December
14 – Belfast, Northern Ireland
There's frost on
the ground when we leave Chiddingfold, lots of roaring fires in cottage
hearths, we're sure. But we're too busy zooming around roundabouts and
trying to find our way back to the Budget rental car office to notice.
We make the flight
with minutes to spare, and settle back for a lovely flight across Wales
and the Irish Sea to Belfast. As we approach to land, we see a typical
Irish scene: fields in shades of verdant green, whitewashed cottages
and sheep dotted about like so many puffs of cotton.
 We
make it to our hotel after a scenic tour from the airport, courtesy
of our cabbie who shows us such historic sights as the Falls Road and
the housing estate where a Loyalist informer was recently murdered by
his own people. I ask him how he feels about living with the violence.
“We carry on just as usual, no matter what,” he says. We pass
the many multi-coloured murals on the side walls of buildings, depicting
the fighting brigades who have used violence over the years to control
and intimidate. But hopefully no longer.
The woman we are
here to see is part of the process that is changing all of that. When
I call Monica McWilliams at the offices of the Women's Coalition, we're
thrilled to discover that she's literally across the street from the
hotel, meaning we can whisk her away to Stormont before the light gets
to low, so that the photography can be taken care of before we sit down
to talk.
Actually, she's
whisking us. When she realizes that we mean to take her to Stormont
for the photograph, Monica bundles into her car, a rental since her
car was recently stolen to be used in a bizarre and dangerous Northern
Ireland crime, joyriding. These kids have been used to living on the
edge, Monica says. Instead of fighting now, it seems, they steal cars
and smash them up, unfortunately sometimes killing innocent bystanders
in the process.
 At
the Stormont, the seat of the Northern Ireland Assembly of which Monica
and another Women's Coalition representative are members, she stands
down the hill from this imposing building wearing my funky black coat
to ward off the chill. When they first arrived at Stormont, Monica tells
us, all 108 members of the Assembly planted trees on the grounds, an
effort in solidarity that has been sorely tested over the years. We
admire a peace statue recently erected near a wooded glade, a man and
woman on their knees, their arms clasped around each other. Among the
stones that form the base of the statue is one from Hiroshima, another
from Berlin.
On
our way back into the city, Monica drives us through East Belfast, where
the curbstones are painted red, white and blue and the murals, pictures
of guns and violence, mark the home of the Young Ulster Militants. We
pass by the High Court, with a series of low battlements along the sidewalk.
“This building has been bombed more often than I've had hot dinners,”
she says cheerily. Then there's the Europa Hotel, where former U.S.
President Bill Clinton stayed, which before Bosnia, she says, was the
most bombed hotel in western Europe.
But it's peace that
Monica is trying to wage these days, and as we head through local pubs
with her in search of a place to sit -- all full to capacity of pre-Christmas
revellers -- there's always someone stopping her to commend her on her
work. De-commissioning is under way, the Women's Coalition inclusionary
approach is making inroads and as we sit over a beer and later over
dinner, I am more impressed than ever at the sheer historic weight of
these proceedings. There's no political bluster here; this is a group
dedicated to working together, to building consensus and to bringing
forward the needs of women. This is a huge commitment, and the sacrifices
have also been huge. “It's harder when you've got kids,” Monica
says. “When I started mine were 6 and 8 1/2.”
But women have always
been there, she says, in the community groups of which there are thousands
in the North. “I always think women in community groups are politicians,
working for benefits, organizing playgroups,” she says. “They
just never stood for election. So when the politicians asked where we
came from, I said, 'Here. We were always here.'”
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