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New exhibition explores life along Derry-Donegal border - BBC News

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Participants in Borderlands
DCSDC

An exhibition exploring life along the Irish border will open at the Alley Theatre in Strabane, County Tyrone.

The free showcase aims to highlight how crossing the border daily impacts lives socially, financially and culturally.

It features 22 people living along the border between Derry City and Strabane District Council area and County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland.

The series of interviews, entitled Borderlands, recorded by the Holywell Trust, will be archived for posterity.

The interviews, which were recorded virtually over lockdown in 2020, range from former soldiers who served during The Troubles to present-day farmers navigating Brexit rules.

Ronan McConnell, from the council's museum and heritage service, said the exhibition is an opportunity to see the border from many different viewpoints and experiences, both past and present.

"By archiving these recordings it allows future generations to hear a real representation about how life around the border has evolved, and how it may continue to evolve for people from Culmore to Castlederg," Mr McConnell told BBC News NI.

He said it was about "capturing honest opinions" over a wide range of subjects from the creation of the border over 100 years ago to more recently Brexit .

Mr McConnell said the recordings illustrate that the border can mean many different things to many different people, from a justification for someone's national identity to simply an opportunity to buy cheaper fuel ten minutes down the road.

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Theresa Stewart
DCSDC

Theresa Stewart, who was interviewed as part of the project, never wants to see a physical infrastructure put back in place along the border, as she fears it could detrimentally affect young people.

"I think it will make relationships more strained definitely if there was ever a physical structure put back in place," Ms Stewart said.

"I don't want my children or future grandchildren, being traumatised by being stopped in the car searched by soldiers carrying a lot of weaponry," she added.

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David Young
DCSDC

In another entry, David Young spoke of his father's hardware shop in Castlederg "that was bombed fix or six times" during The Troubles.

"It was a fairly easy target as the road down the front of it came from the border and the road at the back went to a different part of the border.

"My father sort of developed a siege mentality. We would never have thought of crossing the border in those days."

Speaking to BBC News NI, Mr Young said following the NI peace process and the removal of cross-border checkpoints, he would now cross the border daily without a second thought.

"Apart from a change in the road signs you wouldn't know you were anywhere different these days."

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Gerry Temple, in his entry, explained what life was like working as a UK customs officer on the Londonderry/Donegal border for two decades at the height of The Troubles.

"I was a married man with a young family starting and the mortgage rate was going through the roof, and I needed a job.

"I'll be honest, the customs in Derry had an awful reputation for being bad and my dad's advice to me was if you want to fix them, you have to be inside to fix it."

Border map

Mr Temple, when asked about his perception of the border now for the project, said he does not recognise it.

"If the virus [Covid-19] has taught us anything, it is that there is no such thing as a border - It doesn't exist."

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Gregory Campbell
PAcemaker

DUP MP for East Londonderry Gregory Campbell explained what the land border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland means to him in his recording.

"The border offers me, it should offer everybody, the sanctuary of being British on the island of Ireland, not offering a threat to anyone who feels Irish on this part of the island.

"That is the way it should be, it should be an open, free and accessible border that I view as being the justification for my Britishness but it isn't a threat to anyone's Irishness," Mr Campbell explained.

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The exhibition, which was funded by The Northern Ireland Executive Office's Together Building A United Community strategy, will run from 26 July until 16 August.

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