Young Cuban girls embrace Spanish heritage with dance

HAVANA -- Little Cuban girls fantasize about being flamenco dancers -- strong, beautiful women in ruffled skirts and swept up hairdos who evoke wondrous, thunderous magic by stomping their black strapped shoes.\nIn a country that gained its independence from Spain a little more than a century ago, the Spanish dance remains highly popular among young Cuban girls in the same way ballet enthralls girls in the United States and tango captivates girls in Argentina.\nStill, thriving cultural societies formed by Spanish immigrants to Cuba represent regions such as Asturias and Andaluz and offer flamenco dance and other programs.\nThe leading flamenco school is run by the government's Ballet Español de Cuba, operating under the auspices of the grande dame of ballet, Alicia Alonso, and the leadership of classically trained dancer Eduardo Veitia, the company's general and artistic director. Reynaldo Ibanez, technical director of the school for 12 years, says the best of the best have the chance of joining the dance company as they mature.\nOn a weekday afternoon, 20 girls on the cusp of adolescence dance to the staccato claps of their teachers' hands in a small practice room in Havana's Gran Teatro. It's a majestic performing arts palace in clear need of renovation, with chipped and cracked columns, peeling paint on the towering walls and marble-floored hallways dulled by decades of grime.\nThey gather their black ruffled skirts in their small hands, clutch the fabric to their hips and stomp assertively on the rough wooden floor, sounding like a stampede of wild horses.\n"Bamp bamp bamp bamp BAMP! Bamp bamp bamp bamp BAMP!" thunders through the small room as the soft light of late afternoon pours through the tall, narrow, open windows looking out over the green gardens and towering palms of Havana's Parque Central.\nThe girls, each with her hair swept into a bun and fastened with a bright yellow tie, imitate the "profesora," gyrating their hands like a flock of fluttering birds.\nA similar scene unfolds in other small rooms throughout the huge multifloored complex. In some, girls as young as five in pale pink tights and leotards learn basic classical ballet moves to prepare for the transition to flamenco dance when they are older.\nTheir mothers wait on park benches outside.\n"Just imagine," says Aleida Gomez Rodriguez, smiling proudly as she talks about her 11-year-old daughter, Leidy Rosa. "She's been coming to classes since she was 5"