Haiti Travel Guide History of Haiti - Crash Course
Here is a crash course in Haitian History in a few short sentences, the shortest you will on the web, guaranteed:
The island that is now Haiti and the Dominican Republic is called Hispaniola.
Before Columbus came, the people that live there (in peace) were the taino/arawak people.
Columbus landed in Haiti in December 1492. He and the Spanish thought there was lots of gold here.
WRONG!
SO... They turned the island of Hispaniola (La Isla Española) in to a big farm and used it as a food source while they hunt for gold in the rest of the Americas.
They enslaved the taino people. The taino people couldn't take it, so they all died. literally exterminated from slavery.
Long story short...
In 1697, The Spanish handed a part of the island to the French as a little side dish during of signing of a war treaty (Treaty of Ryswick).
The French quickly realized:
"Holy Napoleon Batman... We can make money here!"
So they brought in African slaves, lots of them to Haiti (then Saint Domingue) and beat the crap out of them to make them work in these big farms.
Later on, in 1802, the slaves said "enough! No more beating... Liberte ou la mort (give us liberty or give us death)"
They fought the French for their freedom... They won!
The Haitian Revolution, by the way, is the ONLY successful slave revolt in the History of the world.
The Republic of Haiti was born!
Yeepee!
Then... all the super powers at the time (France, England, Spain, and the newly born United States) said:
"WHAT the f***? A black country? Run entirely by black people? Well... Golly... Black people are supposed to be slaves.. This is an outrage...!"
So... We Haitians have been paying for our arrogance ever since!
We Haitians have been trying to build our country with our ten fingers ever since our independence. Noone wanted to help us.
There has been more embargoes imposed on the Republic of Haiti than any other country in the history of the world.
Since 1806 oui, they've been hitting us with embargoes! There's an embargo right now!
So... We did the best we could under the circumstances.
Haiti is not perfect but...
le vant nou plen, wa pa kouzen nou, president pa bope nou!
That's Haitian Creole for:
"I'm proud to be a Haitian were at least I know I'm FREE..." LOL...
The end.
More Haiti Travel Guide:
- Haiti Travel Warning
- List of International Airports In Haiti
- List of Local Airports in Haiti
- Tips for Tourist Traveling to Haiti