Some Comments on Cuban Women
HAVANA TIMES — “All Cuban women are whores,” a regular at a bar in Barcelona blurted out with a very sour look on his face when he heard that I lived in Cuba. The generalization struck me as awful, but I have to admit that it is a rather widespread opinion.
That is what Cuba looks like from a hotel: a country of tourist complexes surrounded by prostitutes on the hunt for “successful” males, those who have to travel 5 thousand kilometers in order to have sex (and pay for it).
Many may be surprised to learn that, in Cuba, sex is one of the few free and non-rationed things. It can’t be too comforting for one’s male ego to discover that one has been paying for something that others do for mere pleasure.
It is not my intention to criticize jineteras. I have a couple of good friends in the trade and they are as respectable to me as any other women. Even they, however, would have to agree that they represent a small part of Cuba’s female population.
There are hundreds of young women in my neighborhood. Some of them were my son’s friends and even girlfriends, and I only know of 3 or 4 prostitutes in the neighborhood. The rest work or study, fall in love with a plain old Cuban and slip away to parties on the back of a bicycle.
I could share hundreds of anecdotes about Cuban women who would leave more than one of these bar sociologists with their mouths agape, as many are the ones who prioritize love and sex over money in their personal relationships.
I know one woman who was married to a Spanish businessman. They lived in Madrid until, in one of her trips back home, she met a common Cuban, a manual laborer. She now has children with him and they both seem happy, despite the ration booklet.
I imagine her ex-husband finds it hard to understand that she should had given up all of the comforts she had in Spain to return to Cuba to live like the rest, trading such coveted luxuries for the simple pleasures of the soul and flesh.
At any rate, it’s hard for such difficulties to unnerve Cuban women – they were the main financial pillar of their homes during the economic crisis of the 90s, when people had to do the impossible in order to cook without food and wash without soap.
In those days, a Cuban woman was a kind of “household Christ” who worked the miracle of multiplying the bread and fish, so that her family could have the food needed to survive on the table every day.
These women had to do this while going work, as 65 % of Cuba’s professionals and technicians are women, some of whom have made important contributions to the sciences, the humanities, the arts and sports.
More than half of Cuba’s health professionals – doctors, nurses and technicians – working abroad are also women, women who have gone and continue to go as far as the mountains of Pakistan, the jungles of Guatemala and the poor neighborhoods of Caracas.
It’s true they are a little different from other women in the continent. Cuba has a very high divorce rate, and women there consider abortion a right and do not feel sex is a sin, such that they make love without feelings of guilt.
Fashion does not dictate the decisions they make and they do not let their age get in the way of these: they wear what they please and no one criticizes them for it, when many of their contemporaries around the world believe that the only right thing for them to do is to raise grandchildren.
They are very loving mothers, independent as partners and creative and very passionate as professionals. Generally speaking, they are not women who can be bought. Even among prostitutes, those who rent their bodies, it is difficult to find one that sells herself.
The fact is that a Cuban woman is never wholly ours – she chooses who she wants to be with every single day and, if her partner wishes to be re-elected, he will have to show her the love and passion she demands. For them, changing partners does not entail the slightest trauma.
No few foreigners have been dearly disappointed on trying to buy a woman in Cuba. Now, in the loneliness of a bar, they do not quite manage to understand why they failed, so they mumble for anyone who wants to hear that “all Cuban women are whores.”
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(*) Visit Fernando Ravsberg’s blog.
Most Cuban woman think a Cuban male loves a Yuma just for money and/or to get out of cuba. They think that a Cuban male only can love another Cuban woman. They can be jealous of the Yuma.
I really don’t get that right, I have been married with a Cuban woman for 15 years and we are still happy and have a great sex let me tell you crazy people from the mad house, Cuban woman are the best you hear me the greatest, my Cuban wife stood strong with me when I was financially in trouble, she works two jobs to support me and here we are with half million in our account. Please people stop talking shit about the most loving women in this planet, I think that you people have some issues not only with Cuban women but all women, now we have two wonderful kids and our love still going stronger. So please people go to other carribean countries same shit going on.
