Shelley and I were in Belfast the other week. Whether you call it the Six Counties, Ulster, the North of Ireland, Northern Ireland or simply the North, you might want to read about what a wonderful time we had -:
Newcastle United completed the signing of Peter Beardsley from Vancouver Whitecaps on Tuesday 20th September 1983. I learned of this on the first local sports news bulletin of the day on Metro Radio, just before dawn the following day. I was out of my pit extra early that day, on account of the fact I was off to the New University of Ulster, in Coleraine, County Derry that very morning. In what was to be a glorious promotion winning campaign, with Kevin Keegan, Chris Waddle and Beardsley himself scoring goals for fun, I first got to see the little maestro on Boxing Day when we beat Blackburn 1-0, as it was a little too far to get back for home games from my new home athwart the River Bann, which proved distinctly dissimilar to my childhood experiences of holidays in rural south west County Cork.
Returning at the end of three years “study,” armed with a moderate degree, a hacking smoker’s cough, an extra couple of stones courtesy of a severe black porter habit and zero idea of what to do with the rest of my life, I at least got to see Beardsley regularly during the last year of his first spell on Tyneside, his final appearance consisting of limping off against Manchester United in a 2-1 win on Easter Saturday 1987, and the whole of his Indian Summer return between 1993 and 1997. As regards the Causeway Coast, a liquor-logged weekend in January 1999 was the last time I’d been in that area, despite having clocked up visits to 31 of the 32 Irish counties (Kerry; you’re still on my radar) since then. Indeed, I’d taken it for granted that I’d not set foot on Portstewart Promenade again in my life, though it is strange how things turn out, especially as my son Ben has settled down with Lucy, who hails from Comber, County Down and my partner Shelley’s mother came from Sixmilecross, just outside Omagh in County Tyrone.
Those of you attuned to the hyper-sensitive semantics of nomenclature regarding that part of the world will notice I’ve so far avoided the use of any contentious names for the area as a whole. No mention, thus far, of: Ulster, the Six Counties, Northern Ireland, or the North of Ireland. As this piece will hopefully show, this is because the recent trip Shelley and I made to her ancestral home and the territory surrounding my alma mater (well, I hardly ever went there as a student, so why would I bother visiting the campus now I’m pushing 60?) has made me reconsider my attitude to a place that I have taken to calling the North of Ireland, or more informally, the North, but that I’m now ambivalent, rather than openly hostile, to calling Northern Ireland.
As I’ll hopefully show, things have changed over the last 40 years; almost entirely for the better. It isn’t as intense as it was; how could it be? While it’ll never be home to me in the way I feel about de Banks, you can go from Strabane to Larne and Portballintrae to Newry and sense you’re in a place that is now at ease with itself and what it consists of. I’ll still never build a bonfire or play a flute, but then again neither will about 75% of those living in what I’m no longer averse to calling Northern Ireland. Or perhaps just the North…
Next year, when I turn 60, I want to have both a beach holiday with Shelley and a trip to Belgium for beer and football with Ben. Therefore, the issue of a holiday this year required somewhere a bit further afield than Ayrshire, where we went last year but closer than the Maldives, for instance. Having sourced a place to stay with Ben’s father-in-law to be, Shaw, out on the Newtownards Road, the North was to be our destination. Shelley felt a need that bordered on an urge to visit where her mam’s family came from, especially as her mam’s 13th anniversary fell on the Wednesday we were over there. In contrast, all I needed was the chance to sup black porter and, hopefully, see a football game.
Because of parental responsibilities with Shelley’s kids, we could only feasibly go away between Monday 21st to Friday 25th August, which I initially thought would rule out the prospect of seeing a game; all the more galling as Dundela, the team I’d been keen to watch, were at home to Ballinamallard on Saturday 26th. Luckily, the IFA had rescheduled a couple of Premier Division games for the Tuesday night; Crusaders v Carrick Rangers and Linfield v Cliftonville. Despite paying cognisance to the stated aims of a new, more inclusive society in Belfast, there was no way I was heading to Windsor Park. If it had been at Solitude, fair enough, but I’ve already been there. Therefore, in the spirit of groundhopping, it had to be Seaview for Shelley and me. And what a choice that turned out to be, but more of that later.
