Then a man from Belfast bought the field and built houses in it ----not like their little brown houses , but bright brick houses with shining roofs .

It was still somewhat unusual for them to gather together in Belfast.

About a month ago I was invited to give a brief talk to my nephew Gianni’s first grade class—nothing too deep, mind you, rather simply about what it’s like living in a foreign place such as Belfast.

Perhaps it was unwise of him to blame just one religion for trying to mark out urban territory; in recent memory, one British city (Belfast) had no-go areas for people of the “wrong” Christian sect.

Sections of the city have undergone regeneration since Belfast emerged from the Troubles the three decades of violence that culminated in the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.