M c f landscaping hispaniola moreau de saint-méry’s border politics a few days after the haitian earthquake of january 12, 2010, sonia marmolejos, a young dominican woman who was in the darío contreras hospital of santo domingo with her newborn daughter, decided to breastfeed three haitian children who had been admitted there after the disaster. they were wounded, hungry, and dehydrated, so sonia marmolejos acted on impulse and she did not expect to receive any special recognition for her generous gesture. the government of the dominican republic capitalized on this story, defined sonia marmolejos as a heroine, and used her actions as a metaphor to illustrate the charitable response of the country toward neighboring haiti. haiti and the dominican republic share the island of hispaniola and a history of colonialism which, however, has conjugated itself in very differ- ent ways. officially under spanish rule since 1493, the island was mostly left unpopulated for three-quarters of a century. in 1625 the french started to occupy parts of it (mainly in the north) and until the official recognition of the french colony of saint-domingue in 1777, they constantly pushed for- ward their unofficial borders, while the spanish carried out punitive raids to eradicate the french presence. on the spanish side, the economy was mainly livestock-based but the french developed an impressive network of planta- tions which relied on the constant import of enslaved labor from africa. saint- domingue soon became the richest and most profitable colony of the antilles until 1791, when a formidable slave revolt shook its foundations and had momentous repercussions throughout the island. hispaniola became a war zone: the french, spanish, english, and rebel armies forged and broke alli- ances and alternatively secured and lost portions of territory. in 1804, the for- merly enslaved insurgents declared their independence from france and the colony of saint-domingue became the republic of haiti. the black jacobins and their successors repeatedly tried to export the values of their revolution to the spanish part of the island and in 1822 the haitian president jean-pierre boyer annexed the former spanish colony of santo domingo. the haitian occupation of santo domingo lasted twenty years, until 1844. the haitian