Dining? I wouldn't call it dining. I'm no food snob, but this 'dining' experience takes the cake. Once the weekend crowds left Monterrico, I hiked up and down the beach in search of food. According to my two guidebooks, there were restaurants--real restaurants--somewhere in this town. I could see evidence of the open-air restaurants, but they were dark and empty, and not a soul moved within.

So I hit Calle Principal. On my first day there (a Sunday), music was booming and people were swarming in and around these local comedores. But on that day, a Tuesday, one after the next, it was the same. The whole town seemed evacuated. Not a soul was in sight, and all the tables and chairs of the comedores were empty.

Finally, I saw a light coming from a kitchen behind an open-air comedor decorated with Gallo advertisements. I shyly approached the light. Then, among the tables and chairs, I heard a cough, a murmur, and something slurred in Spanish. Some man was half passed-out in a hammock among the tables. Whatever he said, it called out the cook--a large woman who sat me down with a look that said "You're eatin' here or you're not eatin' at all." The tablecloth was dotted with flies eating bits of red sauce.

"Hay pollo, hay carne, y hay camaron" she gruffed. ("There's chicken, there's beef, and there's shrimp.")

"Camaron," I said, with a gulp. I hadn't seen anything but dogs and pigs in Monterrico--no chickens or cows--but I suspected there were indeed good, fresh shrimp in that ocean.

She seemed put off that anyone could have come there and ordered food. I watched her cook away in the shadow of kitchen firelight as she scolded a whining toddler and whapped him with a stick. The drunk man spat all over the floor.

Eventually, my camaron meal arrived: whole fried shrimp in a basket of glistening french-fried potatoes.

I dared to dive in, pulling the heads and feet and poop-shoots out of each tender sea creature and munching the greasy potatoes as I worked.

The cook at last came out to the patio to sit in a plastic chair and scold the drunk man and the toddling boy and count her money.

My hands were a nightmare of grease and body parts, but I handed la senora an extra Q20 note and made her promise me I could find her again for lunch tomorrow.

At a place that would break every sanitation rule I can think of, I begged for more. Monterrico was an abandoned town, it seemed, and I would just have to make do with la senora, the strange drunk man, and whatever deep-fried menu del dia was offered.