GUANAJUATO, MEXICO — Once upon a time, not so long ago, the city of Guanajuato adopted an anti-obscenity law. Along with the usual naughty words and tantalizing images that were clearly forbidden, many conjectured that the salacious act of kissing in public was also illegal. Mayor Eduardo Romero insists that it just ain’t so.

To better drive home his conviction that lip locks on the public byways is anything but obscene, Romero has declared his central Mexico colonial city to be “the kissing capital” of the world.

Take that Paris, Rome and Niagara Falls!

Since the belief that kissing in view of the public was a punishable offense was so widespread, the city officials agreed to suspend the anti-obscenity legislation and review its wording.

Meanwhile, Romero has launched a series of advertisements meant to alert the local, national and presumably international world of kissers to the fact that his city is more than just kissing friendly. Indeed, its cobble-stoned streets are perfect for the activity now that he has proclaimed the area to be “Guanajuato, the kissing capital.”

Silly obscenity laws aside, Guanajuato has a rightful claim to a romantic kissing heritage. Legend tells the tale of a young couple who were in love but forbidden from seeing one another due to the gentleman’s poverty. Alas for the disapproving father, the sweethearts lived directly across the street from one another – on a street so narrow that they could lean out of their windows and kiss.

Today the street is still known as the “kissing alley.”

And Guanajuato? In the local indigenous P’urhépecha language, the city’s name means “hill of frogs” – and everyone knows what happens in legends after pretty girls kiss frogs… which could explain why the city needed an anti-obscenity law in the first place.