The Stories

One thing that has surprised me about our visit to Belfast is just how willing people have been to share their stories.  There were a couple pre-arranged talks organized for us before we arrived, but some of the most astonishing recollections of The Troubles came from people we met casually.  By asking a lot of questions and demonstrating how keen and interested we were, people jumped on the opportunity to share their interpretation of events.

 

Ruth, the manager at Farset International and a long time friend of the program, adopted us as her surrogate family for the length of our stay.   Her upfront personality and unwillingness to be overly politically correct, allowed us access to a very honest story.  It was told through the eyes of someone who has lost countless friends and family members to the conflict.  She described once as a young girl being nearly blown up in a terrorist explosion.  The near miss resulted in her being briefly taken care of by a group of Catholic people in the neighborhood.  When she had finally come to, she quickly returned home and pretended as if nothing had happened.  She was more afraid to how her Protestant mother may have reacted to Ruth receiving aid from Catholics, than what could have been a horrific tragedy.  Through this, Ruth has grown into an incredibly strong and capable woman, somehow made strong by the events she had survived.

 

Every taxi we took through the city posed as an opportunity to access another viewpoint.  One cab driver told us stories of the 3 times he claims murder attempts had been made on his life.  Another very up front taxi driver stayed for an extra 10 minutes after he had dropped us off to do justice to his story of how he got involved with the IRA.  He graphically described his first “job” and how happy he was to learn who his first target would be.  This man, he described as a low life responsible for ruining many lives from selling drugs.  The taxi driver told us how he had been wearing a full mask when he shot out the man’s knees.  He wished he could have taken the mask off, as if his victim knowing his own identity would have made him feel more proud of what he was to do.  Luckily, he said, he kept the mask on.  He now lives down the street from this man.   He claims the man is still a low life but now walks with a limp.  The above mentioned scenario was fairly common throughout our interactions with taxi drivers in particular; and reflects the level of shockingly honest disclosure people were willing to share during our time in Belfast.

Many of the stories that were shared to us had an agreed upon distrust and disrespect for the police force.  During The Troubles, the police force serving Northern Ireland was known as The Royal Ulster Constabulary.  The RUC at its peak had about 8,500 members serving.  From the start of the conflict until the signing of The Belfast Agreement in 1998, 319 officers were killed and another nearly 9000 were injured.  During the conflict, the RUC was the most dangerous police force in the world to serve in. This police force was disbanded in 2001 due to allegations of bias.  This led to the creation of The Police Service of Northern Ireland.  

 

 Three members of the PSNI came in to talk to our group once again about their interpretation of events.  The officers openly discussed the lack of respect they felt from the public, something they felt was slowing changing but still far from many other countries.  The officers were extremely friendly.  They let us try on their riot gear, and sit inside the fortified Land Rover police vehicles.  While the police in Northern Ireland are usually scrutinized, the stories they told of working the front line during riots were just as harrowing as any other.  The representatives who spoke to us claim that now the majority of police efforts in Belfast are centered on community policing and communication in an attempt to win over the respect of the public.

 

Our last night at Farset, Ruth managed to convince her husband Jim to come speak to our group.  Jim served in the British Army for years during The Troubles. He was stationed various locations around Belfast.  The stories he shared with us involved some of the most horrific recollections of torture and disembodiment of soldiers imaginable.  He recalled constantly finding bodies, losing friends to makeshift explosions, entering booby-trapped houses and being taunted and attacked by young children.  The lawlessness described by Jim seemed hard to fathom in a city we had all grown very fond of the previous few days.

All of these stories told slightly different variations as to what happened during the 30 odd years of violent conflict in Northern Ireland.  All were a little unwilling to accept the brunt of the blame, but very willing to admit to taking part in various atrocities.  Non-violent people were turned violent through a strain forced on them by unjust conditions.  They knew what they were doing wasn’t right but didn’t see any other options.  What worries me most now is the lasting impact that this trauma would have on an entire city.  It’s quite clear many of those willing to share their stories with us were suffering from some form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  It seemed to me that maybe sharing their stories with us, people who would listen, was some form of coping with this. 

 

 Although the conflict is officially over, Belfast is still a very fragile place.  We asked similar questions to most of those who would talk.  One of these questions was whether or not they thought trouble could ever start back up.  They all agreed it wouldn’t take much.  This being said, talk about peace is winning over evidence of violence in Belfast.  All the stories shared with us were talking about the past.  It is clear that new trends have begun to emerge to make peace and reconciliation the focus; the stories however will always remain.