Original subtitles

by sea and by air.

This is incredible!

I want to find out more about this island divided between two

countries with an often troubled history.

Yes, here's success - success, excellent!

..and the mildly eccentric...

I just keep getting offered more monkeys, you know.

You would take more if you could? Yeah, absolutely.

This is a land steeped in religious faith.

What are you doing? Why barefoot?

But in the 21st century,

many here are embracing extraordinary changes.

Who would have thought that homosexuality would unify Ireland?

I mean, that's pretty amazing.

On this last leg of my journey, I'm going to be travelling

down the east coast to the great cities of Belfast and Dublin.

eruption, of course.

But the myths and the legends that surround this place

are much more interesting.

The main legend is that giants used this as a road, as a causeway,

between Ireland and Scotland - which isn't many miles in that direction.

And it's quite a convenient myth in many ways for many Protestants,

particularly here in the north of Ireland, because it

the UK or unite with the Republic of Ireland to form a United Ireland.

Kate Burns is from one of the many communities in Northern Ireland that

didn't suffer the pain of intense sectarianism during the Troubles.

A few decades ago, jobs were scarce here

and the island's population was in decline.

Now there's tourism and fishing

but Kate's also pioneering an unusual new industry.

There's about 123 and it's been growing.

About 123? Yeah, yeah.

And are you...you're a new arrival?

Well, I arrived in 1978.

Oh, that's very recent. You only just got here, then!

What was life like here during the Troubles?

From a community perspective, we just didn't have - there just

wasn't this division that there was on the mainland, even though

Rathlin is stunning,

but to keep this remote community alive in the 21st century,

Kate and the other residents have had to be imaginative.

So, Kate, where are we going?

Right - this is quite a good place to get kelp.

it's good for you and it's good to eat.

Well, I would pay money for that as a snack, even as it is there. Mmm.

What have you found?

Now this is what I'm after today, this particular kind of kelp,

which has got brown patches on it.

Can you see those patches? Yes, yes.

Those are the seeds.

Really? And so what are you going to do with it?

There's almost no negative impact on the environment from growing

the superfood this way.

Low in calories but rich in vitamins and minerals,

Kate believes it's a foodstuff that could revolutionise

the economy of this remote island, but growing seaweed could

and can now produce between 60 and 80 tonnes of food a year.

Her son Duncan helps run the farm.

The kelp grows on more than a dozen ropes strung out across the sea.

sustainably - it's got to be the future.

Back on the mainland,

I resumed my journey down the east coast, leaving Rathlin Island behind.

I'm now going to head along the causeway coastal route

Look at this place!

This beautiful coast road has always been celebrated by locals.

There's one hugely popular US TV series in particular that's

making Northern Ireland's scenery internationally famous.

This is it.

It's called the Dark Hedges.

Oh!

Game Of Thrones is the international smash-hit TV series.

It's shot in a former shipyard building in Belfast

and at locations like this.

We've got travellers coming from Asia

to look at a road in Northern Ireland that's featured on a TV series.

Where have you come from?

California. California!

People have really got into the whole world of

Game Of Thrones, haven't they?

Yeah, well, you know... It's a novelty.

We don't have medieval, you know, castles and history and horses...

Water, rain! Water, green!

So what are the sort of key things that you think of

when you thought of Northern Ireland?

It's, er, I mean, Game Of Thrones definitely influences a lot of the people I work with.

I work with a lot of nerds.

I work at a software company

so we have like, you know, comic-con day and dress-up day

and stuff like that, so we always have characters walking around... From Game Of Thrones!

I headed to Northern Ireland's capital city, Belfast -

which for many outsiders still has a tricky reputation.

Before I get into Belfast, there's something I wanted you to see.

And that is...

Bet there's nowhere to bloody park, though.

Goodness me! A man with a lemur on his head.

I met up with one of Belfast's leading comedians and satirists.

Jake? Simon, welcome, welcome.

Oh, I hate everybody.

I have no respect for power, I have no respect for privilege,

I have no respect for history.

I have no respect for what's gone before.

How would you describe Belfast today? Is this Belfast today?

Yeah. This is Belfast. This is the Belfast I know.

So my generation, when I was a younger man,

we never came into the city centre.

We always socialised in our own little camp. Why?

Because it was dangerous. Because you could get shot.

Very simple, very basic.

And it's become busy and vibrant since.

It's totally opened up.

Since when?

Started after the Good Friday Agreement. Started after peace.

Started after we stopped shooting each other.

