Arcadia Ireland

Arcadia students from across Ireland recently joined together for the Belfast and Antrim Coast weekend. It’s great fun to get the Arcadia community back together, to reconnect with friends made during orientation.

The Journey

On the Friday morning, students boarded buses in Galway, Cork, Limerick, Maynooth and Dublin to join up in along the way. As you travel to Northern Ireland there isn’t much to let you know you’re leaving the Republic of Ireland and entering Britain. We have an invisible border, but there are two things that will let you know you’re in the UK. Firstly, the road signs change; the M1 road becomes the A1 and all the colours of the signs are different. Also (and this would freak me out if I was driving) in Ireland we use kilometres per hour and in the UK they use miles. So the signs go from 120 to 60 in a matter of seconds- even though that’s pretty much the same speed. It’s a bit confusing. The second sign is the melody of 50 phones getting texts from their providers about new charges (thankfully roaming charges will be abolished in the EU by 2017!!).

Titanic Center

First stop was the ''Titanic Experience'' which accurately describes it, as it not like any other museum I have ever been in – it’s really fun! The building itself is very impressive, built to like an ice-berg and measuring 126 feet high – the same height as gantry cranes used to build the ship.

The tour begins with a short introduction from a beautifully accented staff member passing out our tickets –replicas of the genuine passenger tickets. The rest of the tour is totally self-guided, so you can just take the place in at your own pace. You begin at the top floor and move your way down through time from; Industrialization in Belfast, building the ship, the cargo and passengers, the sinking, all the various depictions of the story and finally finding the ship 2.5 miles below the surface. The Titanic Experience is designed to be fully interactive – this includes holograms, 3D features, and the ''Shipyard ride''.

After the Titanic we travelled to our hotel right in the heart of Belfast City. Following a short rest, we met up again to tuck into dinner in the hotel restaurant. After dinner the students were free to explore Belfast City for the evening. 

Saturday

We were up bright and early and ready to enjoy the hotel breakfast. The Irish Breakfast is as delicious and it is filling– bacon, eggs, pork sausage, baked beans, toast, grilled tomatoes, hash browns and of course black and white pudding! Yum! We were joined by the Arcadia Students studying in Queens University Belfast, who are invited to join all the events of the Belfast weekend.

With full bellies we set of to the Giant's Causeway. I actually hadn't been to the Causeway since I was a kid so I was immediately impressed by the new visitor’s centre they had built. We were introduced to our guide, who was able to explain all the myths as well as the geography to us. The Giant's Causeway is a UNESCO world heritage site, and completely phenomenal. Geologists will tell you it was formed by volcanic activity and erosion. However we know it was really formed by Giants! Luckily, it was a really clear and sunny day we were able to see the full beauty of the stone pillars.

We arrived back to Belfast that afternoon and the students had plenty free time to explore other sites of Belfast. Belfast is a Victorian city so its architecture is very different to Georgian Dublin and the other Irish cities. The area surrounding Queens University and the Botanic gardens is a beautiful area for an afternoon stroll, while the Victoria Square Shopping centre in the City Centre is a great place for browsing.

Again that evening we dined in the hotel restaurant and the students were able to go out and enjoy the Belfast night-life. I hit the hay, good and early though!

 Sunday

The last day! Once again joined by the Queens University students we set off in two buses for a tour around Belfast City. Our guide was able to give us a really excellent explanation of the division between North and South, the relationship with Britain and the Republic of Ireland, the ''Troubles'', loyalism/unionism and nationalism/republicanism and the current peaceful stability. We stopped off at several of the murals where he explained their relevance and meaning. We hopped off the bus at the ''international wall'' where monthly updated murals make statements on the current state of the world. We saw the mural of Bobby Sands the M.P. who died on hunger strike, the nationalist areas characterised by green and the loyalist areas characterised by union jack flags. We were also able to sign the peace wall – one of the eighty walls that still divide Belfast in an effort to maintain peace.

Our tour ended in the Queens Quarter for the Arcadia lecture by Prof. Dominic Bryan on the Troubles of Northern Ireland. Dominic is an expert in his field – and in fact was the PhD supervisor for our two guides on the bus tour. Dominic's lecture worked to really challenge our ideas of why people do what they do. What was the catalyst that started the Troubles and what was the stalemate that finally ended it? He put everything he said in great context, using American examples to illustrate points on the Troubles. He ended very profoundly, pointing out the hardest part of the peace process is that those who perpetrated extreme hurt against one another now have to work together. Reminding us that you don’t make peace with your friends, you make peace with your enemies.

After our lecture we had one final meal, said our goodbyes and headed back to the buses for the trip home. The journey back to Dublin seemed much longer the trip up to Belfast but at least we had plenty of photos of the weekend to go through. 

Thank you  for a great weekend Belfast! We’ll be back next semester!!