People in Bougainville will tell you a horrific story - like how they killed someone - and laugh about it,' said a Western aid worker incredulously about the Bougainvilleans, who have just come out of a nine-year war.

'Oh, I can relate to that,' I replied. 'I know because I laugh a lot. It's a great way of relieving tension.' On the editorial floor of the NI's British office in Oxford, the other editors have become accustomed to my laughs out loud, but to myself - often about subjects that do not appear to the vast majority of people as 'funny'.

In Bougainville and Northern Ireland, where I went to explore the progress of peace, I had many long laughs at both the hilarious and the tragic. And in each place I found a sense of humour was just one tool people use to shine through the sadness. Everyone develops their own sources of hope - even in the soggy rain-filled days of Northern Ireland's winter, as one chatty cabbie explained to me.

'I love the weather here,' he enthused.

'You're mad!' I exclaimed above the sound of the pouring rain on the car roof.

'I do; I like the cold. We had one day in the summer when it got really, really hot [a mere 25 degrees Celsius] and I couldn't do anything, I couldn't go to work 'cause all I did was sweat in the car, like. It was horrible... And I love the rain.'

'The rain ?!?!'

'Yeah, I love to go out for walks in the rain. 'Cause, like, when you're at home Daddy's not allowed to get upset. Can't have the kids seeing you mad or sad like. So you got to get out and go for a walk. But if the weather's good, people stop you in the street and say "Oh Kieran, how you doing?" like and you can't get a moment's peace. But when it's raining there's no one out 'cept you and you can just walk and walk and think things through.'

Laughing too much, walking in the rain - we all have ways of keeping ourselves warm when the chilling effects of violence and war threaten to make us freeze over; making us cold enough not to care about human life. But no matter how much violence is glamorized - from Joan of Arc to Arnie Schwarzenegger - if you ask someone to describe the most scary person imaginable they will say 'cold, unfeeling, automatic killers'.

But let's not allow the fact that we are warm-blooded make us fuzzy-headed. If we want to get serious about creating peace and reconciliation it's going to take as much action, courage and warmth as we can muster. And since the world as we know it is violent, change is going require a bit of 'insanity' as well. Laying down arms is an act of 'victory' not 'surrender'. Peace and reconciliation do not mean 'giving up' but battling on without using violence as a crutch.

In the words of one Ogoni protester in Nigeria: 'We are going to fight for our rights peacefully and non-violently - and we shall win.'

In pursuit of peace & reconciliation
Anouk Ride joins the hunt for a non-violent solution to Northern Ireland's conflict.

Eye to eye with SLORC
Ong Ju Lynn uncovers those caught in the dangerous web of Burma's military regime.

Superdove
It's not a bird, nor a plane; it's the mighty SUPERDOVE with a hundred ways to change the world without violence.

Joining the witch-hunt
Peace and reconciliation via witch-hunting? The concepts may not be incompatible, argues Nancy Scheper-Hughes.

WAR AND PEACE - THE FACTS

The stolen ones
The cries of thousands of Aboriginal Australians who were kidnapped by the state have been stifled. Now Tjalaminu Mia tells her own story.

Kosovo - death of democracy
Is there hope of reconciliation in Kosovo? Photos and a report from Europe's latest war.

Clipping the Condor's claws
Marcela López-Levy believes the South American generals have good reason to be nervous.

The dead tell tales
Guatemala's peaceful martyrs cannot be forgotten, writes Sarah Elton.

The rebel peace
The islands of Bougainville - once awash with blood - have turned the tide of war, reports Anouk Ride.

Action: Own the peace

Letters
Letter from Mongolia
Update
The NI Interview with Zenilda da Silva Vilacio
Reviews: plus Mikhail Bakhtin classic
NI Crossword
Endpiece: by Samuel Wiafe
Country profile: Lithuania

FRONT COVER PHOTO: MARK MASON / IAN NIXON / STILL PICTURES / ARGUS
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