Cuban women

I noted my hostess Maria, in my first casa particular in Havana was a gracefully aged woman. She was clothed simply – in a sort of singlet and shorts, and she may well have bee in her 50s or even 60s. I have no problems imagining her dolled up for a night of salsa. This generally seemed true of Cuban women, either getting graciously skinnier or delectably voluptuous as they lose their youth. In their youth, of course, everything is on display, for despite the imposition of Catholicism on their native religions – which still survive as Santeria – there is absolutely no shame.

Girls were almost always inappropriately dressed, sometimes making me feel like an absolute prude. Spaghetti-strapped tops plunging into décolletages that simply mesmerize; gravity-defying posteriors that were not only suspended in mid-air themselves, as it were, but also had me suspending my disbelief – and covered in the tiniest shorts and skirts, to boot; ruddy complexions of varying hues. And when they dance – there will be a separate post on salsa, but when a woman of African heritage shakes her booty: that sight is inarticulable.

The men, in keeping with Latin culture, were shameless letchers. Constantly eyeing every passing woman, often loudly remarking or even propositioning. It is so common, there is a word for it in Spanish - propio.

It did not take me long to get with the flow!