belfast, northern ireland

on thursday night, kerry and i left los angeles (after a nervous ride to the airport, (bad traffic) for jolly old england...we landed, found that i had forgotten to book our luggage to belfast, so, in a rush, we went through customs, retreived our luggage, went upstairs to check in for our flight, found that our next plane was in a different terminal, found the train, took train to terminal one, checked in, went through one check point, then security....finally got to our plane with 5 minutes to spare!!! whew!!! so, we finally arrived in belfast...right after getting into our room at about 7:30 pm, we saw marty and dee walking down the street...we went to dinner, came home and collapsed...today we took a tour of belfast...you know, belfast and northern ireland has had it's wars...they are called 'the troubles'...it's been going on for hundreds of years...and since about 1916 in the last go around...the catholics vs. the protestants...it's all about religion...we toured around the areas today...we saw a park of murals...they show different aspects of the troubles, starting back in the 1600's...a really cool one is of the sniper...it's an optical illusion...his gun is trained on you, no matter where you stand...we saw where the protestants live...the peace line, which is the dividing line between the two groups and the catholic area...kids go to segregated schools..everything is separate...so interesting...belfast is a neat city, not huge, easy to walk around...we are staying near queen's college, so there are alot of students...belfast is where the titanic was built...they are very proud of that...they say, it was great until the 'english' took over the ship...haha...after our tour we ate lunch at a little sandwich shop, then we went to a mystery book shop...that was fun...just full of mysteries...took a little nap...had some chinese food...alot of those in town...now...to bed! tomorrow we pick up kelly and kristen, then the 6 of us are driving to portaferry where the mullin family originated...that is why we are here in ireland...dee is doing some research on the mullin family for us...so we are tagging along to the 'old' hometown!!!