by JACOB KUSHNER
The part of the border that divides the Dominican Republic from Haiti on the southern coast of the island of Hispaniola is seldom reached by outsiders. To get to the Dominican town of Pedernales from Santo Domingo takes a seven-hour ride on a public bus, or gua-gua, through a desertlike region bordered to the south by pristine stone beaches on the Caribbean Sea. On the opposite side, the trip from Port-au-Prince to the Haitian town of Anse-à-Pitre requires switching between multiple tap-taps that drive along a worn-out road. For the second leg from Marigot, one must choose between a brutal dirt-road drive that has no mercy for the ancient vehicles that navigate it, or an overnight voyage on a perilous wooden raft over the sea.
The conflicts that transcend the metal gate between the two towns seem reminiscent of the children’s stories of Dr. Seuss that warn against infantile stubbornness and teach the morals of cooperation. In early February, Dominican agents seized a motorcycle crossing an unguarded section of the border and refused to return it because of a dispute over the title of the vehicle, which had been purchased on the Dominican side. So, one Saturday morning, Haitian residents of Anse-à-Pitre retaliated by seizing the motorcycle of a Dominican crossing there to buy rum.