10 sexy festivals from around the world

While sexy can mean different things to different people, sometimes there is just no disputing. From naked bodies covered in paint to scantily clad burlesque dancers to artistic bondage shows, there is a festival out there that will fulfill your idea of what sexy is.

New Orleans Burlesque Festival
New Orleans, Louisiana

The New Orleans Burlesque Festival takes place in New Orleans every year during mid-September. For three days, guests are treated to naughty striptease numbers, spicy parties, and, of course, tons of sexy burlesque dance shows. And you don’t only get to watch these hot acts, you get to learn them too, as the festival hosts an array of workshops, like the Stockings and Garter Workshop which will teach you how to sensually remove your hosiery, and Bumps and Grinds, where you will learn sultry, stage-worthy dance moves.German Fetish Ball Weekend
Berlin, Germany

Every year, the German Fetish Ball Weekend takes over Germany as the biggest international fetish gala and is the largest fetish and BDSM weekend in Europe. The weekend is packed with X-rated events from risque fashion shows, sexy performances, libidinous bondage shows, and parties where you will meet guests dressed in leather, lace, and less. This year, the event will take place from May 25-28.

World Body Painting Festival
Kärnten, Austria

The World Body Painting Festival is a body painting, face painting, and special effects festival that takes place in Austria each year. This sexy event incorporates art, fashion, music, entertainment, and parties with a BodyArt Fashion Show, hot DJ’s “dressed” in paint, and chances to gain skills in this unique art yourself. Have a great body painting photo? You can submit it to win Bodypainting Art Photo of the Year.

Sexy International Film Festival
Melbourne, Australia

Each November, the Sexy International Film Festival takes place in Melbourne, with promotional screenings also taking place in Perth, Paris, London, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The event features films from all over the world covering topics on love, relationships, and of course, sex. Expect a lot of lingerie, nudity, and titles like “Dame Factory”, “Scenes of an Adult Nature”, “Grandpa’s Wet Dream”, and “Black and White Sex”. Submissions for the 2012 festival begin in March. For information on purchasing tickets, click here.

Exotic Erotic Ball & Expo
San Francisco, California

While the annual Exotic Erotic Ball & Expo didn’t take place in 2011, it will be back for 2012. The festival has been going on for over thirty years and celebrates sexuality and freedom of expression with live music, exotic dancers, masquerade parties, erotic performances, and sexy games like Lesbian First Kiss. And if that’s not enough, there’s a wild after party that will keep you up all night.

Kinky Salon
Global

While most people know Kinky Salon from their yearly Copenhagen event, the San Francisco-based company actually hosts events all over the globe that are devoted to a “safe and consensual exploration of sex-positive self-expression”. Attendees to the events can expect sexy art parties, exhibitionism, and carnal costumes. You can also check out the Kinky Salon Amsterdam, New York, and London.

Nudes-A-Poppin Pageant and Festival
Roselawn, Indiana

Nudes-A-Poppin’ Pageant and Festival is the biggest nude beauty pageant in the world. Since 1976, this event has been featuring showgirls, pole competitions, oil wrestling, and screaming ‘O’ contests as contestants battle it out to be crowned titles like Ms. Nude Entertainer, Mr. Nude North America, and Ms. Nude Rising Star. This year’s event will take place on July 21-22.

Carnival
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

When thinking of sexy festivals, Carnival is usually the first one that people think of. While not as obvious in erotic nature as many of the other events mentioned, the sexy samba moves, burlesque-style costumes, and nude dancing make Carnival a carnal treat. Plus, it helps that Brazilians are some of the sexiest people alive. This year the event will take place February 18-21.

Seattle Erotic Art Festival
Seattle, Washington

The Seattle Erotic Art Festival was founded by the Sex Positive Community Center (now the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture) in 2002. Through the arts, the event promotes feedom of expression and a sex positive community. Attendees can expect sexy performances, erotic installations, libidinous films, workshops, and after-hours parties. This year, the festival is expanded to take place over two weekends, June 16-17 and June 22-24.

Phallus
Tyrnavos, Greece

While many of these festivals tend to gravitate towards celebrating the female form, the Phallus Festival in Greece pays homage to the penis. This one-day fertility festival signals the beginning of Lent and honors the Greek God of wine, madness, and ecstasy, Dionysus. Attendees of the festival will have the chance to eat penis-shaped food, sit on penis-shaped furniture, kiss ceramic penises (and sometimes have them places between their legs), admire penis art, and wear penis accessories. A similar festival also takes place every year in Kawasaki, Japan.