We arrived at Newcastle airport with plenty of time to spare on the Monday morning. All the more so as the flight to Aldergrove, as I still call it, was delayed an hour. As ever, Easy Jet are only marginally behind Ryan Air in terms of treating passengers like cattle, so we eventually got squashed in on a fullish plane, landing 40 minutes later. Instead of the kind of hypervigilant, militaristic experience that going through any kind of customs checkpoint, whether it be road, rail or sea, involved during the 80s and, to an extent, the 90s, this time we waltzed through arrivals without being asked how old our grannies were or what school we went to, stopping only to marvel at the R2D2 lookalike robot floor cleaners that even asked you to please step aside while they swabbed the floors.
Shaw
was waiting for us, and within the hour we’d done a bag drop and had a cuppa at
his, before taking the Glider, a new-fangled swish commuter bus that is a fine
legacy to Werner Heubeck’s long tenure as busfahrer. Alighting a stop
too late at Connswater Shopping Centre (Van Morrison songs were to be a feature
of this holiday), we doubled back on ourselves, via a charming, almost apolitical
East Belfast celebrity mural (Eric Bell, George Best, CS Lewis and a fella
called Morrison et al), to Bullhouse East, a craft ale paradise on the
Newtownards Road, where the Rolling Papers Hazy IPA was a glorious,
5.2%, citrusy party on the palate. It could have been tempting to just sit down
there for the day, especially with a wood-fired pizza oven out back, but there
was a whole city to explore, so we took the Glider further on into town and
headed for, where else, The Crown. Passing the Northern Bank, source of
the PIRA Pension Plan withdrawal, I noticed it was now Danske Bank, who no
longer sponsor the Northern Ireland Premier League. Sports Direct now
have that gig, which we’ll say no more about.
Talking of whom, awakening late on Tuesday morning, my senses were assailed by the burnt aroma of slowly cooked arabica, creeping into the bedroom courtesy of Bell’s Bean Roasters round the way from Shaw’s place and a companion sizzle of an incipient Ulster fry being prepared by our host. What a hero. I still don’t know which food Van the Man was taking about when he refers to the smell of the baking / bacon from across the street got up my nose on Cleaning Windows mind. No matter, a proper heart attack on a plate set us up brilliantly for an afternoon’s research. We headed for the GRONI (General Records Office, Northern Ireland), as opposed to the PRONI (Public Records Office, Northern Ireland) on Stranmillis Road, just up past Queens. Going past QUBSU, I was transported back to the days we travelled up to see The Fall, Johnny Thunders, Everything but the Girl and New Order from Coleraine, in battered NUU minibuses that we’d semi-fraudulently hired as we overegged our alleged membership of the Musicians’ Union.
In the GRONI, after negotiating an incompetent receptionist and morally censorious archivist, Shelley successfully located and ordered her grandmother’s birth, marriage, and death certificates, as well as her late aunt’s birth certificate. A quick trip into the Ulster Museum put the whole of The Troubles in context for Shelley (remember she was still at school when the Good Friday Agreement was signed), before Shaw did the honours by chauffeuring us on the usual Belfast tourist route up The Shankill and down The Falls. Now I do realise the murals are probably more a kind of historical artefact than a statement of current political beliefs these days, but it does jar that a memorial at the bottom of The Shankill includes the names of those responsible for the Miami Showband atrocity on a list of fallen heroes, while the top of The Falls has a display dedicated to former Barcelona boss Patrick O’Connell, who once turned out for Ashington, trivia fans. I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions about the efficacy of the moral compasses either side of the still depressingly real and recently reinforced Peace Line.
