I had my fair share of
Ecuadorian Carnaval last year, after walking the Sangolquí parade route home
from the library, alone, with my backpack and blonde hair (aka wearing a big
red target). I was barely recognizable when I made it to the house, covered in flower,
water, foam spray, dye, and whatever else my vecinos decided to throw at me along the way. So this year I headed
east, to see how they celebrate in Rio de Janeiro, the Brazililan city known
for having the biggest Carnaval celebration in the World… and for a good
reason! I arrived in the midst of the first weekend of the celebration, which
the Brazilians take very seriously and I was relieved to see there wasn’t an
egg-throwing teenager in sight. The streets of Rio were full of guys in
dresses, elaborate Carnaval costumes, and people of all ages dancing samba in
the street. The celebration lasted all day and all night… for five days
straight. Sunday night we headed to the Sambadrome
to see a little bit of the biggest show on the planet. I have never been so
overwhelmed. We bought tickets to the parade around 2am, and the enormous rows
of seating were still full of spectators waving flags to support their samba
school of choice. We watched as literally thousands of costume-clad samba
dancers passed, interspersed by gigantic floats built almost as high as the
stadium seating. After about 40 minutes watching the steady flow of floats and
dancers we picked up a program to see which groups we had seen… and realized it
had all been part of one samba school! I still can’t believe the time and work
that goes into the Carnaval preparation, and thousands of schools compete, for
one week of celebration. While the parade was a once in a lifetime experience,
the highlight of my Carnaval experience came the next day, while doing some
sightseeing in the city. We visited the Selarón staircase in Lapa, city stairs
that have been decorated by a mosaic of tiles from all over the world, a work
of art by a Chilean artist that he says will only be completed on the day he
dies. While admiring the artwork and searching for a tile from Ecuador, we all
the sudden found ourselves in the middle of a bloco a moving street party playing live Samba music and dancing.
Before we knew it we were surrounded by locals in costumes, singing and
dancing, and climbing all over the stairs. We went with the flow, and joined in
the party. Carnaval in Rio was a once in a lifetime experience, and one I
highly recommend witnessing.
Heather
