Heres a recent story and its true incidently. In the little village where I was born in Northern Ireland the local people, in light of the peace process and hope for better days to come, decided that there should be a day to honour their village, the place where they all grew up and the home to generations of their families. Ballymartin is the name of the place by the way at the foot of the Mourne mountains.

Anyway a committee was struck, comprising members of all religions, and they decided to have a parade and a village feit. Saint Joseph's pipe band was invited to play in the parade which they agreed to do and in order to keep things even the committee approached the local Orange Order to see if their flute band would parade aswell. They declined the offer to parade with a catholic band.

Now it seems to me that in Drumcree the Orange Order were prepared to do anything in order to parade along a road. Now here were the good folks of Ballymartin giving them the chance and they turn it down. Its a funny old world. Den