"After a good dinner and coffee, a rum like this and a Havan Club cigar are a gift from the gods," says Jose Rafa Malen, a 70-year-old bartender at the famous Florida bar, one of several historic bars in central Havana and a favourite of American writer Ernest Hemingway. The art of the cocktail in Cuba exploded 100 years ago under prohibition in the United States, with the invention since then of famous alcoholic mixes such as the daiquiri, mojito, and of course, the Cuba libre. IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES