The emerald Isle.

This past weekend I went to Ireland. I flew into Dublin and spent the night there, then started a tour of Northern Ireland. It ended up that it was just me and another girl on the tour, she was a teacher who is a nanny in Ireland. We also had a girl guide so it was great fun! We went up to Derry and stooped a few times on the way. We were able to learn about the history of the city and Bloody Sunday. It was really interesting to learn about the history and the fighting that took there and why. I had thought that I had know what it was about but I did not and it was great to learn and be able to see it. We even went to the Bog side, which is where Bloody Sunday happened and saw Free Derry. It is a part of the city that during the fighting declared itself free and not a part of the UK. 

   The next day we went to the Giants Causeway. It is an amazing place, it is a rock formation that was caused when lave was coming out of the earth and froze. It is amazing it looks like a stairway into the ocean. I went on the tour so that I could see this, it is something that I had wanted to see for a while and am so happy that I have. We got to Balfest that night, which is when I caught a stomach bug. LAME! But the next morning I was ok. We went on a black taxi ride. It takes you through belfast and into the catholic and protestant areas. As well as by the peace walls. The driver tells you the history as you go. It was so strange to see a wall about 50 feet high with cameras all around it in a modern world. I kept being reminded of the segregation that happened in the states. I could not understand how people could still hold onto past grudges and choose to live in this way. I was able to understand towards the end just how deeply it still effects people. But that there is also progress being made. I had asked are driver if he was Chatolics or Protestant and at the end of the tour he told us that he is Protestant. he said that he has children and he and his wife have chosen that they go to an integrated school. A school where both Protestant and Catholics go.  The night we were in Belfast was the same night that the shooting of the two british soldiers occurred. It was the first violence since 2000. The city as well as the whole region were in shock and really seemed afraid that they might return to the old ways of fighting. 

 

When we got back to the hostel I went and got food from a shop with a girl from my  room and ended up in the hostel talking with some other people staying there. I was sitting there talking with these people that I had just meet and we talked about what we all have in common, travel. It was great a canadian, Swede, german, Argentinean and myself.  It was great to sit and eat together and share travel stories. 

When I got home on Monday I was told that I new roommate was moving in the next night. I meet him and he seemed nice enough. He is an Italian guy who moved in the next day and is nice and I think it will be fine. Today a french couple moved in. They seem nice and I like her it will be nice to have a girl in here to talk to . I think it will be great and I do only have another month left so it will be ok even if it is not a perfect situation.