PLEASE THINK about what you are saying before you said it, bye my Cuban wife in my bed waiting for our fun time hahahahaha
Wrong. You don’t know too much about Cuban women, wherever in Cuba or Miami. I would say 60 %. Going back to Cuba in January.
yes. you are right.. the guys around 50 should search and match around 35 to 50 … ok.
hahaha,,, great comment!!
I like that! And agree with you… Mr C
I’m married to a Cuban lady for 12 yrs and live in the U.K 🙂
I agree ? women in Cuba or anywhere else are just the same, I have been with a Cuban woman for the past 5 years and I never experienced these B.S. that this guy’s wrote. Like it or not to me and other friends Cuban women are the sweetest and great family oriented women, please guys if you go to Cuba just for sex so go just for that, if you 50 and get a Cuban woman that is 23 think about it. U.S, Canada same shit and worst this women just do not respect men compare to Cuban women, so my friend if you are 50 stay in your range and you might find a good woman, please people just said it as it is, I bet you 95% of you talking about Cuban women are either 15 to 35 years old older then these women.
Thats called freedom
I think many commentators are missing the point – mostly guided by the need to defend or criticize women who are willing to have sex for money – and in doing this they make generalizations about women and men, or irrelevant comments about love, hotels, and education The claim can be tested very simply: A man stops women randomly in a street in different countries and asks for sex in exchange for money. Would the percentage in Cuba be (much) higher than in other places? Would it it be 100%? The answer to the first question is ‘yes’, to the second it is ‘no’. So not all Cuban women have sex for money but many do. But so what? This should be the answer of women (and men) who want to defend women who do it rather than start talking about love, family values, education and the like. They try to be ‘modern’ but fall into the traditional norms they claim to reject.
Wow!!! What an insulting and disgusting way of generalizing Cuban women…The lesson here is that Communism sucks…and when desperation, hunger and no hope rules your life , disgusting beasts take advantage of those who practically sell not only their bodies but their soul to Devils. It is happening all over the world. I am a Cuban woman who was raised in a very traditional household in the USA, chaperones and the whole deal. LOL…I am far from being a whore. I am passionate and a happy soul. There should be more articles with the title: “Not all Cuban women are whores…” . Get educated and informed before you go insulting all Cuban women.
If you think Cuban women are any different than women anywhere else in the world, you don’t know women. And if you are a man that thinks you are different than other men, you are a fool.
I’m a Cuban that left the country in my childhood. While there is no doubt that ‘stories’ of tourists that engaged in this type of behavior with prostitutes exist, I doubt very much that 100% of all Cuban females are prostitutes. That strikes me as such an irrational train of thought! Your poor opinion is only ignorant and unrealistic to say the least.
I’m married to a British, and only had 2 romantic relationships in my entire life. My family is extremely traditional. I met him while I was studying at Uni/working and living in Costa Rica, and he was on holidays over there. At first I approached the relationship very casually as I had no hopes of ever seeing him again after his return to his homeland. It was HIS decision to come back every summer and establish a long term relationship with me. I moved to the U.S with my family and he continued visiting me there for 5 years.
He is very handsome, intelligent, kind, talented and also POOR. After I moved to the UK and married him I was the only one working while he was studying. I’ve never being unfaithful to this guy, while he has been in the past. I still think that the affection and love is what made us stay together after 12 years.
I’m extremely proud of my roots and the values I was raise by. Another piece of information for you all: while I was living in the US, all of my North-american female friends constantly advised me to cheat on my boyfriend as he could never know what was going on over there. The justified it their advice with the usual: you get hit on by guys allot, you should enjoy it a bit girl, let it go for once. Guess what people, I didn’t cheat and I feel great about it, but yet I had to carry around your pathetic ideas about the cuban female stereotype. Give me a fucking break.
