I wouldn’t say I’m religious, but I was baptised Catholic and my family and background are Catholic.
Like many, my understanding of the Orange order, or what it means to be part of such an organisation, would have been limited to what I see as a very basic, southern Irish viewpoint – when they march, there can be trouble.
I had also never been to Belfast before this trip to the north.
The first thing I noticed when I arrived in Belfast was the silence of the place; I had expected there to be throngs of people but the streets were curiously empty.
Brian John Spencer, an Irish Protestant and Belfast native, was chaperoning me on my trip, and he explained to me that a lot of the Catholics in the city go away for the Twelfth.
“It’s a city of two tales,there is great prosperity here and great poverty,” Brian, who previously wrote about being Irish and Orange told me. “There is some rough parts and then there are the leafy suburbs.”
The celebrations began on Sunday when bonfires were lit across the city at midnight.
Waves of intense heat met our faces as we stood amongst a large crowd to watch just one of the many blazes lighting up the night sky, while firefighters worked at keeping the inferno under control.
All around us people were chatting and laughing, looking forward to a good night. I was overwhelmed by the strength of the flames but most people took it in their stride and there was a carnival atmosphere.
In the heart of the city centre, these firefighters sprayed the walls with water to stop the neighbouring buildings from catching fire.
At the bonfire we met William Smyth, a Dubliner who has lived in Belfast for the past five years and always attends the march. William stayed out all night with the other bonfire revellers and when he rejoined us the next morning he was in great form despite his lack of sleep
“It’s crazy, there is no trying to make sense of it but in a few years my little girl will want to go to the march and the bonfire and I will be able to tell her all about it,” William explained.
“I want to be able to make sense of it, well as much as is possible anyway.”
By now we were also joined by a Canadian, Mike O’Gorman, living in Belfast for the past eight years but attending the march for the first time.
“People always tell you just to get out of the city,” he told me. “But I said I would come along this year and see what it’s all about.”
After a night’s sleep, I encountered my first negative reaction to my presence in Belfast on the day of the march itself.
I had gone into a shop by myself to buy some water where, initially, the shop assistant welcomed me with a smile.
The moment he heard my accent though, he became sullen and unhelpful. His demeanour was very much – “what are you doing here at this time?”
Back now in the company of Mike, William and Brian John, the parade was now under way. There was a massive police presence in the city centre and access through some Catholic areas was restricted.
Near Catholic areas, the marching bands reduce their drums to a single beat and Brian John told me that people have been jailed for playing more than that in the wrong area.
Despite the police presence, the streets were now full with people drinking and, as our motley crew turned one corner in the city centre, there was a woman unconscious on the ground with a bloody nose being helped by emergency services.
The march began at Carlisle Circus and ended up at Malone House, or ‘The Field’ as it’s known locally. We walked the whole way out and back, thirteen miles in total.
Along the way people would sporadically stop Brian John and hail him for his uncanny likeness to Conor McGregor.
As we walked through the outer Belfast suburbs, where the drinking was less prevalent and people sat in portable chairs nibbling on snacks, Brian explained that this more sociable atmosphere was his experience of the Twelfth growing up.
All along the way people were out in their hundreds to support the marching bands and Orange Order.
We were almost back in the city after our long march and on the last mile we met PhD student, Jonathon Evershed from West Wales who was having a barbecue at the side of the road. Jonathon has been living in Belfast for the past three years and says the march feels alien to him. “To see people waving the flag of my nation (Union Jack) in this way seems bizarre. It makes me question what it is to be British.”
Back in the city later that evening we saw one man taken away in an ambulance and another trying to steal a bike that had been tied to a lamppost. The streets were starting to get rowdy.
We looked for a pub to sit in, to have a drink and take stock of all that we had seen, but we struggled to find one that would have us. Most of the bars were closed and those that were open would only serve food.
Eventually we found an inn.
“I’ll never understand what it’s all about,” William said over a pint, “but that doesn’t stop me enjoying it”.
The march newbies, Mike and I, agreed it was much different to what we expected. For Brian John it was just another year at home in Belfast.
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