Carnival Crescendo

As the red sun sets behind the Corcovado mountain the city lights begin to glimmer and, eventually, a single deep drum beat rises up from a favela in the valley below. By the time dusk transforms into night, from the shanty towns to the main streets, the whole Central district is alive, awash with thousands of Cariocas and gringoes alike moving to the beat. Eventually, at the height of the thundering percussion, all performers suddenly stop for two beats, leaving a silence even more resonant than their drumming, and when they crash back into their beat a moment later, they are joined by guitars and the crowd erupts into song and samba dancing - loud and numerous enough for the entire metropolis to hear and feel shake through the earth.


A local favela at dusk

These are the daily blocos and street parties in Rio at the moment. Growing in size and number in the week leading up to Carnaval, there are dozens performing in town squares and parading through the city streets. The locals are drinking in the streets from midday - every one of them in fancy dress costumes - moving on to parties at 11pm, dancing through the night until 6am before moving on to the early morning blocos at 7am. You would be hard pushed to find people who party harder anywhere in the world.


Me and the Casa579 staff, Daniela and Ziggy ready for a bloco party

In light of the popularity of the Carnaval, our pousada is saturated with guests, relegating my sleeping quarters to either Igor's house - a dark, insect riddled mosquito haven 200 steep steps down through the forest garden - or the moon and star-lit roof terrace. Pretty easy choice... with the exception of one night, in amongst 3 weeks of blissfully sunny days and cloudless nights (tough life), where we experienced a storm stronger than the likes you would have expected even Noah to have witnessed - the rain and wind was so hard on the terrace we had to put struts up to support the roof and guttering.

Though the night at Igor's resulted in over 50 bites and roughly 2 pints of blood loss, spirits were not weakened, for there was a plan brewing... After convincing the manager that I would take full responsibility for maintenance and cleaning, work began on reviving the roof top jacuzzi. I had earlier determined that there were a number of guests that would be aesthetically well suited to this new facility and work began immediately to take my mind off the incessant itching. To my dismay, repairs and the need for chemicals and testing kits delayed the process by a few days, and now after a job well done, and after a change of guests, for my efforts I am left with a space to join Pete, Ted and Karl in the tub if I wish. Not quite what I had in mind...

As much as I enjoy recounting my experiences in this blog, I can't help but notice there is always a negative factor to blemish what would otherwise be an idyllic stay, and was certain I would have better luck this week in avoiding this. Alas, it was not meant to be... My new work mate at the guest house, a Brazilian Paulista called Ziggy, has recently joined us and already set up a tour for the guests were you are taken on a forest hike and visit a number of cachoeiras (natural waterfalls) for the day. I joined our guests on his first tour where we had an excellent expedition through the overgrowth, heaving ourselves up steep slopes by grabbing tree roots and vines, to get to these remote waterfalls. These small waterfalls have beautiful pools at the bottom where you can swim and watch the wildlife that surrounded the area, from purple butterflies with wings the size of your hands, to toucans and monkeys. After enjoying the cleansing, clear water and bathing in the pools, we somehow resisted the urge to re-enact Peter Andre's 'Mysterious Girl' under the falls before having a lunch by the river. Ziggy was delighted by the success of his first trip and had great reviews. Unfortunately, yet understandably, the only thing the other guests focussed on when we returned to talk about our day was the dead body we saw at the begining of our ascent into the forest. Only a few hours before we arrived a local man had been murdered, having had his throat slashed, and lay a few feet away in a big pool of blood, still with open, glazed eyes. There were heavily armed police on the scene and explained that a suspect had been caught and the area should be safe - Ziggy explained that the man had killed himself to the guests to make them feel less ill at ease and tried to take everyone's mind off it, but to his dismay, this is all everyone wanted to know about when we returned. It was certainly unsettling to see this sight so close up and be reminded yet again of how dangerous this city can be, but remaining as light hearted as I can, I still find it entertaining to see Ziggy wince when I describe his trip as the 'Cachoeira Cadaver' tour.


Me and guests at the cachoeira in the Jardim Botanico district

In the last few weeks I have participated as a non-paying guests on other tours as a pousada representative and been to see some of the country's best known samba acts in free concerts to raise awareness for Haiti, but the most memorable thing I have participated in this week, and one of the eternally extraordinary experiences of my entire life to date for that matter, was at the opening day of the Rio Carnival at the Sambodrome. Last Friday I paraded in full costume with Estácio de Sá Samba school in front of some 80,000 people, not to mention a global TV audience, joined by 3,000 fellow dancers in a costume that can only be described as a Transformer / Roman Centurion / Father Christmas hybrid. After six hours at an all day bloco in Santa Teresa and work at the hostel from 6pm until midnight, a group of us left for the metro station in a pair of kombis (kombis being the city's mini-van bus alternative) after a few caiprinhas at 2am.

Waiting for the parade to start

The envy of the local kombi circuit, our driver had a TV screen and neon lights installed in his VW and had chosen to blast out music during our decent to the station. Though samba would have been more preferable, "I Want it that Way" by the Backstreet Boys was blaring out as our Formula 1 racing driver / pop star wannabe swerved dangerously as we sped down the hill. As we came out of the metro station by the Sambodrome, the full scale of the event came into focus. The streets were crowded with participants from the passistas (young samba girls) to the bateria and volunteer participants in glorious costumes like a myriad of a thousand shattered rainbows milling around a melee of illustrious floats. There being some five parades preceding us, our 4:40am entrance was somewhat delayed, and the blocos and work of the day were beginning to catch up with me - once left exhausted by the side of the road, we eventually began moving in lines of eight behind our float towards the entrance and the excitement began to build. The roar of the crowds and the thundering of the bateria drums intensified along with the pace of the parade. As we turned into the Sambadrome, a deluge of fireworks erupted along with the crowd. Adrenaline coursed through everyone as the bright lights and overwhelming noise enveloped us. We had fifty minutes for our parade to wave, dance and sing the Estácio song that we had learned earlier that day.

Though clearly not under as much pressure as the professional dancers, we still felt it our duty to do our best to perform well, as the Carnaval is strictly judged and schools are heavily competitive to win the event or be promoted in to higher leagues for funding and most of all prestige. By the end of the kilometre long parade, hot, sweaty and exhausted, we collapsed in a heap and watched the other participants filter through. A solid year of work by thousands and millions of Real spent on fifty minutes, and a mixture of emotions of elation of the experience and sorrow that it was over took over the participants, such that could never really be fully comprehended by a visitor - for millions of Brazilians, this is their life. How will they be judged? We would find this out later, but then our only mission left was to find our way home by searching for taxis in the streets that were slowly piling up with discarded and once so beautiful costumes that began melting into the rubbish piles by the road. The night was finally over and shall remain an utterly remarkable experience of my time here in Brazil.


Estacio do Sa - 2010