O’Conall Street

South Down is a beautiful place. Driving from Belfast the Mourne Mountains soon arrive on the horizon inviting you to explore. By the time you get to Dundrum bay a detour for Castlewellan sets things up nicely for another beautiful drive down into Newcastle. My wife’s family are from these parts and I am no stranger to the mountains and their wonderful journey down to the sea.

Today was no different except the sight that greeted me In Castlewellan was sad and to be honest depressing. There is not a lamp post in the town without at tricolour flying from it. Not a single one. Whoever put them up must be having a serious crisis of identity. Their is a republican March in Newcastle also today. Can’t tell you if the organisers thought it essential to dress the town in green white and gold because I don’t need to parade to be Irish nor do I need to have a flag on every corner to declare my identity. I hate the flying of union jacks all summer just as much.

Next time I hear a republican politician on all angry about loyalist flag flying I hope they acknowledge there is much work to be done on their side too. What a terrible pity on the tenth anniversary of the agreement and a week after a very good and non political St Patrick’s festival.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 23rd, 2008 at 3:28 pm and is filed under Personal, Politics, Public Relations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.