Oh, these Latin men..

Mike and I went to one of the ocean-front restaurants last night for some delicious fish and seafood.  (La Fonda).  As the youngish waiter served us, I caught a subtle look from him - a slightly flirtatious smile and glint in his eye that instantly made me feel good.  It hit me then that this happens all the time and it's not because I'm some hot bod young blonde - far from it - it's just because I am a woman.   The men here just seem to appreciate the femaleness of women, no matter what they weigh, their age, colour of hair, or body shape.

I mentioned this to Mike, trying not to alarm him or make him jealous, but just as an observation - something I had been experiencing and observing all along but it hadn't really crystallized until that moment.  He says North American men certainly do appreciate women in the same way, they just feel they should suppress any expression of it - kind of a "PC" thing - in public. I disagree.

I think North American men have been programmed more by the media and society in general to place far more value on the young, the slim, the blonde (not necessarily but more than other hair colours), the buxom, and that a woman like me becomes "invisible" after a certain age.  A youngish waiter in a restaurant in Calgary would NEVER lightly flirt with me.

The kind of flirting I'm talking about is totally harmless.  It just sends a little message - I am a man and I see you and appreciate your presence.  That's it.  It's lovely.  There's no leering, no "pervy-ness" (Mike's word).

It's a kind of payback to all the mature women in this place for the fact that the young mazatlan women here are extraordinarily beautiful, and the expat men do a fair amount of drooling over them - some quite overtly. We just roll our eyes.  Meanwhile, the youngish waiter is giving us secret little looks and smiles and we remember we are women.

Another reason I love Mazatlan.