Where do you people think up this tripe? If Capitalism is so bad why does it create a standard of living 20x higher than communist cuba?
Ok let me see if I get her story right.
None of the women are whores.
But all the women relinquish the right to change out their man on a moment’s notice.
Got it!
Just a small percentage of Cuban women go out with older men while most are Doctors ,Nurses,Scientists,Engineers,Teachers,Nutritionists,Mothers,.Wives,Soldiers,Labourers,Tourist Guides,Atheletes,Chefs,so on and so on and there you have it and these women have made Cuba a beautiful place to live.
Very nice article Fernando. Too bad there are no female commentors to offer balance.
The difference in the educational levels of the Jamaican and Cuban people are staggering .
In Jamaica all 13 year old students take a skills test that determines whether or not they can continue in the public school system . The great many who do not pass most often cannot afford private schooling and so drop out of the educational system entirely leaving them barely literate.
The elderly Jamaican man I employed for about 15 years to do gardening at my house in Jamaica can neither read, write nor do numbers to this day.
I know from long experience that a great many Jamaicans are somewhere between his level and that of a 6th grader .
This is nothing at all like it is in equally poor Cuba because in Jamaica the money needed by the highly-indebted Jamaican government to take care of infrastructure , as it is in the U.S., is in private hands and banks under capitalist economies.
In Cuba the government holds all wealth and determines the priorities .
As we all know, Cuba chooses to spend its wealth on health , education and the welfare of its people .
It’s one of the few things truly socialist about Cuban society and certainly reflects the will of the vast majority if Cubans .who support these things that are unknown to the poor of Jamaica, Haiti etc etc etc etc .
Before capitalism and the state, the human race thrived because of mutual aid .
Absent this spirit of helping one another, the human race would not have survived to this day .
Read Kropotkin’s ‘Mutual Aid : A Factor of Evolution ” to get a deep understanding of this innate human characteristic and stop being funny and ignorant of reality all in the same short post.
Larry the Cableguy you ain’t. .
Don’t bet your last dollar on your last sentence, rest assured not all are looking for a free ride, the biggest percentage are. Have a friend who fell in “love”, did all the paper work and paid all the dollars, she got off the plane and into a taxi, right to the wet foot, dry foot country. Things did not work out and was soon back at the border wanting to come back…..notta.
Let’s face it, all women are whores, except your mother and mine… But on mine I have some doubts… (pun intended)
People that think that all Cuban women are whores put themselves in environments where that is true. Go to an expensive discotheque and indeed al girls present are for sale. Go to a whorehouse in where ever, the same goes.
Compare it to an American that flies to Amsterdam, spent his whole holidays in the red light district and comes home, telling his friends that all women in Amsterdam are whores and that it is so bad that they don’t even have shops in Amsterdam, all windows are full with half naked women!!!
My estimate: less than 5% of Cuban women are willing to sleep with a guy just for the money…
All the people of the world were rich until capitalism came along and invented poverty. Also dandruff, halitosis, flatulence, and whiny, blowhard Leftists.
You are right that this scenario is played out all over the world. The difference in Cuba is that you are just as likely today to meet a doctor or a lawyer or an architect with less than romantic intentions as you are a high school dropout. In Jamaica and elsewhere, these professionals do not engage in that behavior.
taking advantage of the poverty
Hahaha! I bet you are.
I wish I had a dollar for every time I heard a tourist say that he was the exception to the rule
I’ve spent considerable time in Jamaica over the years and can tell you that I’ve heard and seen the same story repeated there many, many times..
The same could be said of probably every poor country’s men and women who seek a way out of endless poverty.
In Jamaica the Jamaican men who plied the beaches and resorts
romancing the fat and fiftyish American woman were called “rentals”
or Rent_A-Rasta ( many often AFFECTED the ( exotic and mysterious a tourist ) Rastafarian life style to make the necessary impression .