The
next set of murals we saw were UDA dedicated ones on the Shore Road, as Shaw
dropped us off for the game. He’s a lapsed Glen man and seemed to take us past
The Oval every time we went out in the car. Mind, Seaview was also a regular
sight to behold. I must admit to not feeling particularly at home in the
environs of Crues ground, though the closer we got to it, the less political it
became. Indeed, the preponderance of black and red flags and shirts meant you could
easily have been in Phibsborough going to see Big Club. Well, perhaps not, but
it stopped feeling like a Panorama documentary from the late 70s after a
while. To be fair to Crues, and the half a dozen Carrick fans that made the 20-minute
trip down the side of Belfast lough, there was not a single sectarian chant
heard all night. It could be that the Huns v PSV Champions’ League qualifier on
RTE (yes; really…) had thinned out the number of bigots on display, or they
might all have been at Windsor Park for a cross-community singalong, but I’m
prepared to give Crusaders the benefit of the doubt and applaud them for the
warm, positive and welcoming atmosphere. Chatting with the fella who sold us a
programme, he expressed genuine joy that we’d opted to pay them a visit as part
of our holiday.
Then again, when you win 9-0, it is easy to be magnanimous I suppose. Ironically, Carrick could twice have scored in the opening minutes, before the home side tore through the opposition and fired in a quick two-goal, salvo. It would have been 3 immediately afterwards, but a last-man foul and penalty held up the cavalry charge for a minute or so. The spot kick went in, and Carrick were broken like a cheap, plastic watch in the opening quarter of an hour. Frankly, it got no better for them from that point onwards. A crowd of about 700 in a quirky, gloriously mismatched stadium cheered as the home side rattled in goals from every attack. It ended up 9-0, but there were 2 disallowed and a couple of near misses as well. All this on the day when Carrick were bought out by a consortium of American businessmen from the Estee Lauder foundation. Despite the final score, they are only promising cosmetic changes in the future. Arf!
Ironically, Carrick recovered from this mauling by taking a point in a 3-3 draw away to Linfield, while Crues eviscerated Dungannon Swifts 4-0 in their next game. Just before I wrote this, Crues drew 2-2 with the Glens at The Oval, in a rescheduled game that had been postponed the Saturday before we arrived after a month’s rain had fallen in one night in Belfast.
Shaw collected us at full time, and we headed back for an early night as Wednesday was the big trip out to Omagh and beyond. Fuelled by a sausage and bacon soda, we started on our 240-mile odyssey by heading out west, to a soundtrack of the wee man from Strabane, your Uncle Hugo Duncan on Radio Ulster, proving that schmaltzy country and western will never surrender. Minute scanning of Google maps took us out to Sixmilecross, a pleasant planter village that, despite a preponderance of post Reformation places of worship, has a distinctly more Nationalist feel to it as a result of demographic shifts, as shown by the autographed Tyrone GAA jerseys on display in the window of the local pub, The Whistler’s Inn. We called in to ask for directions and the woman behind the bar directed us out to where McNally houses were on the edge of the village. I’m not sure we saw them, but we soon found the other, much smaller, settlement of Mountfield where Shelley’s aunts were christened. There is only 1 place of worship in that village. There were no Union flags fluttering on lamp posts here, though the smell of turf burning clogged the August air. Nice place.
Next
up, we visited Omagh for lunch, grabbed some maps from a wonderfully helpful
Tourist Information officer, noted the bizarre sight of a number 93 double
decker heading for Sixmilecross (how could it avoid all those low hanging
branches on the country lanes?), and struck out for the Causeway Coast. The
ragged beauty of the Sperrins, the less pressing allure of Cookstown, Maghera,
Swatragh and Dungiven on the road to Coleraine, before we came across the
beauty of Portstewart Promenade. Parking up at The Anchor, we took a stroll the
full length of The Prom to where I used to live at number 5, then back again,
stopping for a ice cream at Morelli’s. A winding tour down the small streets
where I drank, smoked and read 4 decades ago, noticing places where I lived or
simply dossed when drunk, and then down the coastal path to Portrush.