Naturally, that's when things began to open up.

Today, kids are coming into Belfast city centre, they're mixing,

no-one gives a damn whether they're Protestant or Catholic.

Now, this - this is a real shocker.

This is one of the euphemistically named peace walls.

A security wall that divides communities -

this is a Loyalist community on this side

and on the other side is a republican community.

And they have to be kept apart.

Marching bands like this one practice all year for the main event

on July 12th, in which thousands parade through the streets.

I met up with Michael Crosby,

a long-standing member of the Pride of Ardoyne Flute Band.

Now it's a street party?

Give us a sense of the community here,

that's quite a small area, I'm thinking.

This is Glenbryn estate which we refer to as Loyalist Ardoyne.

You have nationalist Ardoyne, so we refer to this as Loyalist Ardoyne.

We have something like seven to eight streets.

It's been through a lot of hard times during the Troubles.

We've lost a lot of people in here,

shot dead, whatever, through the Troubles.

But we're a close-knit community.

If you look down the street, you have houses that still have

barbed wire in front of the windows. This is 2015.

But, of course, a stone's throw away in nationalist Ardoyne,

Catholics feel just as besieged.

Celebrations for the 12th July kick off with huge bonfires

lit all around the city the night before.

Look at the size of that!

But it feels intimidatory as well.

What's curious, I suppose, is this sort of thing would never be

tolerated in many other British cities.

But here, still allowances are being made, have to be made,

otherwise people would get very angry.

Nationalist and Catholic symbols - like effigies of the Pope -

can be burnt on the pyres.

It can be deeply upsetting to Catholics.

It felt strange to be in Belfast on the 12th. It's not a normal weekend.

Many people in the city have no interest in the event

and leave for a holiday.

On the Glenbryn estate, they're about to light their giant bonfire.

The flag of my country is the Union Jack and the Ulster flag.

But putting it up there isn't just another country - that's the enemy, isn't it?

Yeah. And it still feels that way? Yeah.

The whole scene is completely surreal for me.

Many people here feel their culture, identity,

and survival is under threat, even though recent polls show that

most Catholics in Northern Ireland also want to stay part of the UK.

What is your ultimate concern?

I hope in my generation,

when I'm dead and buried, that this country is still British.

And my grandkids can still go to school and express our culture

like I'm doing tonight, having a few beers.

What a scene.

It's really sad to hear the fear,

actually, the concern

that people here have about the loss of their culture,

They don't see it that way.

They see their position under threat.

It's easy to judge this community for not moving on,

but many died here during the Troubles

and I could sympathise with their reluctance to abandon traditions.

There's also high unemployment here.

Their British identity gives a sense of pride.

It was the morning of the 12th

and members of the Protestant Orange Order were matching through the centre of Belfast.

Don't knock it and don't try and take it away from them,

unless you're going to give them something to believe in.

So here comes the Pride of Ardoyne

and they're getting quite a reception from the crowd.

I spotted Michael.

Michael. Michael! Can we come with you?

The war memorial's just there.

Yup, the people who fought the two world wars and Afghanistan and Iraq.

And here. Yeah, and here, yeah.

That's really interesting, cos as outsiders,

we can perhaps forget that people here, your community,

For them, it commemorates a tragic time in their history.

I headed back to the Ardoyne area of Belfast

and met up with Catholic priest Father Gary Donegan.

weekend as a time of celebration.

How do you see it?

For us, it's a time where people in the community

generally are under siege.

people have been drinking, people have been taking

all sorts of substance abuse on both sides of the community

and you've got the perfect storm then for a possible riot or public disturbance.

I re-joined the parade.

from taking their flags home past the Catholic area up ahead.

So they're singing, if you can't hear, "We want to go home."

What are you feeling about what's up ahead?

I'm nervous.

It wasn't long before violence erupted.

Come on, we better go back.

Already, instantly - my God, bottles are being chucked, hoods are coming up.

We need to move back out of the way.

Go back. Go, go, go.

So we've now come round behind the police line.

I think the barricade is up ahead.

To me, as an outsider, it all felt bizarre and faintly absurd.

These local Catholic residents watch from afar.

The police seem to think they might get it from both sides,

but the rioters - this year at least - were all Loyalists.

Incoming!

An officer has just been hit just there.

My God! They're having to drag him away.

of the fundamental issues that are dividing the society.

So there is now management of stalemate.

And there have got to be advances made in bringing communities

together and integrating them,

getting them to live together.

