HAVANA, Cuba — On this island of constant shortages and scarcities, the latex condom has uses that stretch far beyond the bedroom.
At baseball games, concerts and other entertainment events, Cubans blow them up and bat them around the crowd like beach balls. When Cuban parents can’t afford birthday party balloons or can’t find them, they unfurl a few “Vigor” brand prophylactics and start puffing. The latex is so strong and supple that kids can even draw faces on them.
NEW YORK — The 50th anniversary of the birth control pill — the ultimate remedy which revolutionized the dating and mating game forever — presents a good excuse to contemplate some of the less studied, but all the more intriguing remedies people use to improve their sex lives, from Africa to China, India, Japan, Papua New Guinea and beyond.
And they do so by any means possible: conception, contraception, erection or deception.
PARIS, France — A French lawmaker wants to reopen brothels, outlawed in France since 1946, in order to protect prostitutes from predatory pimps and exploitation. But the sex workers say no thanks.
“All of the prostitutes are against the reopening of the brothels,” said Janine Mossuz-Lavau, a sociologist and expert on sexuality and prostitution.
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — The taxi drivers hustling around the bars on Long Street in Cape Town say they are ready for all the soccer fans that will flood the city in June for the World Cup. So are hotels, restaurants, breweries and, inevitably, prostitutes.
Arguably, the soccer World Cup is to the sex industry what the holiday season is to candy shops. A temporary surge of excited people feeling collectively festive, willing to pay for a bit of extra indulgence.
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