Northern Ireland - how do you perceive it?

[TheBelleOfBelfastCity]

Genuinely just curious. I was born and raised in NI, opinions on MN seem to vary wildly from no go zone to friendly and welcoming. Trying to got a sense of what the most common thoughts are.

Have you visited? Maybe even thought about doing so? What was your opinion?

No Waitrose on the entire island of Ireland.

Funnily enough I gave in and moved over here once Ikea came and for the first few years here there was still talk of Waitrose coming - alas :(

Now whenever we head over to England or Scotland by car, I can be found in Waitrose, Morrisons and Aldi - stocking up on bits I still miss

I remember back when we first arrived, the excitement of seeing a woman shopping with a M&S food hall bag, so I asked where it was - Derry/Londonderry she says, so off we drove, back when it was a single lane road, just to stock up on ready made curries :) Found out a week or two later there was one in Ballymena which was a hell of a lot closer :)

No need for that.

Remember all those years they dangled the prospect of John Lewis and Waitrose at Sprucefield in front of us?

I'd love to visit Belfast. My Grandfather was born there and i'd love to go there to see his birthplace.

@OwlishPeering and @Janedoe82 interesting. I remember nice things at Saint George's market (?) in Belfast centre.

Outside of Cork I was gobsmacked when I asked the fish lorry man if the scallops were local, ie not from a Thai slavery boat. He answered "no, they're from the next county over."

Well, there’s local and there’s local. Ask a Cork fisheries man about Kerry scallops, and he might well say they were foreign, or nearly.

@EggCustardTart In fairness, CastleCourt has gotten slightly better over the past year or two due to the opening of Ulster University’s city centre campus, and the thousands of students now living in new build accommodation near that part of town. It has a bit more life about it and I do think that there is hope for the area. It is a disgrace how the council have allowed some streets to turn into wasteland though

I’m still holding out hope!! 😩

Personally I really do not feel that this is representative of the majority of the country - you’d have to go to quite a sectarian area to come across these attitudes. Where I live an English accent is just as common as a southern Irish one, nobody bats an eyelid at either. I have English family members who adore coming ‘home’ every few months and always feel very welcomed by the general public in Belfast

As others have mentioned though, the open drug use in town & difficultly getting taxis are issues.
But the good outweighs the bad as far as I'm concerned.

Yes, I agree that the open drug use is a big problem, however it is certainly not unique to Belfast and has become an issue all over the UK & Ireland, exacerbated by Covid and the cost of living crisis. Recently I’ve been in both Dublin & Cardiff, to be honest I was quite shocked as to what I witnessed in broad daylight.

The taxis are a pain! If only Translink had used the £300m they’ve just spent on their shiny new white elephant Grand Central station to actually improve public transport services 🤦‍♀️ I find it mad that even on a Friday/Saturday night the last bus to our area is 11:30pm

There is racism and sectarianism in some parts of NI still. And most schools are still segregated. Until the schools are fully integrated they there will always be some aspect of sectarianism.

There many, many mixed schools who don’t have ‘integrated’ status. The vast majority are not segregated, that’s a very outdated and false idea. Methody for example is the most religiously mixed in the country yet as a school it is not formally integrated - things just happen organically.

Personally I feel that forced integration is a form of segregation in itself - needing a specific number of catholic, protestant etc students makes divides more obvious

My partner is from there. I had never been until I met him seven years ago: have been three times since.

Belfast is great. Some stunning countryside.

What did make me laugh when I went there last a couple of months ago: we were getting a taxi in downtown Belfast not far from the Shankill area and the driver told me he couldn’t imagine living in London because it was too dangerous 😃

Kind of ironic that someone in Belfast felt that way and my OH (who grew up during the Troubles) thought that was hilarious but it does point to how far NI has come…

I had the same when someone asked me was I not worried to go to Vietnam @Thepeopleversuswork , I had to explain why I found it so funny.

I grew up there and have many bad memories and frightening experiences and made the decision to leave as I did not want my kids to be impacted by my job or ever have to be afraid. Was away 25 years and then moved back to a different part of NI and have to say feel very different about NI now. Nowhere I would rather be

Where I live an English accent is just as common as a southern Irish one

I've noticed a substantial increase in English accents in the past couple of years.

the driver told me he couldn’t imagine living in London because it was too dangerous

Looking at crime rates, the taxi driver has a point. London has an annual rate of 105 crimes per 1,000 people; Belfast has 49 per 1,000 (Belfast is 39% higher than the average for NI as a whole).

I would say its a great place. Have been there for work and a family holiday and also did a cycling trip on the Antrim coast. Peoplr are friendly. The countryside is great and it is not overcrowded. It is still odd that as you travel.through NI there are clear divisions and you can see this in the flags displayed. However everyone was lovely to us

Not all parents want integrated education. Plenty of people want their children in faith schools, for different reasons, I imagine, than they do in England.
Some people still see their child's school as an extension of their cultural background, and being a major part of the child's life, it reinforces their background & heritage. There have been some polls that collected data on attitudes to integrated education. I support IE & I know moving forward is a long slow process.

There are indeed lots of schools that are mixed in practice if not in formal designation. Like I said my own DC are the ones that prove that in our school!

But most towns/areas will have two schools and one will be mostly Protestant and the other mostly Catholic and I do think it's naive to pretend otherwise. I don't think parents willfully segregate as such in most areas but people will go with what's familiar.

It will take generations for NI society to truly move past sectarianism, I think it's possible to embrace and celebrate the progress made to date without pretending it's more than it is.

Beautiful place. Recently toured around Antrim, Derry and Belfast.
Everyone was so lovely and welcoming.
Yes, there was a LOT of flags.

My DD has just moved from England to start her degree at Queen's University. It's a stunning, world class, Russell Group institution and it's top 7 in the subject my DD chose. It's amazing that it's not more widely known on the UK mainland. She received offers from Warwick, Leeds, Liverpool and Exeter, but once she did the open day at Queen's that was it for her.

I also don't think you can really call the big mixed Belfast grammars 'integrated'. Yes there are catholic children in them but lets be honest- it is in the majority moderate middle class catholic children. I went to one, my kids go to one and the children in them are on the whole not from the same background as working class catholic children.