It's going to take a long time, but this situation here,

this is a small part of the story of Northern Island

Even just a few streets away, life continued as usual.

For the majority of people living in Belfast,

sectarianism and tribal conflict is largely a thing of the past.

I'm off to summer school!

Linda Ervine come from a family of leading Unionists,

but she's become a champion of the Irish language and a teacher.

almost, here in Belfast.

So it's quite unusual that you started to learn

and love the language, because that's the standard view

of Gaelic Irish speakers, that they would be Catholic.

Yeah. And some people would regard the language as something divisive,

something that's saying, you know, that you're nationalist,

that you're in favour of an all-Ireland, for instance.

One of the things I don't want to do is I don't want to go down the road

of "We're taking it back" - there's enough of that in Northern Ireland.

What we always wanted to do was just take our place within the Irish language community.

Why do you think so many people are now wanting to learn Irish?

So it's kind of strange. It can totally change your outlook

and I think the work that Linda has done and is doing

and the work that's happening in east Belfast is miles ahead,

streets ahead, in terms of community relations.

Everything focuses on difference.

And, for me, all we do is, you know,

we're not interested in we'll have 50% Catholics and 50% Protestants - we're offering a language.

Come and learn a language.

And we don't take a note of whether you're Catholic or Protestant

cos I'm not interested.

I'm interested in people who want to learn the language.

And that's what we need to do in Northern Ireland, bring

people together in a way that they can meet, integrate and something

that interests them, rather than focusing on how they're different.

This is home, so to travel to part of my own country

and I'm heading south, continuing my journey.

I travelled down the east coast, crossed the border

into the Republic of Ireland and headed towards the town of Drogheda.

In 1649, English forces under Oliver Cromwell attacked

and took Drogheda under an epic siege and battle.

But what exactly happened during the attack is still being

argued about to this day.

Tom Reilly is a local historian who has made an extremely

detailed study of first-hand accounts of the period.

On the wall, yes. Oh, the wall, I see.

In 1649, Cromwell and his Puritan supporters

had just overthrown King Charles I.

Then Cromwell turned his attention to Ireland and Drogheda,

a vital port that was supporting the King.

These are the medieval town walls.

Old Drogheda here. Yeah. You're inside the town walls.

So, if you were standing here, 1649, about five o'clock,

you would hear psalms being sung. You'd be walking on bodies

and you'd want to run,

because Cromwell is coming up with a bodyguard

What happened after that is what is still disputed today.

Well, like everybody is still being taught,

I was effectively told that Cromwell, this monster, this ogre,

this blacker than black individual

came to my town and killed, essentially, all the civilians in it.

Cromwell tightened the English grip on the rest of Ireland.

It was another 250 years before Ireland achieved independence.

organised by Sinn Fein, the republican political party.

It was nearly 100 years

since the Easter, 1916 uprising that led to Irish independence,

and they were beginning a series of events to mark the occasion.

Today, Sinn Fein was staging a re-enactment

of the funeral, attended by party leaders.

It included a reading from a fiery speech by Patrick Pearse,

a nationalist leader at the time.

"We pledge to Ireland our love

"and we pledge to English rule in Ireland our hate.

"Life springs from death

"and from the graves of patriot men and women, spring living nations.

"They think they have provided against everything.

"But the fools, the fools, the fools!

"They have left us our Fenian dead

"and while Ireland holds these graves,

"Ireland, unfree,

I suppose it's the events, the historic events,

and what's happened here that has inspired this sort of fervency in the extremes.

The sense I get here, though,

is there is still passion for nationalism.

There is still passion for a united Ireland,

but there's not the fire.

Things are changing. Things are developing.

But the dream of the united Ireland,

I think, is gone, certainly for this generation.

The Irish government had held its own ceremony just a few hours earlier.

We met up in the heart of Dublin.

So we have come to one of the most important, well, areas,

This was where all telecommunications,

the telegraph came, all mail came. The only way you could control

the realms beyond your own front door was through this building.

If you could destroy this,

you could basically destroy the stranglehold Britain had.

On Easter Monday, 1916,

score of rebels approached the General Post Office.

One of their leaders was Manchan's great grand-uncle,

known as The O'Rahilly.

Despite being relatively untrained,

they caught the guards unawares, and seized the building.

So, when they came in here through the doors,

they knew they were most likely not going to leave.

and heavy artillery into Dublin.

A Royal Navy gunboat sailed up the River Liffey.

The British responded with overwhelming force.

