I wasn't sure what to expect from my first trip to Belfast Oktoberfest in the Kings Hall but was…read morepleasantly surprised. It's about as German as I am, which is not at all hahahahaha! Nonetheless it made for a fun, interesting and unique evening out. The concept seemed a little strange at first. You pay £3.50 entrance fee, buy tokens for drinks and then take a seat. Following this a Lady in a rather cheap, tacky but amusing Bavarian costume takes your order and carries the drinks to your table. It was a great, speedy and efficient serving system. Though it would have been nice to see some Gents in costumes waiting on tables too! First up we ordered 'white wine' from the menu - yes that was the only description! We ended up laughing at the bottle of AUSTRALIAN Hardy's Chardonnay we received! We then ordered steins of Paulaner Oktoberfest beer which was absolutely delicious. None of my party are beer drinkers but we loved this beer. Finally we tried a bottle of Rotkappchen, a dry German sparkling wine which was good and very enjoyable. The entertainment consisted of a strange mix of German style 'oom pah pah' band and not very German (i.e UK) chart hits played by a DJ. Overall it was actually very enjoyable with a great raucous, merry atmosphere. Just don't take it too seriously or expect it to be too authentic and I think most people will find Belfast Oktoberfest makes for a fun evening out and a definite 'must try' at least once.

Again, I seem to think things that other people like are completely rubbish. This goes for…read moreColdplay, Nando's, and the Conservative government are prime examples of this. And to this list of ignomy you can add Oktoberfest. I have been to it a couple of time and found it to be oh so very, very boring. Its all just overpriced beers and faux banter with people pretending to be Germans. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the hot women with big cleveages but I just think the entire enterprise is completely rubbish. Most people won't agree with me but I'd stay away from this place. Save your money and actually go to Germany.

Without a doubt Culture Night Belfast is the best night of the year. Despite recent arts cuts…read moreCulture Night was back in September 2015 even bigger and better than before. It's an annual occurrence consisting of a full day of activities. Over 250 free arts events starting at 1pm and running until late. Belfast comes to life on this one day like no other. There's a leisurely, relaxed, bustling vibe throughout the city with most activities happening in the Cathedral Quarter area. Visual art, music, dancing, sword fencing, magicians, street artists, performance art, circus acts, art exhibitions, fire dancers, roller derbies, jugglers, food and drink. There's a bedazzling array of entertainment and it's for all age groups from babies to centenarians. The streets are closed off to traffic and you can grab a drink, a Culture Night brochure and just wander about exploring what's on. It's a magical night. Forget Christmas, Halloween or any other festivity or festival. Nothing compares to Belfast Culture Night - it's the best - I hope it never stops. Here are some of my favourites from CNB15: INKIE art exhibition ~ Ink Monkey art shop Claire Carpenter art exhibition ~ Cafe 31 Faigy art exhibition ~ Assembly Rooms Yarn bombing by Saturday Knit Fever Fire dancing by FirePoise Lumen by Guerilla Shout & DSNT Hit The North Street Art Festival Urban dance by Cypher Sessions Belfast Roller Derby Irish dance ~ Tir na n-Og Dance Group DeLorean Print Cars ~ Belfast Photo Festival

Culture Night Belfast took place for the first time last year, and it got even bigger this year. It…read morebasically involves every arts organisation flinging its doors open to the public for free and as a result, there's a real buzz about the place. It initially started as a Cathedral Quarter event, but was extended a little to include some of South Belfast this year. My understanding is that they want to eventually have Culture Night take place all over the city, which would be some achievement! The events are massively varied - Belfast Film Festival might put on what they call "Bean Bag Cinema", which is where a film is screened in one of the Cathedral Quarter's alleyways, with the audience sitting on Bean Bags. The galleries in the area might put on special shows, artists take to the streets to create something on the night and almost every cafe or restaurant has some sort of live music going on. It's such a great way to remove some of the barriers that stop people getting involved in the arts. Since it's all so relaxed, it's really easy to just go down, have a wander round and see what grabs your attention!

