Welcome to Belfast: A Soccer Duty

Two hero-reporters from the Bugle plane to sectarian-troubled Belfast and do a Polaroid-study of youth-league soccer and its role in democracy!

One more UK fable inspired by the inter-religious storytelling in the iconic film The Devil's Own (Alan J. Pakula). Enjoy! 

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Belfast, Northern Ireland (UK) is a commercial city in Western civilization but's beset by sectarian woes between the Irish-Catholic minority and British-Protestant majority population living alongside each other with strained socioeconomics-conditions disparities catalyzing armed tensions between the IRA (Irish Republican Army), the UVF (Ulster Volunteer Force), and British police/military. Belfast is the arena for our tale of photojournalism in the West!

Two American journalists, Peter Parker and Mary Jane, working for the Daily Bugle in DC, head to Dublin/Belfast on Aer Lingus from JFK for a special photo-series/journalism report on the quality/funding of youth-soccer leagues in sectarian Northern Ireland and what it might 'spell' for inter-religious coexistence dialogue in the troubled United Kingdom (UK).

PETER PARKER: We'll swarm in armed with our 'classic' Polaroids and get the youth-soccer fable we need, darling.

MARY JANE: You said it, Pete; we'll get those soccer Belfast spreads for the Bugle feature on media-workers in political arena.

Peter Parker and Mary Jane head valiantly into troubled Belfast armed with their nifty night-day Polaroids, ready to find the great 'fable' about youth-soccer 'promises' in sectarian Northern Ireland to stamp out concerns that Western journalism simply 'ignores' its own inter-religious modern civilization ailments while focusing purely on Israel-Palestine. This shall be a great 'trophy-piece' for the DC's Bugle (and for Peter/Mary)!

PETER: We've been reading tons of Belfast (NI) stories about IRA/UVF and sectarian economics in the UK.

MARY: We're ready to 'complement' these headlines/stories with our youth-soccer 'angle' on sectarian development(s)!

Now, a 'Polaroid' is simply an elegant vintage/classic handheld photo-taking device ('toy') that enables one to print out an 'instant' photo of a snapshot/image taken in street-work, which is handy for a moving photojournalist seeking real-time instant images for their journalism-mission. The Polaroid of course preceded today's handy snapshot-taking smartphones (iPhone).

Back in America, a seminal 1800s pluralism-immigration 'opus' called Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese) catalogs the struggles in the streets of old New York between waves of Italian and Irish immigrants flocking to the New World for a better life. There's plenty of talk in other words in Western civilization about the 'colors' of pluralism-intrigue (e.g., Italian-Irish gangs). This is the kind of 'history-piece diorama' work Peter Parker and Mary Jane hope to 'complement' in Northern Ireland, a cinema of democracy!

PETER: Kids in Northern Ireland walk to school and past rogue units of the Irish and British working in darkness!
MARY: These youngsters need a real spiritual 'outlet' or 'vent' to move their living lives forward with good sanity.

The special Belfast public-school is the subject of our photojournalism tale about Peter Parker and Mary Jane (Daily Bugle!). This Belfast school is where both Irish-Catholics and British-Protestants study/play side-by-side and participate in a school-organized/managed/marketed youth-soccer league. Mary and Peter are at the school taking Polaroids now.

STUDENT: Our teachers are all fair and smart and we get energized to do the youth-soccer thing after class-time school days.

Now, these youth-soccer leagues tied to the Belfast school have given the community much hope in inter-religious coexistence/habitation in this time of commerce-consciousness and socioeconomics-conditions disparity negotiations in Parliament (UK). Everyone wants equal fortune and playtime on the field for this school-tied youth-soccer 'project' in troubled Belfast by the time Christmas news-stories surface for troubled Northern Ireland. Soccer has become a scarlet prayer for the community in the UK.

PETER: We've allotted outstanding images of what makes this Belfast youth-soccer project a real triumph!
MARY: We're sure to create a revealing mosaic for the Bugle feature on Western inter-religious work(s)...and soccer's key.

As the units of intelligence-men, some sent as diplomatic officials from the USA, work to resolve various economics-conditions woes in the Northern Ireland criminal underground (e.g., blood-diamond trafficking by corrupt capitalism-barons), Peter/Mary continue their complementation work with youth-soccer photojournalism as a potential 'cure' to this UK commercial vanity-problem.

STUDENT: My brother gave me his old toy water-rifle, which the IRA used to perform an 'acid-gun' heist of blood-diamonds.

PETER: If we may 'substitute' these sectarian 'fears' with patriotism-storytelling, community activity will flower.

MARY: This youth-soccer project in troubled Northern Ireland (UK) can be 'linked' to Western tales of democracy-work!

Will this 'Polaroid-project' about diagonal youth-league soccer in sectarian-troubled Belfast spell some Christmastime relief for the Catholics/Protestants of Northern Ireland (UK)? That's the hope of the Daily Bugle, and its two valiant star-reporters, Peter Parker and Mary Jane. Perhaps there's 'daylight' in Western civilization for Christmastime, in this 20th-anniversary commemoration year of 9/11.

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"Money is everything" (Ecclesiastes)