Splendidly seedy as ever, Barry’s amusements were in full swing, and I was
delighted to note my old home at 77 Causeway Street still has the same front
door. It looks like the windows haven’t been washed since we moved out in 1984
either. My eyes misted over as I
reflected on how I’d seen all these important places again. I hope to go back
for a proper visit. From there, Shaw put his foot down and we completed 240
miles in the car and 8 miles on foot, before another quiet night in his place.
This had been a special and an important day for both Shelley and me.
Thursday was our last full day, and it involved a physical catch-up with one of my old pals and a phone catch up with another. Firstly, we did another Van Morrison influenced tour, cutting down Cyprus Avenue and across Hyndford Street, to get some keys cut for Shaw’s place, as he was off out on a work beano at some swanky place in town and we’d need to look after ourselves. We parked up in some particularly staunch Loyalist area, festooned like there was a Royal wedding imminent, which meant I needed the calming tones of Uncle Hugo Duncan to avoid meltdown. Keys cuts, we then headed out to Bangor, which I’d not set foot in since Autumn 1984. We had a dander about the marina, drinking lovely takeaway coffees and noticing the place is massively improved and no longer really a seaside resort, but rather more of a stop off point for the yachting set.
The
purpose of going to Bangor was to meet my old Teenage Fanclub pal Pedro
(Peter), and then to sink some pints. Turns out Pedro’s architect brother lives
on Cyprus Avenue and designed Bullhouse East, so it’s a small world. We
discussed this over several pints in Jenny Watts and then the magnificent
Fealty’s, which served up the pint of the holiday. An incredible spot: a corner
bar with a Free Trade meets The Cumberland vibe for Ouseburn heads wanting a
reference point. It’s a music pub and, hearing sounds from the back room,
Shelley was in her element after finding the County Down Ukulele Orchestra in
full flow. Bright Side of the Road got an airing, of course; 40 ukulele players,
plus one fella on the bodhran and another on the penny whistle. I nipped
outside to take a call from my university pal Susan, who had hoped to meet us,
but was scuppered by initial a bout of Covid (remember that anyone?), then
impeded by work and the need to pack for an imminent Spanish holiday. It didn’t
happen this time, but it will in future. After all, it’s only 33 years since we
last caught up…
We
finished off with a quieter one in The Imperial, took a very swish train to
Lanyon Place (how much better than Northern Irish Railways to Belfast Central
in the old days?), then hopped a glider to Ballyhackamore for a final couple in
Hearth, before calling it a night. Fair play to Shelley, she didn’t like Guinness
(or Club Orange or Tayto Crisps, which must put her Tyrone roots
in doubt), but she drank a pint of black porter on her last night.
I
drank rather too many and, following late night rums and red wine with Shaw and
a couple of his inebriated work pals, I was traumatised by the drink on Friday
morning. Thanks goodness Shelley took control, providing enough sugar and
caffeine to get me upright and on the plane for a rapid journey home of about 5
hours door to door. She’s a keeper; I’m telling you.
So, how was it? Amazing from start to finish. Even the scary bits are only scary because of previous associations and memories, though Pedro did counsel me to keep my voice down when evaluating Jamie Bryson’s intellectual skills and cultural importance at one point. I love the place; it isn’t the Six Counties, and it definitely isn’t Ulster any longer. It may one day be Northern Ireland to me, as it doesn’t even feel like the North of Ireland did in my head. I feel happy calling it the North; it is both imprecise and geographically accurate. Whatever the name, it’s better to talk about semantics than Semtex. We’ll be back in the North, of that there is no doubt, though it’ll be Wilgar and not Windsor Park that I’m hoping to visit.
Finally, a massive thank you to Shaw who was an amazing host, an amazing chauffeur and amazing company throughout our stay. Cheers mate!!
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