Belfast Festival at Queen's was established in 1962 and ran successfully for over half a century,…read moreuntil 2015, when Queen's University Belfast (QUB) announced they could/would no longer fund it. Thus QUB effectively pulled the plug, handed festival staff redundancies and turfed them out into the cold. Undeterred, this dedicated festival team carried on, securing funding from Ulster Bank, Arts Council of Northern Ireland and many others sponsors. They found new offices, a fresh international focus and morphed the Belfast Festival at Queen's into the phenomenon that is now known as Belfast International Arts Festival. Hence a truly great thing was born. Belfast International Arts Festival aims to give all people affordable access to dance, music, film, art, theatre and literature of a contemporary nature and international stature. It's a fantastic three-week-long programme occurring annually in October which offers something for everyone. I never really got into this festival until last year (2015) when I attended the breathtaking AniMotion Show, an outdoor event of music, sound and visual art which totally blew my mind. Being a fan of visual art I also adored Belfast Open Studios where 20 artists studios allowed full access to the general public. Additionally the Annual RUA Art Exhibition is a show I visited numerous times and an absolute treat for the eyeballs. This year I secured my festival brochure as soon as it was available and have circled a long list of events to attend. I love that there are plentiful free and economically priced events. Plus there are many Irish/UK premieres and internationally renowned Artists to enjoy. Belfast International Arts Festival is cutting-edge, brilliant and the granddaddy of them all in Northern Ireland. If you attend only one festival this year, make it this one - it's far too good to miss!

Given that I just picked up the programme for this about an hour ago, it seemed only fitting that I…read moreshould share my thoughts with the Yelping world. The Ulster Bank Belfast Festival at Queen's (to give it it's full, but never used title) is on every year for two weeks in October, and 90% of the time it's made of win. It's the big daddy of the countless festivals in this city, and it's easy to see why. It gives equal billing to music as it does to film, drama, dance and visual arts, and every year they attract a few heavy hitters to pull in the crowds. This year, for example, I'm particularly excited about an evening with Michael Palin and the Dublin Gospel Choir. Possibly the only downside to the Fesitval is that to go to everything that I wanted to would probably involve me selling a kidney! Most of the events are around the £10/£15 mark, but some run as high as £20 or £25. I'm not complaining, I mean, that's just what it costs to have the Festival work, it's just frustrating when you can't afford to see everything!

ruined by parade vehicles obstructing cycle lanes. Asked for complaint forms but since nothing…read morereceived don't believe they actually have a complaints procedure !

It's now a Belfast parade highlight in August each year. It's really diverse, it's certainly…read morecolourful and it's a great family day out. I read that over 5,000 people paraded and I guess there were many tens of thousands of people lining the city streets to cheer and applaud. My entire family are proud supporters of the LGBTI community. It was clear that the popular will, the will and the voice of the people, is behind this community and the people came out in their thousands to support this community. Our statelet, referred to as the Province, is the only place in Western Europe that does not allow gay marriage. Well that's not strictly true as one must count the Vatican City as a state; in Latin its Status Civitatis Vaticanae or in Italian Stato della Città del Vaticano; a country located within the city of Rome. It's no surprise then that this State will not legislate for same sex marriage. So back to our throwback province - why is it always us that stands apart and backward from progressive humane civilised societies contrary to the majority will of our people. There was a case in Belfast involving the making of a cake. A shop took an order from a gay man for a cake and when they realised he wanted the cake to contain a message supporting gay marriage they phoned him to offer a refund refusing the order through their religious belief. It ended in court. The cake shop lost. It cost millions of pounds on both sides (gay man was funded by an equality commission - yip we need an equality commission and we need a parades commission and a human rights commission too) and the cake shop (which is an industrial bakery and a sizeable rich business) was funded by religious fundamentalists. Seriously folks I'm not making this stuff up and I'm giving a snapshot. So before I fall asleep here's my point: the bakery folk can have all the beliefs they want and I don't care if they believe the earth is only 6,000 years old as some do or if it's flat because that's their private business just as my beliefs or lack thereof is my private business. But when you open shops in any high street western world you benefit from the complete societal infrastructure - clean streets, street lighting, fire, police & ambulance services, road & public transport services, sewage and so on. That's provided by taxpayers who don't discriminate as to who can or cannot benefit. Generations of LGBTI taxpayers and straight taxpayers contribute to society and it's infrastructure so when you do business on a High Street you must not refuse an individual or a group the services you offer because of your personal beliefs. These stay at home or in your school, church, mosque, temple or wherever else but when you open a shop on a High street you serve every customer equally regardless of creed, colour, race, sex, gender, age and so on. My family like many thousands of others will be back to show support for Belfast Pride next year and the year after and the year after that. It's the right thing to do.

Pigstock is a festival that is really up and coming on the Northern Ireland Calendar, and with its…read morewonderful name why shouldn't it! The festival has been running for the last 3 years, and each year has seen a step up in both the professionalism and popularity of the event. At what other festival around does part of the admission fee help fund the open fire pig roast for everyone to feast on to line their stomach before the inevitable drink and moshing bonanza that will end up having your stomach acting like it is blender? The music showcases the best of local Northern Irish bands, both established and up and coming, with last year including local stalwarts A Plastic Rose and the great newbies Key Of Atlas! You can either camp or go just for the music, but for only a fiver more and a whole nights more rowdy banter, the only choice has to be the camping! My good friend Jamie's uncle helps run this and there is so much passion here for local music, I can;t recommend it enough.Be warned though, if you are looking for a good night's sleep head elsewhere: this one gets rowdy! So my advice next May is to get yourself down to Pigstock and you will be as happy as a Pig in...... well, you know the rest!

