…and not for the first time, we’ve been considering the question: should you visit Cuba now before it changes forever? In the months following the momentous state funeral of Fidel Castro and the first official welcome to American tourists since the ’50s, we head to Havana to ask a group of locals – a dancer, boxer, barber, chef and a pair of artists – about steadily evolving life in this Caribbean communist outpost (p54). Their verdict? The historic façades of their capital might be crumbling away, but its defiant spirit remains as vivid as ever. Havana is just one stop in this issue’s greatly varied tour of the world’s most exciting cities, ranging all the way from Atlanta, USA (p66) to St Petersburg, Russia (p80).