North and South

As I mentioned previously, today was a travel day, so there's not much to report on. We left at 7:00 this morning from Galway and arrived in Armagh around one o'clock, which was earlier than expected. But in between Galway and Armagh, we experienced virtually every type of weather imaginable. When we left Galway it was rainy, windy, and cold, when we arrived in Dublin it was sunny, and when we arrived in Northern Ireland, it started snowing, our first (and probably only) snow of 2015. We decided to blame Jordan for the snow since she was singing "Snow" from White Christmas during our layover at the Dublin Airport. Apparently, what doesn't work for Bing Crosby and Danny Kay works for Jordan Joseph. Travel was relatively rough since we are all tired, or sick, or a combination of the two. The crying baby in the back of our first bus didn't help matters much, and neither did my breakfast of a ham, cheese, and margarine sandwich. In Cali's words, "It's just weird. Butter on a sandwich!" 

It is funny to think that now that we've arrived in Northern Ireland, we are actually in the UK and not in The Republic of Ireland (where we've been the entire trip) anymore. I was confused as to why Northern Ireland was separate from the Republic of Ireland, so I did a little research this afternoon, and I found a great article from BBC that explained everything. The split between the North and the South was initially caused after WWI when Dublin and the south of Ireland split from the UK and declared their independence. Dublin and southern Ireland were predominantly Catholic at the time, while Northern Ireland was predominantly Protestant, and this aided in the tension between north and south. The separation was extremely violent and resulted in many deaths. However, the split wasn't peaceful, and Northern Ireland has struggled politically ever since. The main struggle in Northern Ireland is between Nationalists and Unionists. Nationalists believe that Northern Ireland should join the Republic of Ireland in their independence, while Unionists want to remain part of the UK. Northern Ireland moved toward peace with the Good Friday Agreement of 1998, which gave Northern Ireland the right to form their own parliament while still keeping flexible borders between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

Despite the conflict in Northern Ireland, none of it is present in the day-to-day lives of the people of Armagh. Armagh is a quiet town with a beautiful square and small, local shops. In fact, after we got off the bus, we stopped in at the Seven Hills Cafe for tea and a light lunch.Our proprietor of the B&B where we are staying was nice enough to drive out to the cafe to pick up us and our luggage. Her nephews came as well so that there would be enough room for all of us. The guy that drove Jordan, Kristin, and I to the B&B was very nice. He was interested to know how Ireland compared with the rest of the world, particularly America, and he was shocked to find out that Ireland had better food. We explained to him that most people in America don't get to eat local, homegrown meats and veggies even though we should. Tonight, we stayed indoors because of the sleet and snow. Dr. Elsner ordered Dominos pizza, which tastes exactly like American Dominos, and we watched the ends of Mr. Bean and Shrek 2 while eating Irish candy. Kurt says American candy is better, but I couldn't taste the difference. Tomorrow we will go to 9:00 mass at the Catholic church followed by 11:00 mass at the Anglican church. I will be interested in comparing the two services tomorrow. But more than that I am really excited about taking advantage of worshipping in as many cathedrals as possible before we have to go back to America. 

*Disclaimer... In this post I make it sound like we have walked through a blizzard, and I should probably rephrase. The snow is not sticking and most of the time it's a mixture between sleet and snow. That, however, does not negate its existence, and for South Carolinians anything frozen is a big deal, though the concept of frozen is generally limited to the section in the grocery store and the Disney movie.