Carnaval Saturday

On Saturday night Laura, Mat, and I went to a bloco in Leblon. Blocos are formed by all sorts of groups, and aside from the official samba parades in the Sambodrome, they are what makes Carnaval special. The samba parades require expensive tickets for admission, but the blocos are free and anyone can join in. The bloco in Leblon had a group of drummers, the bateria, out in front, and then a truck with a platform filled with singers following behind. It proceeded at snail pace for a couple blocks, right in front of where I lived last summer. So many people crammed into the street that at times my arms got pinned to my sides. Either it was nearly impossible to move at all, or everyone got shuffled along at whatever pace the crowd was dancing. Unlike the laid-back atmosphere of the night before, the energy level on Saturday night was very high, and everyone was singing and dancing and just having a wonderful time. Most people knew the words to the songs the bloco was singing, and they sang at the top of their lungs.

The best part was getting to be right in the middle of it all. I’ve studied Brazilian music in some of my classes, so it was so cool to be marching right alongside a real Carnaval bateria, so close that at one point I had to be very careful not to get hit with one drummer’s mallet. In a bateria, each type of drum plays a different rhythm, and then all the rhythms mesh together into a complex final product. At times there is a call-and-response element to their playing, and I was excited to hear that one of the calls the Leblon bloco used was exactly the same as one I’d been taught in a class. I think it would be awesome to get a chance to rehearse with a bateria in the off-season just for fun (I played percussion in high school, so I’m already familiar with drumming), but unfortunately, baterias seem to be almost exclusively male. In the Leblon bateria, I saw a single girl with a tambourine, but she was definitely the exception. That’s really too bad, because in situations like blocos, drums can hold a magical, almost enchanting power over a crowd that nothing else can pull off. They’re powerful, but sadly girls are just out of luck.

After the bloco ended Mat went home, but Laura and I decided to try to meet Paulina in a neighborhood called Lapa, which is known for its nightlife. It’s across town from Leblon, so we took a taxi because all the buses in the Leblon area were messed up since there were so many people blocking the streets. Lapa is so popular that, at least at night, the streets are closed to cars. A huge white aqueduct runs through the middle of the neighborhood, and the arches are its iconic image. The neighborhood is quite a bit sketchier than Leblon, and theft is a definite problem, but that by no means dissuades people from going there. Laura and I knew the address and name of the place where we were supposed to meet Paulina, but we couldn’t find the street and Paulina’s cell phone battery had died, so we decided it was a lost cause. We wandered around by ourselves for awhile (though Lapa really isn’t the greatest place for two American girls to be wandering around alone) until by chance we ran into four American guys from PUC that we knew. They all also just happened to be from West Point, which was all the more convenient for us. Who better to go around a sketchy neighborhood with than military guys? There are lots of clubs and bars in Lapa, but there are also vendors selling beer on the street, so tons of people just stand around outside, talking. We did that for the rest of the night, and once again I was surprised at how little music there was. We were standing right outside a club of some sort and I could see the musicians playing just on the other side of the window, but I couldn’t hear them at all. A few guys with drums went by at one point, adding a little bit of festivity to the air, but overall the atmosphere just seemed a little boring. Lapa seems to be The Place to go at night and people are always talking about it, so I was surprised that it wasn’t more exciting, especially during Carnaval.the bloco truck

the bloco truck

the bateria

the bateria

the bateria

the bateria

cross-dressing Tinkerbells

some of the people at the bloco

some of the people at the bloco

We ran across some American guys and asked them to take a picture for us. One was from Minnesota (almost Wisconsin, when you're on the other side of the world), so he decided to jump in the picture with us.

one of the beer vendors, with the Arches of Lapa on the back of his shirt

a kiosk selling masks