Si eres una torta...

So, there I am slathering on more sunscreen when Linda all of a sudden exclaims "Uh-oh, he has someone's torta (sandwich)" and I turned around to see Oso Negro (Black Bear), one of the site dogs, with my torta in his mouth. He had taken it out of my bookbag! Right when I saw him I knew that I wasn't going to get it back--he's too fast and the distance was already great between us.

But I took after him anyway, cursing under my breath. I was soon joined by Pedro, one of the trabajadores and the nightwatchman as well. We went searching through the brush looking for Oso, all the while I'm saying "pinche perro" and "maldito" (basically bad words heh). We finally located Mr. Oso, who was oh-so-pleased with himself, but couldn't find the bag with my torta. However, everyone is so nice here that when lunchtime rolled around (la hora!) not one, not two, but three people gave me tortas--and of course, to be polite I had to eat all three.

The funny part came later though. Carmela, Minerva and I were busy mapping when we saw this young woman approach the site--she was from the local youth committee from the town of Mátatlan (the town closest to the site) and was coming by to check things out and see how the excavations were going. Before she got close though, she asked if there were any dogs. I replied yes there were but that they were not dangerous, then said under my breath "Si eres una torta, entonces son peligrosos" which translates to If you are a torta, then they are dangerous. The chicas and I didn't stop laughing about it for a half-hour, and ever once in a while Carmela would say under her breath "Si eres una torta..." and giggle.