This festival is a real gem, and is a welcome addition to the cultural activities of Belfast!It is…read morelocated this year in Botanic Gardens which makes it a central and easily accessible place for all those of Belfast and beyond! To start off, the food is provided by the finest chefs from the restaurants of Northern Ireland. I was there yesterday and I was lucky to sample food from the chefs of La Boca, Mourne Seafood Bar and the Fitzwilliam Hotel. There is a wide range of food to cater to all tastes, including vegetarians. As for the music, it is mainly of the cover band variety, but when the bands are tight and very engaging like Flash Harry and Rumours Of Fleetwood Mac, the lack of originality can be overlooked! There a wide range of pricing plans, ranging from £5 for five sampling tokens and admission in the lunch time hours to the "Premiere Club Taste Fest" package for £50 which gets you entry to every day, 25 food tokens and a free drink of your choice.It is up to you what you need most! I wish this Festival the best of luck and hope it grows stronger in the years to come!

Ok, so positives first:…read more The food! Yummy! There's so much variety and you get to sample food from the best of NI's chefs and restaurants - Belfast's Merchant, Portadown's Yellow Door - they're all there and the food is (generally) divine. The entertainment is also pretty good. Last year when I went it was the Strictly Come Dancing band and two of the dancers (this was great for me - I'm a massive Strictly fan!) and this year, I saw Flash Harry, who are a really very good Queen tribute band. And now the negatives - it's so expensive! You can burn £30 or £40 without thinking, which stings a bit! Actually, that's about the only negative I can think of. I was going to mention the weather, since it was a total wash out, but it seems unfair to use that against them. It's an incredibly well organised event that's well worth going to, even if it will set you back.

There's always an air of excitement when Belfast Film Festival begins and this year has been no…read moredifferent. With the Northern Irish film Industry booming it seems like this year's festival will be a celebration of the talent that we have on these shores. The Belfast Film Festival organisers are excellent at promoting local venues and businesses. For instance last night I attended a special screening of Network aptly shown in a BBC studio at Balckstaff House. The venue was a perfect compliment to the movie and this is the beauty of The Belfast Film Festival - it provides a cinematic experience. The local promotion didn't stop there as Fratelli's hosted the pre movie drinks. It's fantastic to see a festival and local businesses work together to promote all Belfast has to offer. Venues include QFT, The Black Box and Moviehouse on the Dublin Road. This is the 15th year of The Belfast Film Festival and it's running from 16th April - 25th April - so if you want to see some local talent in the big screen or just want to see some local venues in a different light then look no further.

Belfast Film Festival takes place every year in April for two weeks…read more The programme is usually very varied, so it's hard to describe it exactly. Basically though, you can expect every kind of film; comedy, sci-fi, art house, horror, classic and there's usually a strong local or Irish feel about it too. The movies are screened in venues all over the city, some conventional cinemas and some more unconventional venues (like on a boat going on the Lagan for instance!) For proper film buffs, there are talks and workshops as well. There's generally something for everyone and it's a great chance to see some interesting films in unusual settings. There are also special events that take place during the rest of the year, so it's always worth keeping an eye on the website to see if there's anything on.

The Tall Ships festival was a four day spectacular that brought the very best out in Belfast and…read morethe people of Belfast. It really had it all. Fireworks, photographs, fun and best of all food. The four day festival began on Thursday the 2nd of July as Tall Ships from across the globe docked in Belfast Lough. It would be easy to overlook this event and without the work of Visit Belfast and the tourist board the Tall Ships Festival wouldn't have been half as good as it was. The festival wasn't just about the ships it was about the hospitality of our city. The ships obviously were the focal point but what are boats without some banter? The organisers entertained the 500 hundred thousand plus visitors with a fun fair outside the Odyssey Arena, a continental market and of course a spectacular fireworks display on Saturday evening. There was something for everyone at the festival - kids were boarding the boats and doing there best Jack Sparrow impression and the adults were filling up the beer tent and doing their best walk the plank impressions on the way out. Although there were a lot of people at the festival at no point did it feel overcrowded. The traffic was catered for excellently too as the organisers put on Park and Ride services around the outskirts of the City. this eased congestion and made it smooth sailing for regular city commuters. I for one can't quite get over how good the festival was - cheers and smiling faces will be my everlasting memory of The Tall Ships 2015, oh and boats of course! I am already looking forward to 2016 when the the ships cut the current of Belfast Lough once again!