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The St Maarten Legend
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ST MAARTEN LEGEND - Catch The Humor... |
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Retelling The Old Folk Tale... One of the more exciting tales that interest me is the way the French and The Dutch divided the Island. Even though fun and enjoyment is the name of the game when you visit our beautiful Island of St Maarten in the Caribbean, our history too offers some humor that gets you more and more addicted to this dual flag rock. St Maarten is probably known throughout the world to be the smallest land mass to be governed by two nations, the French and the Dutch. That is absolutely correct. No tricks involved here. Clocking in at only 37 square miles St Maarten/St Martin lives in perfect harmony even though divided by its imaginary borders. The Dutch side (St Maarten) is considered a part of The Netherlands Antilles along with the sister Islands of Curacao, Statia, Saba and Bonaire. Our Central government sits in the Island of Curacao. By extension we answer to Holland because the Netherlands Antilles is a part of the Dutch Kingdom. The official currency on the Dutch side is the Antillean Guilder.
The French side (St Martin) is much different in terms of governance and is like a community of France. Standing on the French side of St Martin, Guadeloupe, or Martinique is equivalent to standing in Paris France. The official currency on the French side is the Euro. NB. On both sides of the Island the US Dollar is heavily used - One often hears that we live in a Dollar economy. THE ST MAARTEN LEGEND - A mix of gin and wine...
(Now I know that you've waiting to read the old tale so hear it is.) The French and Dutch on March 23 1648, signed the famous partition agreement on Mount des Accords. (Concordia) Prior to that of course they had to decide how the land would be divided. They thought that the best way to share the salt rich land was to compete for it. It is said that a representative of both sides was chosen to do the honors.
The two then faced in opposite directions and started off from the east coast on the shorelines of the Island. Where ever they would meet would be the point at where the island would be divided. The French ended up with twenty one square miles of the land while their Dutch counterparts only got sixteen square miles. It is also thought that the French was armed with his WINE while the Dutchman was in possession of GIN, thus the inability to significantly represent the Dutch team.
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