I actually know one “Rental” who dropped one of his lady friends off at the airport to catch her plane and then picked up his next lady friend coming in on a plane that same afternoon.
Poverty makes people do some very nasty things.
It’s why capitalism is the enemy of humanity.
Half the world’s 7 billion people live in capitalist-caused poverty.
I’d be curious to know what you were doing in Cuba in the first place.
Unfortunately, because of the failure of the Castro-style socialist economy in Cuba, a great number of Cuban women who choose to escape the Castros tyranny do so by seducing foreigners into arranging their immigration to foreign lands. Once abroad, many of these Cuban women quickly leave their smitten lovers for the greener pastures of a mate better-suited to their tastes. The same strategy applies equally to many Cuban men who have emigrated as well. The reputation that Fernando attempts to dispute in this article is tragically well-earned. In the past, fewer Cuban professional women were even allowed to meet foreigners let alone emigrate to foreign countries until the immigration reforms took place in January 2013. The majority of Cuban women are decent, honest and hard-working. Unfortunately, these attributes are of little use in Cuba and worthless if a Cuban woman hopes to compete for the affections of that small percentage of tongue-wagging male tourists unaccustomed to Cuban beauty. When I met my Cuban wife who now works as a CNN reporter, she was a national morning newscaster and although working for slave wages, did have a personal driver, a well appointed high-rise apartment and lived as well as Cubans are allowed to live in Cuba. Her news director cautioned her to avoid being seen with me in public places when we dated and I am sure Cuban internal security investigated me once they found out we were an item. Unfortunately, despite the fact she had no reason to seek out a foreigner and certainly had her share of male fans that included high-ranking party members, athletes and entertainers, she still fell victim to nasty rumors once the rumor mill found out she was hanging out with an African-American. Our circumstance is the exception to the norm however. Most Cuban women who live abroad and were able to immigrate because of a relationship with a foreigner do fit the profile and their behavior within and outside those relationships feed the ugly reputation blurted out in that Barcelona bar.
Well………a Cuban lady falls in love with a tourist, he leaves, she promises to be ever so faithful until his return, plane door isn’t closed and she is now in love with a Cuban male. The tourist has provided her with enough money to live comfortably until his return, with in hours of arriving back to his country, the phone rings with a great sob story from his one true love…..you bet, she has been robbed, someone has gotten ill, the TV has quit working and “yes”, could you send money. She will also insist her “one love” always call before coming to Cuba, to make a long story short, the relationship is soon over and the hunt will begin all over again, etc.,etc.
Well, Cuba was called “America’s (U.S.’s) Whorehouse” before the revolution and I’m sure the many pimps who lost their livelihood when the revolution essentially wiped out prostitution will be in that long list of people who want compensation for no longer being able to exploit poor Cubans .
I once worked with a man who had ben in the navy and who was stationed at Guantanamo before the revolution and he used to tell me stories of the gorgeous Cuban woman whom he paid to be his steady sex partner for what seemed to be very little money .
HIs stories verified what I had long known about imperialism and capitalist-induced poverty and although I listened politely, I was boiling at the insensitivity and inhumanity of his actions and his attitude that it was a good thing he was doing for both him and her .
Ignorance is indeed bliss .
The current crop of jineteras and jineteros can be laid at the door of the U.S. economic war on all Cubans and the economic necessity of the corrupting tourist trade .
It’s just one more intentional effect of that war which enables the imperialist hypocrites to point out just how bad the conditions, WHICH THEY THEMSELVES CREATED, are in Cuba.
And of course, it’s all FIDEL’S fault . isn’t it .
Him and his damned ” feed, house, clothe,educate and heal ” ALL Cubans .
What was he thinking ?
Didn’t he know that goes directly against capitalist law ?
You’re supposed to EXPLOIT the poor , not take care of them .