Life is full of little déjà vus.
"Belgrade to Belfast."
The thought struck me as soon as I landed at Belfast International. Something about the airport felt strangely familiar.
The dark tones, clean layouts and distinctive signage instantly brought Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport to mind.
It turns out there is a good reason for that: both airports are owned and operated by Vinci Airports, whose branding and design is evident in both places!
The resemblance was enough to make me both smile and grimace.
I had a lot of expectations for this unexplored city but nostalgia was not one of them.
John, the friend of my host Eilish, is a former customs officer.
He is retired now, but his career once involved dealing with illicit oil smuggled from 'southern Ireland' into 'northern Ireland'.
Driving me to the City Hall with Tim, a retired doctor, in the passenger's seat, he remarked 'aye, well ye had your fair share of troubles over there', when commenting on our shared pasts.
It was one of those comments that could only come from someone who had lived through a place with its own complicated past.
Different countries, different conflicts, but a shared understanding that history has a habit of lingering.
I was walking around the city in the afternoon. In a crowd of passing faces, I caught sight of a familiar man with long white hair.
I must have seen the Reverend at Sinclair Seamen's Presbyterian Church walking on the streets.
Prior to writing a place entry about it, I'd gotten into a rabbit hole about this maritime-themed church in Belfast.
I'd gone on their website and YouTube sermons (which are unusual to my Orthodox Christian ears), whilst drafting the thing on Atlas Obscura. I will never not love the 'Norn Iron' accent.
And to see a person I know the name of! This must be what celebrities feel like.
I finished the first day on the docks beneath Samson and Goliath, the giant yellow cranes standing over Belfast Lough.
Somewhere beyond them lies the Irish Sea.
Somewhere far to the southeast flows the Danube.
The two places could hardly be further apart on a map.
Throughout the day, thought, I kept stumbling into familiar things: an airport that reminded me of home, conversations about troubled histories, faces I somehow recognised from a distance in a city I'd never visited before.
Perhaps that is the strange thing about travel.
We leave in search of somewhere different and spend the journey finding pieces of the places we already know.
Between the Danube and the Irish Sea, we share the same water.
