Bonfire Preparations

We took a bus  from Dublin to Belfast today, crossing the invisible border between Ireland and Northern Ireland.  (Leaving the bus I told the driver I hadn't seen any evidence of the border, and he told me I couldn't have.) 

Our hotel room (on the 8th floor) is close to the center of Belfast and overlooks this large parking lot.  A young lady at the hotel desk told us that what's happening is the preparation of a bonfire to celebrate the Battle of the Boyne on the upcoming 12th of July.  Poking around on the internet I soon realized how fundamental the holiday in fact is for Northern Ireland.  (A clear summary is here.) In the battle  (July 1690), the Dutch Protestant William of Orange, who had just assumed the crowns of England, Scotland and Ireland, administered a final defeat to the Catholic James II, whom he had deposed from them. William's victory helped  ensure the continuation of Protestant domination in Ireland for more than the next two centuries,  until the early 1900s. Thus July 12th is a Protestant holiday (called The Twelfth), celebrated demonstratively and sometimes violently by Orangemen in Northern Ireland. I'm glad we will be leaving Belfast soon before that! The extra provides a close-up of the growing pallet heap.