Living without electricity for 29 years
By Cathal McNaughton
John McCarter is 77 years old and has been living without mains electricity at his home at Downhill, Londonderry county, for 29 years.
It seems incredible that a pensioner who lives so close to the prosperous Causeway Coast tourist area in Northern Ireland is allowed to live in such basic conditions.
However, John is the perfect host and couldn’t have made me more welcome when I arrived at his modest wooden cottage set against the backdrop of the dramatic Co Derry coastline.
He explained that he has been having a drawn out dispute with his landlord and a family member about getting mains electricity connected to the property. The mains supply is just at the end of his garden but, while the dispute continues, John remains without electricity relying instead on coal fires and candles as temperatures drop.
The trouble with Northern Ireland
Tradition is something that is celebrated, enjoyed and handed down to the next generation, but in the small corner of western Europe where I was born, it has led to shootings and bombings and the loss of thousands of lives.
For 16 years I’ve worked as a photographer covering ‘The Troubles’ in Northern Ireland and in this time I’ve come to realize that what one side of the political and religious divide sees as celebration, the other sees as triumphalism.
The Twelfth of July parades are one such tradition that sparked disturbances on the streets of Belfast this week with rioters throwing petrol bombs and police responding with plastic bullets as Catholics and Protestants once again clashed.
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The Wall
When I was growing up, my grandfather lived in a small cabin in the woods with no electricity or running water. He heated with two coal burning heaters. There was no sheeting on the internal walls and I could look through the cracks to the outdoors. He cooked on a wood burning cook stove. Walked to a spring daily for his water and still trapped rabbit, squirrel, turtle, etc. for meat. We would go to see him every weekend and take groceries. We walked about half a mile back into the woods to the cabin carrying our boxes of groceries. His lights were oil lamps.
He became ill before the weekend and trudged a mile and a half to the bus stop and came into town; then walked three blocks to our house. He died that night. The human spirit is awesome! His name was John also. I pray that John of this article is helped so he can remain in his home.