[images via Kaylin Idora Photography, ChrisK4u, Exotic Erotic Ball, Wikimedia Commons, _Yuki_K_]

Sexy goddess bares all in Boston


The ancient goddess of love, sex, and beauty is making an appearance at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Aphrodite and the Gods of Love is a new exhibition examining one of the most popular ancient goddesses and her place in the Classical world. More than 150 ancient works of art are on display, including famous pieces such as the Knidia, a life-size sculpture of Aphrodite made by the 4th-century BC Greek artist, Praxiteles. Another interesting piece is the Sleeping Hermaphrodite, a reclining figure who from one side looks like a voluptuous woman, and from the other like a man.

The exhibition traces Aphrodite’s sexy origins in the Near East and the place of her cult in Greek and Roman society. Aphrodite was a Greek goddess who was adopted into the Roman pantheon as Venus. She was the symbol of romantic love and ideal beauty. She also oversaw marriage, an odd choice since many of the myths surrounding her involve her cheating on her husband, the blacksmith god Hephaistos (Vulcan). Men worshiped her because she aroused male virility.

Being in charge of such important aspects of life made Aphrodite extremely popular. She was the patron goddess of Pompeii. Interestingly, Ramsay MacMullen in his Paganism in the Roman Empire points out that altars in private homes in Pompeii were more often dedicated to Foruna, Vesta, and Bacchus than Aphrodite. Perhaps because love received so much public worship, people felt they needed to give good luck, the home, and drinking some attention. They can be related, after all!

McMullen’s book (which I highly recommend) also touches on various ways the Romans worshipped Venus, including picnicking in the orchards around her sanctuary in Cnidus, and wild processions where a woman playing Venus led a string of dancing children playing Cupid. She and the other deities were very much part of daily life.

The exhibition also looks at related figures of Classical mythology, such as Aphrodite’s sons Eros (Cupid), the well-endowed Priapus, and Hermaphrodite.

If you want to meet this lovely lady and her interesting offspring, you better hurry. Aphrodite and the Gods of Love is only on until February 20, 2012.

Top photo: Fresco of The Judgment of Paris, Roman, Imperial Period, 45–79 A.D. Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Napoli e Pompei. Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli. © www.pedicinimages.com. Courtesy, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

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Galley Gossip: Pilot sexually harassed by a passenger!

Dear Heather, I have to share this with you. I’m a pilot and I was sexually harassed last night. While jump-seating home, the lead flight attendant calls the cockpit and says a passenger thinks one of the flaps is out of position. The captain sends me back to check the wings. I squeeze into the fully occupied exit row to peer out the window. While looking out the window, a female passenger sitting in the middle seat puts her hands on my butt. Her friend then shouts, “Woo, get some!” Passengers nearby all start laughing. Anyway, turns out what the initial passenger saw and thought was a problem were the outboard ailerons on the wings of the Super 80. One was up and the other was down. This is normal while on the ground. Anyway, I returned to the cockpit and told the pilots what just happened and we all had a good laugh. I should mention the Captain was female! Thought you’d find it funny! – Bob (the singing pilot)

My first thought when I read Bob’s letter was, wow! What kind of person places their hands on a pilot’s you-know-what and yells out something like that.

Just to be fair, I later on found myself yelling out the exact same phrase several times throughout the course of my day. I couldn’t help it! And each time my voice become lower and before I knew it I had developed this southern accent, kind of like that famous redneck comedian I can’t remember the name of. Next thing I knew I was visualizing it, the whole exit row groping, only it was I who slapped the pilots and a few lucky passengers as I passed them in the terminal. Mmm hmm, get it girl!

NOTE: I would NEVER do something like that in real life!

Now back to Bob.

The woman who slapped him was somewhat attractive, at least that’s what Bob said. He only told me this because I asked. I asked because I wanted to know what she looked like so I – er, we! – could visualize this better. Not that any of this matters, because what matters, really matters, is how the woman made Bob feel. Not good.

“I was flattered and a little embarrassed. And humored. Cause it was funny. I mean my butt was kind of in her personal space. She had the shot……she took it. So let’s just say I was ‘Flambumored.'”

At least Bob now kinda-sorta knows what it’s like to be a flight attendant, if only for a few seconds, and for just one squeeze.

When I asked Bob to explain EXACTLY how it all went down so we could learn from his experience, he said, “I told the passengers in the exit row I needed to get in there to check the wings and that they could either get up or let me crawl over them. They all opted for the latter.”

And there’s the red flag.

Let this be a lesson to all pilots. Do not, I repeat, do not climb over passengers! Do what a flight attendant would do and let them step out of their row and into the aisle instead of wedging yourself on top of them.

