I think Haiti is a place that suffers so much from neglect that people only want to hear about it when itโs at its extreme. And thatโs what they end up knowing about it.
Edwidge DanticatAll anyone can hope for is just a tiny bit of love, like a drop in a cup if you can get it, or a waterfall, a flood, if you can get that too.
Edwidge DanticatHere, though, there is nothing. Nothing at all. The sky seems empty even when I am looking at the moon and stars.
Edwidge DanticatThese were our bedtime stories. Tales that haunted our parents and made them laugh at the same time. We never understood them until we were fully grown and they became our sole inheritance.
Edwidge DanticatThe whole history between Haiti and the Dominican Republic is complicated. We share the island of Hispaniola, and Haiti occupied the Dominican Republic for twenty-two years after 1804 for fear that the French and Spanish would come back and reinstitute slavery. So we have this unique situation of being two independent nations on the same island, but with each community having its own grievance.
Edwidge Danticat