The Mascots of Al Manglar

Excuse me...did you say you have a boa constrictor for a mascot? We went back to Al Manglar (which means In the Mangroves) for the 4th night in a row tonight. I think we like the food. I wrote more about this restaurant on Trip Advisor, if anyone is interested in coming to Samara with us when we return in January (probably a dream). I found myself telling Rosa, the chef, that we would be back in January (which was probably a lie). She had to prompt me on the italian word for January because all I could say was "the month after December". Otherwise, unbelievably, I spit out a sentence or two in italian and was somewhat understood. Anyway, we arrived to find Massimo (our waiter from Naples) out in front of Al Manglar talking to something in the muddy stream. I yelled something like "Hey are you talking to the toads?" No, he said, a crocodile. !!!!! Sure enough, yes, a maybe pre-teen sized cocodrillo was there at the bank of the creek, sticking his nose up and showing his little pearly adolescent teeth. Apparently, Rosa feeds the little rascal daily at least once. Raw fish, etc. He's her "baby". A Mascot. So, when Massimo walked up to the water, out popped croc looking for a meal. He's a growing boy! Massimo was scolding him for his enormous appetite and suggested he go distract himself with a girlfriend. Wow! I'm standing 3 feet from a crocodile who might be getting pissed off about  a) not being fed and b) being told to go get a girlfriend - which I think would piss one off if one had to go miles to find one. There seems to be only one croc per muddy stream. Our spanish teacher Leni said there is one that lives in the muddy stream under a bridge down the road from her house. Recently it rained so much here that her entire road merged with that muddy stream and its lone inhabitant swam up the road and was lounging around in her front yard. She is saying all this with only mild distress. Yikes! I guess it's like me and tornadoes. I grew up with funnels touching down and sirens blowing all the time and frantic weathermen saying "Folks, this is no joke. We have a funnel on the ground. Take shelter now!" We would be standing out in the streets looking up at the sky saying, "Naaa!" Or sometimes piling into the station wagon at 2am and going to the fallout shelter at the hospital because we were all going to blow away. Fun! I just didn't have the fear of tornadoes that I do of crocodiles. I grew up with muddy streams, too. But, all I remember inhabiting those creeks were crawdads and snapping turtles. Scary? no. So, back to Al Manglar ...we came back tonight because Rosa and Massimo promised to have lasagna. We tried two nights in a row without success, but we knew it was worth trying again for because we had it a week before, and Massimo promised they would have it. We decided to trust this Neopolitan, even though he thoroughly convinced us never to go to Naples because you cannot trust anyone there and it is impossible to reform them because it is in their genes. Hmmm. Well, we trusted him (and Rosa who is from very trust-worthy Verona-home-of-Romeo-and-Juliet) and they did produce the goods - the lasagnaaaaah. Excellent lasagna. Subtle, integrated, smooth, layered delight! We got the one with ground beef and ham (I'm pretty sure we will have to renounce our vegetarianism with that one). So, okay, rewind a bit to pre-lasagna. We sat down to wait for the deliciousness, amongst the usual array of cats and dogs that wander in, and we heard some commotion out front.  It was Rosa feeding our randy little growing boy, the croc. We had to see this. He swallowed a big piece of fish whole and then turned on his side (oh, that's ayurvedic isn't it?) and gave us a smile showing his fine, razor sharp adolescent teeth. She says he is very smart. I wonder if he is smart enough to know that when he grows up, he could make one of us his meal. It's just a little eerie the thought of befriending a crocodile. It's about trust. Can you trust someone who could swallow you some day? Maaaybe... Anyway, one piece of fish was not enough for young crockinstein. He wanted more and started to charge up the bank towards Rosa. We may have a nasty drug dealer/addict situation developing here. Again, I'm thinking, never deal drugs to someone who would bite your leg off if you were a little too slow to deliver.  Massimo again reprimanded him and suggested female distractions. Croclet slid back into the water with that "oh dad" kind of look (I thought I saw a hint of "oh dad, just you wait", too). We returned to our table eager to chomp our lasagna (and roll onto our sides with teeth glistening). On this occasion we were sitting more on the inside part of the restaurant. Usually we sat in the open-air section but there was some kind of stink going on that we couldn't handle. Turned out to be a lobster in the trash that Rosa had bought and discarded (trash day was tomorrow). So we moved inward away from the stink of the morte langosta under the beautifully crafted high thatched roof. (Think these words using a sinister voice) - We were soon to be introduced to Al Manglar Mascot #2 (insert creepy music here). Rosa motioned for us to look up at something long and brownish above us that sort of looked like a piece of the roof thatching (are you guessing yet?). The "rrrroof thatching" mmmoved. We began to make out a head. The eyes. It slowly became an "s" (as in oh shit) shape.  It was a boa constrictor with about half of its body sticking through the thatching staring down at us. Su amigo? I said to Rosa. Si, she said. He's my "pet". He eats the bats. A living ecosystem right there under the roof at Al Manglar. The bats eat the mesquitos (but not quite well enough), the snake eats the bats, and I don't think anyone eats the snake. Maybe the croc would. Or a nasty badass honey badger if they had any there. (see previous post).  Tune in next week for  "Who's chomping who" and "Crocky gets a date".