All kidding aside, please do not poke, prod, pull or slap the crew. Trust me – there are quite a few touchy feely passengers who will live a whole lot longer if certain flight attendants (and pilots!) are left alone.

[Photo courtesy of TheZipper]

SkyMall Monday: Top 5 products for hurricane season

Here on the East Coast, Hurricane Irene made for quite the weekend. First, we braved the hordes of crazy people in the supermarket (no one needs that much peanut butter), then the torrential rains and, more than anything, the constant barrage of media hype. Thankfully, we’re all safe and accounted for here at SkyMall Monday headquarters. However, we’re now well aware that hurricane season is underway and still has weeks to go. That’s why it’s time to make sure that you’re prepared. By now, you should have flashlights and batteries (and to the people who needed to buy them this weekend, why didn’t you own them already?), but there are plenty of other items that you should own to ensure that you’re prepared for the next month or so of tropical weather. Here are the top five SkyMall products you need for hurricane season.5. Monet Rain Boots (pictured above)

When the weather is bad, it doesn’t matter how ugly you look so long as you stay dry. Since it doesn’t matter, you might as well be the ugliest.

4. Make Your Own Truffle Kit

There’s a good chance that your local chocolatier will be closed during storms so they can hoard their confections for their own family. Fear not, however, as you can easily whip up some emergency truffles. Disaster has never been so decadent.

3. The Spectator Umbrella

Let’s go right to the product description:

When not providing rain protection, it can be converted into a seat cane with a comfortable 13″ wide leather strap seat by simply spreading the handles.

You want to stay dry as you brave the storm, but you also want to relax once you get to the shelter and using the cots that they provide just sounds unsanitary.

2. Women’s Waterproof Rain Cape

Over the river (which is flooding over its banks) and through the woods (which is full of fallen trees), to grandmother’s house you go (because she’s outside of the evacuation zone and still has electricity). Ponchos are so last year and jackets are cliche. This hurricane season, it’s all about capes. Just look out for the big, bad wolf (or, you know, downed power lines).

1. Testosterole Sexual Enhancer

You’re going to be spending a lot of time inside the house with no TV, internet or electronic entertainment options. Eventually, you’ll want to have some fun with what’s underneath that cape. [Note: I would have posted the product description but it’s painfully long and includes the word “secretion,” which makes me very uncomfortable.]

Stay safe out there, kids.

Check out all of the previous SkyMall Monday posts HERE.

Barbary Coast Sex: Satisfaction Guaranteed

It’s not very often when a madam guarantees you’ll have the best sex of your life. Or at least so satisfying you’ll walk out of there thinking your twenty-five cents was very well spent. Such was the case in Barbary Coast-era San Francisco. Having walked from the Old Mint, the beginnings of the Barbary Coast trail, across wide Market Street (the city’s answer to the Champs Elysées), past the tourists queuing for a cable car on Powell Street, and, finally, across Union Square, I found myself standing on Maiden Lane. In the 1870s this narrow street, stretching from Union Square to Kearney Street, was the home of 1,000 prostitutes. Their houses of ill repute were called cribs.

I stood there trying to imagine the topless women hanging out of first-floor windows, yelling “Touch one breast for ten cents, two breasts for fifteen cents, or come on in for twenty-five cents.”

The men were encouraged to hang up their clothes in a closet. And once the they were, uh, preoccupied with their lady, a colleague from another room would remove the back panel of the closet and take the rest of the John’s cash.

I joined up with a walking tour on Maiden Lane. Sponsored in part by the San Francisco Public Library, San Francisco City Guides gives free tours throughout the city. This particular one, called “Bawdy & Naughty” focused on Barbary Coast-era prostitutes. Specifically, though, on Maiden Lane, today a posh pedestrianized street flanked by Chanel, Prada, Paul Smith, and Hermes shops.

The guide, John Ferriera, walked the group (of which there was a guy who bore a striking resemblance to everyone’s favorite news pontificator and Mexican immigration lover, Lou Dobbs) down the two-block street, regaling us with salacious stories of 19th-century San Francisco. As we stood in front of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed building at #140, Ferriera told us about Bertha Kahn, a famous Maiden Lane madam who coined the term “Satisfaction guaranteed.” If you weren’t satisfied with your amorous encounter, she’d give you a token to come back and try again.


Today, randy San Franciscans can go to the Tenderloin to pretend they’re in Barbary Coast-era Maiden Lane. It’s highly doubtful, however, that anyone there is putting a guarantee on satisfaction. And it certainly will cost you more than twenty-five cents.