
Put One Foot Wrong in Baarle and You’ve Left the Country - e15ctr0n
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/world/what-in-the-world/put-one-foot-wrong-in-this-town-and-youve-left-the-country.html
======
zeotroph
Another interesting piece of Enclave-Exclave history recently came to an end
when Bangladesh and India exchanged some territory to "simplify" a part of
their border [1]. It also featured the worlds only 3rd order enclave, i.e. a
piece of Indian land in a Bangladeshi enclave, in an Indian enclave.

1:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Bangladesh_encla...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Bangladesh_enclaves#Notable_enclaves)

~~~
1024core
> It also featured the worlds only 3rd order enclave, i.e. a piece of Indian
> land in a Bangladeshi enclave, in an Indian enclave.

If you read the article, there are a few such places in Baarre too. So that
enclave from Bangladesh couldn't be the "worlds only 3rd order enclave".

~~~
cperciva
Baarre has second-order enclaves: Dutch-inside-Belgian-inside-Dutch. Dahala
Khagrabari (#51) was Indian-inside-Bangladeshi-inside-Indian-inside-
Bangladeshi.

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Fripplebubby
Luckily, the borders in this case are porous enough that it doesn't seem like
a big issue. In one case in North America [1] it lead to some property owners
being essentially under house arrest during the hours that the border
crossings are closed, and at least one real arrest.

1: [http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-incredible-
complica...](http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-incredible-
complications-of-living-atop-the-us-canada-border)

~~~
ocdtrekkie
It's hard to understand in these sorts of situations why an exchange of land
isn't made. Especially in the case of Estcourt Station, where there are zero
year-round residents, and the cost of maintaining this is a staffed border
station, postal service, and potential police service.

I know countries generally get iffy about giving up borders, but why would the
US want to keep this? Are they obligated to because someone owns land there?
It feels like at least some sort of agreement to place that small parcel of
land under the management of the Canadian authorities or something would save
hundreds of thousands of dollars in the long run.

~~~
lagadu
The problem isn't completely innocuous stuff like this: the problem is setting
a precedent when it comes to other international disputes, something the other
country can point at once they go to the appropriate supra-national court.
Establishing precedents in international scenarios can be pretty risky.

~~~
caf
So you establish a treaty in which the parcel of land in question is sold for
some nominal figure. That wouldn't be establishing a new precedent, such
purchases have happened already.

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moultano
Reminds me of "The City and the City" in which the two countries occupy the
same space but are bound by law to pretend the other doesn't exist.
[http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4703581-the-city-the-
city](http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4703581-the-city-the-city)

~~~
100k
Fabulous book.

I saw it as a metaphor for those things in our cities we choose not to see,
e.g. poverty and homelessness.

~~~
moultano
I saw that as the metaphor as well, but I wished he developed it more in that
direction. Considering how amazing it could be as a political message, it
feels incomplete that he didn't deal with that explicitly at all. It's almost
like he was trying too hard to avoid putting anything political in it.

Overall, I loved the theme, setting, language, but didn't get much out of the
plot. That's mostly how I've felt about all the Mieville books I've read so
far. (With the exception of The Scar which was delicious in every aspect.) I
keep reading them because I love every sentence, page, chapter, but I don't
expect the whole to ultimately satisfy.

~~~
maxander
I suspect its part of the conceit that it's unclear whether its allegorical
about any particular thing. Similarly, in a scene or two it gets _very close_
to being a fantasy novel, but never settles the question. Mieville seems like
the kind of author more pleased with that kind of idea-trickery than making a
mundane worldly point explicit.

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fwhitaker
This reminds me of a fantastic book, "The City & the City," by China Mieville.
The setting is something like this, where a city that should be whole is split
by two countries. Here, it is illegal to look across the border, even if you
are looking at a car driving down what would normally be the same street.

I never considered that something similar (albeit simpler) existed in real
life. Very cool, thanks for sharing!

~~~
icebraining
There are still a few towns divided between Portugal and Spain, including one
which has the smallest international bridge in the world[1] - made of wood and
just 6 meters (20ft) in length!

And there's an extra catch: unlike the Netherlands and Belgium, the countries
in this case have different timezones, so you're not just out of the country,
you're also one hour later/earlier.

[1]
[https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_(El_Marco)#/media/File:M...](https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_\(El_Marco\)#/media/File:MarcoElMarco.JPG)

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unsignedqword
Tom Scott has a great short little video on this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE93J33SfHY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE93J33SfHY)

~~~
tim333
It was interesting him saying the idea of national boundaries with sovereignty
was kind of invented in the Peace of Westphalia. That seems to be fading a bit
with transnational organisations like the EU. I'm wondering what will happen
to the UK Eire border now we're supposed to be Brexiting.

~~~
__derek__
This article on the history and future of nation-states from New Scientist is
from 2014, so it doesn't cover Brexit, but you may find it interesting: "End
of nations: Is there an alternative to countries?"[1]

[1]: [https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22329850-600-end-
of-n...](https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22329850-600-end-of-nations-
is-there-an-alternative-to-countries)

------
tormeh
This is not so weird, actually. The border between France and Germany goes
through a roundabout between German Saarbrücken and French Forbach[0]. The
French city of Strasbourg has a German suburb called Kehl. The German city of
Görlitz and the Polish one of Zgorzelec are effectively one[2]. Their names
are actually identical, just spelled using German and Polish rules,
respectively. You might think that only provincial cities are like this, but
Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, borders both Austria and Hungary[3].
Driving from Bratislava to Vienna takes less than an hour.

0:
[https://www.google.no/maps/@49.2043979,6.9562696,17.39z?hl=e...](https://www.google.no/maps/@49.2043979,6.9562696,17.39z?hl=en)
1:
[https://www.google.no/maps/@48.574774,7.7601104,10719m/data=...](https://www.google.no/maps/@48.574774,7.7601104,10719m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en)
2:
[https://www.google.no/maps/@51.1451572,14.9916637,6742m/data...](https://www.google.no/maps/@51.1451572,14.9916637,6742m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en)
3:
[https://www.google.no/maps/@47.9059776,17.2954767,7.98z?hl=e...](https://www.google.no/maps/@47.9059776,17.2954767,7.98z?hl=en)

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ww520
Berlin before unification, before the wall went up.

~~~
jakub_h
That almost sounds like Tamarian! ;)

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eCa
Another enclave complex in Europe was created when a German railway line was
handed over to Belgium after World War I[1]. Parts of Germany ended up on the
wrong side of the tracks[2]..

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vennbahn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vennbahn)

[2]
[https://www.google.com/maps/@50.6037104,6.2261342,12.25z](https://www.google.com/maps/@50.6037104,6.2261342,12.25z)

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asadlionpk
This is a good video on this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC52l4Jdn-I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC52l4Jdn-I)

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microcolonel
Archive link for folks who don't have cookies enabled.
[http://archive.is/U1gxk](http://archive.is/U1gxk)

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jwr
This is a good reminder of how a ridiculous and outdated concept borders are.

~~~
tedunangst
When were borders not outdated?

~~~
jwr
Well, they did make sense back until (and including) the industrial age, when
it made economic sense to invade territory, and either start using local
factories or just loot machinery and bring it back to the home country.

But that time is gone, there is nothing you could loot right now that could
justify the cost of an invasion.

