Jackelita!

I think my favorite place in David is a little snack place called Jackelita. It was the place that I saw an iguana last year. I´ve been back several times this year for delicious cheese sandwiches (60 cents,) fresh juices, duros (natural popsicles,) and ice cream (35 cents.) Every time I go back I look around hoping to see an iguana.
This time Alessandra and I were lucky to see 5! Rosalina, eating a cone of pipa ice cream, asked a man in the back of the store if there were any iguanas and he said there were many and he took us to the backyard to see one. There were two trucks full of produce parked out back, including a white truck crammed past the brim with pineapples. (You have to admit there´s something funny about pineapples. They are neither pine nor apple and they grow together in fields like heads with explosive hair styles straight from the ground. They must have a sense of humour. I always laugh when I see them in their sun drenched fields.)
The first iguana I saw was a small, proud, bright green one scampering around in the trees behind the restaurant. Alessandra and I followed the man back behind the Jackelita parking lot. He told us there were as many as 30 iguanas living around there.
"Oh! There´s one! Back there!" Alessandra pointed to it.
"Oh I see it!" I watched as the large sand colored iguana slipped through the fence, his stiff tail dragging behind him.
We stepped slowly closer.
"Ahhhhhh!" 3 feet away a neon green iguana that had until that moment when he judged us too close for comfort, blended in perfectly with the green grass in front of us, scrambled in a fast thrash toward the chain link fence near the parking lot.
"hahahahahaha!" Alessandra and I laughed. Up in the branches of a shady tree we could see another sand colored one resting. Only the tips of his feet and end of his tail were visible from below and as if he knew we were talking about him and found it rude that we were making a spectacle out of him, tucked his tail over the branch as well so that only the tips of his claws grasping the branch could be seen and only by someone that really knew what they were looking for.
The man at Jackelita also pointed out something I couldn´t see in one of the trees called a squirrel bird which I will have to look up later.
When we came back into the restaurant Rosalina was in her seat at the booth next to the fish tank. The two pineapples, and bags of fresh vegetables that Rosalina bought directly from the distributors (the men in the trucks) all for less than 5 dollars were on the table. It was a hot day. She and Alessandra had finished their ice cream and I was still eating my flavour packed zarzamora duro.
"We can go now, it´s ok, I can finish my duro in the car." I said. I had already spilled the melty purple juice over my top and skirt.
"No, I want to see an iguana." said Rosalina.
"Go look back there. There are lots of them!" I said.
"No, I want to see one from here." said Rosalina. And it´s true she had a front row seat to watch the space in the gravel driveway where fresh green lettuce had been layed out as an offering for the iguanas´ lunch. We watched for a while.
"Why don´t the iguanas come eat?" Alessandra said impatiently. We waited some more moments.
I focused on my duro.
"Oh look!" said Rosalina.
I looked up. The King of iguanas, an extra large sand colored one with two black rings on it´s giant tail stood a few feet from the lettuce waiting for something, his eyes on the lettuce. Deciding everything was ok and the situation comfortable he walked calmy over to the lettuce and began to eat. Eating seemed like a big effort for him. He crunched the lettuce like the steady needle of a sewing machine. Snapping, open, close, open, close..... The lettuce being processed slowly but surely and snappily. The security guard at Jackelita (why does Jackelita have a security guard?) came to look at the iguana, a huge smile on his face. He obviously loved them and he answered our questions about what else they eat with great pleasure.
"I have seen them eat vegetables as well as the remains of dead animals." he said.
"ewwwww! Gross!" said Alessandra (the spanish equivalent anyway.)