The gunboat was dropping bombs

and eventually it starts dropping bombs on top of this building.

The roof goes on fire and they decide,

"run down Henry Street into Moore Street,"

but right at the edge there, there's this whole barricade,

with a Lewis sub-machine gun

and my great grandad, The O'Rahilly,

he manages to crawl into a doorway here, on what was called Moore Lane.

It's now called O'Rahilly Parade after him.

And, slowly, he dies there.

or has it just been what it is? Yeah.

Because the fight was so glorious, because it was led by poets

and leaders and idealists, it was a glorious fight

and then we became infused by the myth of that fight and that

did have bad results.

That led to the whole Northern Ireland question.

The strength and passion of the fight clearly was so potent that it

was like an intoxicating dream that has dizzied us all for a century.

And I worry, now, 2016,

that we're going to mire ourselves in the past.

Our only chance now, as a nation, as a world, is to put behind us these

ridiculous dreams of nationhood and struggles for nationality we had

and to try and become pan-global, sort of, human-focused.

The Catholic church was central to the identity of the new nation.

The future Archbishop of Dublin even helped draft the constitution.

Some say the Republic became almost a colony of the Vatican.

Is it OK to come in? Thank you.

The curtain raiser for the festival was

a film about the campaign for equal marriage.

I was with film-maker Anna Roberts

and festival organiser Ger Philpott for a gala screening.

It feels like this is such a colossal event in Irish history.

It is. The nation was unified. Yeah.

And when you see the response of people on the screen and why,

it's amazing and it doesn't get tired.

I've watched it quite a few times because it reminds me

of what happened that day.

The Yes vote won by a landslide.

CHEERS

You've lived through quite an extraordinary evolution,

transition, whatever you want to call it, in Ireland's culture,

in its society.

Homosexuality was profoundly illegal here until very recently.

It was pretty awful. I was a criminal in my country.

I certainly shed a lot of tears on the 23rd of May

when the results were coming through.

Was it a victory for your community or was it actually a defeat

for the Church and for the old way of doing things and the old ideas?

I think it was a defeat for the Church in many respects

and I think because of the way society has unfolded here,

and the Catholic Church and the child sexual abuse issues,

people said, "Well, actually, no, thank you.

If the Irish have that fundamental belief in the Church taken

away from them, is there a risk that they lose a sense of their identity?

No, I don't think so.

After you.

The Church itself says, "We're in trouble.

"We've lost a grip on the young, particularly."

It just feels like the tide has changed in Ireland.

The sense of what it is to be Irish has moved away from being,

"Well, we are Catholic. We are traditional,"

I wonder what our identity is in Ireland at the moment, actually.

I think we're kind of being absorbed into this globalised,

commercial world, where, really, do we have an identity that we can...?

They've swapped Catholicism for consumerism?

In just a generation, it's been both a poor European backwater

and a tiger economy.

It's been devoutly religious and now commercialised and globalised.

As the world changes around them, what values will people hold on to?

I'm heading south out of Dublin now.

I am near the end of my journey around the island of Ireland.

But I've still got a couple more things

I'd like to see before I finish.

It's one of the most beautiful corners of Europe.

because I'm heading to a secret sanctuary.

Willie Heffernan lives in this remote sanctuary with

a menagerie of rather unusual rescued animals.

So, this is your bit of paradise by the looks of it.

There's Charlie. Charlie!

Yeah, he likes his treats.

He's an old-timer, you know?

Charlie is a black capuchin monkey who was used in laboratory

experiments for more than a decade.

I know that might come as a surprise, but... Incoming!

Oh, nice.

Charlie and the crabstick!

He takes in primates from around the world,

most of which have been used in laboratory experiments.

He's an old-timer, you know?

Charlie's still on the crabstick.

He took me for a proper introduction with Charlie.

So we're landing on the island? Yeah. Excellent.

This is Charlie's and Sam's island.

There we go. Look at this. Aren't they wonderful?

So they were completely institutionalised?

And controlled, down to the very grape, the very peanut.

You set them free? Yeah.

Well, the monkeys tell me that every day.

A monkey sanctuary is the last thing

I expected to find on my travels around Ireland.

Jesus, I'll need a pint after all this!

He might be unconventional,

but the thing about Willie is that he just really cares

and in that, surely, there's a lesson for us all.

It's quite a blustery day, but beautiful.

I'm getting to the end of my journey around Ireland now.

But look at that view!

With the Open University, you can further explore Ireland's

rich history and culture.

To find out more, go to our website

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