I rode the train up to Belfast.
Just two hours from Dublin, but seemingly a world away.
I took a Black Taxi tour of the Belfast neighborhoods at the center of the Troubles.
There still is a large wall with fencing separating the Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods from one another.
At 6 pm every night, they lock the gates between the neighbors and re-open them at 6 am the next morning.
My taxi driver, Pat, said that they could take the wall down, “provided they wait two weeks after I am dead, just in case I come back.”
Pat clearly isn’t in a forgiving mood.
But he acknowledges that the next generation seems to have moved on.
Moved on. . . indeed.
Leave a comment