Conference tallis::celt

1273.0. "Spare a thought for the innocents" by RUTILE::AUNGIER (Ren� Aungier, All CONSULTING OPPORTUNITIES wanted) Thu Oct 28 1993 04:02

All the recent killing makes me sad. Indescrimate tit for tat killing of
people going about their daily lives.

I am a Catholic but when I lived in Belfast some of my best friends were
Protestant. We shared the same pastimes, the hopes for the future. It is
strange, Catholics and Protestants from Ireland abroad tend to stick togehter,
you will even hear them saying they are Irish.

Maybe as I get older I see things differently but it is time that all the violence
stops. I have seen the effects on the young kids of the North, poor innocent
kids who will never have experienced peace. I have laughed with these kids and
as I looked into their eyes you could see a certain sadness. I have some
pictures I took in Belfast mainly of children and the pictures speak a lot
louder than my words.

There is a common enemy and that is called unemployement. There are a vast number
of decent people there, people who are friendly and who would give you the last
piece of bread they had.

In the beginning of 1985 I was in London looking for a job through the computer
agencies. On one occasion I was waiting for money to be transferred to me from
Spain to pay the hostal where I was staying. It did not arrive on time and I
thought I would have to sleep rough. I can't remember now how exactly it happened
but I met 2 Irishmen from the North. They were a father and son, they were
Protestant and we got talking. When they heard of my situation, they told me
that they had a apartment near Bayswater Road and I could come and stay with them.
They gave me food and lodgeing for as long as it took me to find a job. While I
was staying with them, I came here to France for an interview with Digital. 
It is thanks to them and their kindness that I was able to come for the interview.
They favoured a United Ireland, they were quite people, both electricians, they 
didn't really like London but they had nno jobs back home, their mother was still
in the North. Their son had been shot dead in Carrigfergus. The son used to play
the song "I wish I was in Carrigfergus" and sometimes cried or was sad. I came
to France and never got their address and I have forgotten their names but I have
not forgotten the way they helped me. I play from time to time the song "I wish
I was in Carrigfergus", the version by Joan Baez and I often thing where they 
might be today.

We are all from an island called Ireland and therefore we are all Irish. It is
time that peace reigned in Ireland and remember the innocent who die everyday
for no real reason. Talk to the common people and not the politicians and you
will see that their real hopes are for a future in harmony and peace.


El Gringo

Re 0

Unfortunately, the innocents are the ones forgotten in the body counts, 
attempted justifications and political posturing. The Irish Times reported 
the weekend's  violence very well. The front page (cant remember which day) 
showed ppictures of a young boy and his six week old sister, orphaned by the 
Shankill bomb, It showed pictures of the young girl killed it the same bomb.
It showed pictures of <a relative> of one of the bombers. On tuesday, a young 
boy runs into the Kennedy Way, council yard and finds his father lying in a 
pool of blood.

			THESE ARE THE INNOCENTS

I have deliberately avoided the utterly meaningless Catholic/Protestant 
labels in the above. It dosent matter. These are real people we are talking 
about. 

Anybody who cannot recognise the reality of whats happening here, should come 
and visit, and I do not mean as a representative of any organisation. - just 
visit, walk the streets, go into the pubs and listen. Listen to the pain and 
suffering, the misery. 

Blaming one side or another will not move things forward one little bit.  

An interesting, sad and maybe hopeful, story from one of Belfasts hospitals 
this week.

The mother of one of the people involved in the Shankill bombing was in the 
waiting room  of the hospital wait on news of her son. While she was there 
the father of the 29 year old girl killed in the same bomb came in to 
identify her body. After a few minutes the mother said to him "Do you know 
who I am?". The man looked at her are replied that he did. They then put 
there arms around each other and cried. <paraphrased from a radio interview 
with the mother>.