Walking the streets of Havana alone is an amazing experience, a complete bombarding of the senses. Once you acclimatize yourself to the people harassing you everywhere you go, with the constant verbal patter and banter of below-radar advertising - “amigo, amigo”, “casa particular”, “taxi, taxi”, “cigar”,”ron”, “te gusta muchacha?” – you can begin to absorb Havana`s immense beauty and uniqueness.
Anywhere in the city, at any hour, you can hear the rolling fever of Afro-Cuban beats; layered with a chance sighting of a 1950`s Chev cruising by, in finest shining condition; or a glance off to one side into the doorway of
a majestic old Spanish colonial building that you realize has been repossessed by the revolution & is now a school, saturated with the bright atmosphere of children playing and learning, complete with an ornate marble stair-case for them to climb each day. The contrasts here can be found nowhere else. When one travels to Cuba it’s not a matter of being subject to a culture shock – but to an entire culture shock continuum. Every question answered is met by a lengthening cascade of more questions; so that the longer you stay, the deeper you plunge into the current of all things Cuban, trying to make sense of all the madness and bewildering beauty.
In the evening, the streets of `Old Havana` become a smouldering sea of `spandex sex` & the vintage vehicles & 17th Century architecture become backdrops for bodies beautifully clad in fluorescent fabrics, clinging to the curves of countless beautiful women. When on ‘the Gringo Trail’, the merest glance at one of these women is an open invitation as far as she`ll be concerned. Before you know it you’ll be buying drinks, dinner & getting married in the morning after a marathon evening of sleepless ‘activity’. So, while you`re thinking of sex, I must make something clear, or perhaps more confusing: prostitution is illegal in Cuba & officially does not exist. Obviously this is untrue. Having been in the company of friends in Sydney, Australia who were sex workers - since I was 15 years of age, I have a sense for `the game`& those involved in it. While many girls in the streets of Old Havana are obviously sex workers, I must disagree with, or at least question, the impressions that many people form about these Cuban women. I`ve heard statements flung bluntly about that, for example, 9 out of 10 girls in Cuba are working or ‘being exploited’ in the sex trade. I myself believe such statements are utter nonsense.
Sexual openness is rampant in Cuba, yes, but what is wrong with that? What converts that openness, in the westerners eye, into prostitution is the typically distorted and sexually oppressive society that he or she has come from in the West. Cuban girls that do `work` - do so for very different reasons than the majority of their western counter-parts. For example, a dentist in Cuba will receive a monthly salary equivalent to $12US. A plain pair of flat shoes costs $30US. It is not possible for that dentist, (or psychologist, or engineer, or bio-chemist, as the case may be), to save enough money after her subsistence-living expenses to afford that pair of simple shoes.
One night of the month, then, she might descend the stairwell of her building & hit the street, dressed in her finest attire, to acquire the shoes by way of spending her evening with a tourist. She can receive between $15US & $20US for a friendly encounter, perhaps much more if she likes the guy & decides to hang around for the night, which happens often. Is this blatant business or carried out in the hope of finding a likeble tourist who`s generous enough to speed up the preliminaries of a romantic encounter & offer her little something to help out? Go see for yourself. However, there are a number of very obviously hardened workers in the same streets who know the trade well & who need to be dealt with using much caution, as the following incident will reveal.
My Spanish was improving, as I had been in Havana already 2 weeks.
I was waiting to interview a friend, an Englishman - & full-blown Communist – who lives full-time in Cuba & coaches soccer at a local high school; a very colourful character indeed. Waiting outside a café, downing a cool `refresco`, as I waited for Billy I amused myself watching three professional `jinateras` ply their trade nearby.
With salsa rythyms filtering out of the adjacent café, they gyrated their hips seductively, trying to catch the attention of passing `gringos`.
But it was I who seemed to be paying them the most attention. One in particular had caught my interest, an Afro-Cuban girl, with braids & great curves, clad in spandex. She fixed eye-contact with me, opened her repitoire of provocative moves & the Seduction was in process. I was none the wiser. She invited herself over for a drink & her two friends followed.
In broken Spanish I explained: “ I am waiting for my friend (who was by then late). I`ll buy you a drink but I am not interested in going with you”. She introduced herself as America – and proceeded with such questions as where was I from, was I travelling alone etc. Without further ado she blatantly asked if I`d like to `foky foky` with her. I replied that I was just waiting for my friend and that I had no money to give to her, even as a gift. She insisted that both points were irrelevant & that she simply like me ‘a lot’. Before I knew it her hands had crept crotch-wards & she was sitting on my lap starting up a salsa-style lap-dance – in full view of passers by & the café`s clientele.
There was no denying my arousal but neither was there any denying that I was uneasy, she seemed perhaps a little more than sneaky. I just had to stay cool, after all, nothing was going to happen, right? Without much delay she asked if we could go back to my place to `foky foky`. I told her that it was not possible because the family at my `casa particular` were very respectful & would not appreciate me bringing unknown girls to the house`. This slowed her verbal pestering – but not her wandering hands. A bit of time went by, with no sign of Billy.
The seduction process slid up a gear or two as she suggested we go back to her place. I was reluctant, yes, but a stiff dick knows no conscience - & certainly no common-sense. By now it was night & “ what the fuck”, I thought to myself, “ it`ll be an experience!”. That it was, without a doubt.
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