April 23 Belfast

We got into Belfast at about 6 last night, we got off the bus and things didn't look promising. I had to remind myself we were at the bus station, this couldn't be the best the city had to offer. We checked into our hostel, it's really nice, small but it has private showers and the staff are awesome. It's called Vagabonds, near the university so there are beautiful girls everywhere. I think Belfast might rival Reykjavik in terms of the girls. We took a stroll last night and just bought some fruit for dinner. They have Tim Hortons coffee at all the corner stores but I haven't seen any actual locations. After watching some movies with the hostel staff we hit the hay.

There's a French guy in our room, he says he only started speaking English 5 months ago. I don't believe him, his accent is still a little heavy but I haven't had any trouble conversing with him. We got up and joined our roomy for breakfast, I was thrilled to see peanut butter on the table. An American from New Jersey just arrived at the hostel and we quickly began talking about or home state/province. The staff recommended the black cab tour and our new French and American friend decided to join us. The more people we got the cheaper it was, I highly recommend this tour to anyone who stops in Belfast. Best tour so far, the four of us squeezed into the back of the black cab and the cabbie joined us. He immediately began to berate us, in friendly fashion of course. He started poking fun at me and Bryce for our size but after finding out we were Canadians, not Americans his tone completely changed. Our American and French passengers weren't so lucky. But they took it all in good fun.

Belfast, for those of you who don't know isn't known for green hills, Guinness, Scotch, castles, or famous landmarks like the rest of the UK or Ireland. It's known for sectarian violence, terrorism and other terrible things. I actually find much of this more interesting, I'd rather look at a wall dividing two warring neighborhoods than some castle a rich douche used to inhabit.

He first took us to a catholic neighborhood, and down the street was a stretch of murals depicting IRA members, men who starved to death during hunger strikes, various marches and folk heroes. Just down the street was a high rise apartment building, and in 1970 the British Army took over the top three floors and manned them as a barracks and watch tower until 2007. The tour was really strange because the murals we saw were incredibly somber but once we began to start driving again humor took over as our driver began to curse and yell about everything from the Brits ruining the Titanic (the Irish built the fucker, then an English bastard drove it into an ice cube! He then told me to shut up because it was a Canadian iceberg) he seemed to try and stay neutral as our guide, but he definitely didn't like the Queen, Margaret Thatcher, or Bono.( what's the difference between Jesus and Bono? Jesus doesn't think he's Bono). We then stopped at the peace wall, it's one of 74 walls in Northern Ireland dividing a catholic neighborhood from a Protestant one. There were houses right behind the wall which was 40 feet high, but the houses had cages over their yards to prevent any grenades from landing in their yard. I guess that hasn't happened in many years, but when the Rangers (a football team in Glasgow loved by Protestants) loses to Celtic FC (catholic supported, Glasgow team) rocks and bottles are occasionally thrown over. On the Protestant side of the wall instead of murals it's covered in graffiti. Every year they have a competition and artists from all over the works tag the wall.

We then headed through a gate in the wall (which is still locked from 9pm to 7am 7 days a week) to the protestant side. We stopped in a park and I immediately noticed one of the murals, they call it "The Belfast Mona Lisa" it's the one below of the Loyalist Soldier on a blue background. Not only is it compared to the Mona Lisa because of its fame, but also because of the style. The Mona Lisa's eyes follow you, and this mural the soldiers gun follows you. Even as we stood directly underneath it you looked as though we were to be executed. Another mural depicted a leader of a loyalist militia, our driver informed us he killed a 26 year old girl working in a shop. She had no ties to the IRA, she was just catholic, however this mural depicted him a hero. One persons freedom fighter is another's terrorist.

Lastly our guide dropped us off at The Crown, a very famous pub here. It was built in the early 1800's by a mixed marriage family (meaning catholic husband protestant wife) it looked like a church inside, I guess it was built with the help of Italian marble carvers. Our guide informed us that the husband although giving into his wife and calling it The Crown placed a crown on the floor in tiles. So you have to step on it as you head in. His little fuck you to royalty. We had pints and bangers n' mash.

We walked around with our American roommate then headed back to the hostel, Bryce and I bought new shoes his are falling apart and mine are a year old and with all this walking make my feet stink horribly. Luckily it wasn't expensive for a nice pair of Nikes. Tonight is our hostels pub crawl I don't see many ladies here right now, hopefully we can meet some local girls instead.