Amigos

The rest of the week following that encounter was that he would seek me out when I was poolside *I do have such a knack for strategically placing myself in good spots eh ;)* stop me in the buffet to say hi even when I pretended to look at everything else but him and only knew he was there when he called my name *seriously - maybe I should forget work and become an actress instead* My family would jokingly tell me that my "friend" was looking for me whenever I happened to step away from her (to hide and smoke - sheesh I cannot handle the stress of not being able to enjoy a cigarette whenever I pleased like before)

I would catch him lingering around the bar stealing glances before the nightly shows, but never did I let on that I actually knew he was there until he approached. I'd sit next to him for a bit but the conversations were always quite repetitive - if a guy back at home tried to capture my interest by continually repeating that they "liked" me and that it was "so nice" I think I would have laughed in their face and walked away...so let's revisit that Cuba drugging concept again - was I not in my right state of mind? WHAT ARE IN THOSE DRINKS?! He would ask that I stayed back after the show and join him at the disco so we could "talk" (jeez - reminds me of the very first time I ever met him) but "talk" we did. I mean at first it was a lot of the same stuff: I like you, you're very attractive, BLAH BLAH BLAH - this isn't my first rodeo, I've heard all this even from guys back at home - I want substance, I want to actually learn about him and about Cuba. After a while, I finally got him to share bits and pieces of his story which I always took with a pinch of salt...I mean after my first visit, I did my homework. All the sites and forums about Cuban scam artists and horror stories of marriages with Cuban men/women I have read.

SIDE-NOTE
Why anyone would marry a person, much less a Cuban, after only knowing them for a week or even a couple months is beyond me. I have dated the same person for almost a decade and I am in no rush to get married although I am open to the idea if it ever arose - but I've always been anti-marriage because infidelity is a very real experience that I had and continue to have when I observe my parentals. So there, I said it, I don't believe in marriage because more often than not - it ends in heart ache anyways so why bother? It's a piece of paper. I'm over it.

I digress. So no, I don't really take anything he says seriously - he's just feeding me the same crap that all the other Cubans fed my fellow Canadians, but it was nice to hear a little bit about Cuba from an actual Cuban. Like how his mother is a seamstress and makes most of the costumes for his parts in the nightly shows. That it was hard to come by items with "style" and "swag" in Cuba because it's hard due to the U.S Embargo. He'd tell me how he makes deals with other tourists in order to obtain items they liked such as shirts, shoes and other materialistic things. I did try to test him though, by asking him how old he was again. I figured he probably can't keep his story straight if he had to adjust his age every time he talked to a tourist woman of different ages, but he surprisingly said the same answer. I responded with "Still?" and he asked "Why?". I confessed I was trying to figure out how old he really was and he made me feel rather dumb (well I was dumb) by saying that it had only been two months since I last asked his age and that his birthday was in May, therefore he would still be the same age as last time. Duh. Another point for the Cuban. I am not good at this game. Eventually he would go back to the topic of liking me and eventually I told him to stop - finally my straight forwardness was semi-returning. He did stop for a few days which was nice not to have the pressure of thinking that our time spent together was anything more than being new amigos.

Is anyone curious whether I lost my shoe again in the disco? Short answer? No *three cheers for me* But only because I was smart enough to wear sandals that strapped around my feet so I couldn't possibly lose it. I did scrape his face with my hair clip when he tried to twirl me. Seriously I have to reiterate, I am a horrible dancer - think Princess Diaries when her body guard was trying to teach her how to really dance. To be fair to myself, I don't dance salsa or tango or merengue...I am an EDM dancer, which means bopping my head to the beats, shuffling side to side and staying in one spot. I don't do partner dances but to his credit he tried really hard to help me get into it.