s son blamed himself for what happened that day, for not seeing the bomb under the bus, for not being able to save the children from an unthinkable harm.” Michael reflected, “What Ernie shared with us that day showed me that the death toll of The Troubles has not stopped counting, and without groups like SEFF who provide a platform for people to discuss the tragedies they have endured, that number will continue to rise with no end in sight.”Ernie with student Bridget Smith

The hardest part of the day was after lunch when we hopped back on the bus for a “tour” of the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland.  The roads meandered back and forth between the two as we crossed the border multiple times within the hour (showing us also how impossible Brexit with a hard border could be).  Our guide for this part of the tour told us the history of every attack that happened in this area throughout the Troubles and the combination of the description of the horrible attacks, the matter-of-fact tone of the explanation (here is where the farmer x was attacked; here is where this bombing took place; here is where this body was dumped etc), and the motion of the stop-and-start bus made for a pretty unpleasant, if important, experience.  Below is a picture of one of the memorials to terror victims at a church in the area.

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Ireland Reflections 2020–Derry Girls (and Boys) Part 2

Happy Monday to all–this continues the Ireland blog posts which I’ll have for the rest of this week! The visit to Derry was so filled with content that I divided this into two posts.  The morning (as outlined in the last post) was a walking tour of the neighborhoods and visiting the museum.  After a brief lunch break, we grabbed some tea and biscuits and piled into the basement of a local community center to speak with a series of incredible people.

First, we met Raymond McCartney, a recently retired Sinn Fein MLA (member of the N. Ireland Legislative Assembly), former IRA prisoner and an ex-hunger striker.  He told us the reason he decided to join the IRA was a culmination of his personal experiences while growing up in Derry/Londonderry.  He noted that it was from those experiences that joining the IRA seemed either inevitable or just the next logical step.   Jordan Daigle accounted, “many IRA members grew-up feeling oppressed or as though they were constantly at risk of abuse. To them, the best way to protect their families was to join an organization whose sole purpose was to expel their oppressors. We very rarely hear is the individual stories of members; what were their experiences growing up or what drew them to the fight. Raymond was the first former IRA member were heard from, but his story was one that was repeated much too often.”group photo of students with Raymond McCartneyMcCartney was a three-time imprisoned IRA hunger-striker, who “effortlessly framed the conflict for me” writes 3L Michaela Bear. “I was so captivated by Raymond McCartney it was not until after he was finished speaking that it dawned on me that he was released from his third prison sentence for killing a civilian and a Royal Union Constabulary officer only because of the Good Friday Agreement” she added.

We were then joined by an unlikely pairing – Lee Lavis and Fiona Gallegher. Lee is a former infantry man in the British army, who spent almost two and a half years stationed in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. Fiona is from a Derry Catholic family who suffered the loss of her brother – an IRA soldier – during that same time. Kaitlyn Gould reflected, “both individuals were victims of the system of which they were placed in, a system where the lives of civilians, working class citizens, soldiers, and so-called “terrorists” were expendable.” It was years after the Troubles that Fiona and Lee became friends through a forum that connected ex-soldiers with civilians. (For those of us who have worked with other restorative justice groups, and want to learn more, here’s the BBC story about them and the Veterans for Peace group)

photo of speakers in a discussion group“Having the opportunity to hear both Lee and Fiona open up to us and hear their experiences of the Troubles was not like anything you could read from a textbook” remarked Brook Oswald. She added “it was incredibly impactful listening to Fiona detail the fear, anger and loathing she felt for the British Army, yet empathize with Lee’s experiences as a loyal British soldier stationed in Ireland during the Troubles.”

Oswald concluded by saying, “you always hear that there are two sides to every story, but you never imagine putting yourselves in each person’s shoes and really understanding what got them to where they are today, which is exactly what the story of Fiona and Lee made me do. If two people such as Lee and Fiona, who viewed each other as the enemy for so long, can put aside the past and use it to move forward, it makes much of the conflict we face today seem so small.”

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