Waiting for Liesa

With Carnaval almost over my thoughts are automatically turning to packing up, heading home, starting my life back in the US. I still have a couple weeks here but need to plan my instrument purchases. A Fabiano pandeiro? A cavaquinho? Leave my caixa and repinique here, or ship them, or carry them? Buy a better repinique? I've gotta plan this out because travel home is going to be tricky, with my 2 alfaias, zabumba, suitcase of pandeiros, box of hammocks, backpack and laptop. Hmm. I better ship some stuff. I'll have a 9-hour layover in New York - lucky, because I also have a transfer from JFK to LaGuardia, which is going to be extra fun with the 2 alfaias and zabumba. I just put some feelers out to some old friends there; one who I hope can help me haul my drums across town; and one who I have lost touch with and would like to reconnect with. Hope it works out so that I can see them both, and get the drums across town too.

Strange to be thinking about New York. Time feels so short that I'm already getting nostalgic for Rio even though I am still here! Today, dancing in the wild, overheated Rio Maracatu parade along Ipanema beach, jumping in the surf afterwards with Pat with all my clothes on (Pat, intelligently, had worn a bikini under her clothes - I had not)... (oh, and, we didn't go in very far - the rip current was vicious, and just in the ten minutes while we were there, Rio's helicopter-rescue crew pulled 3 swimmers to safety right in front of us! - scooping them up in a giant net, like huge fish) Dancing more afterwards.... then a fantastic meal ... more time with friends... walking along the beach sidewalk in the lazy, happy end-of-Carnaval crowds... the warm air, the sound of the surf, all the street vendors, happy packs of Brazilians chattering all around us. I thought, I really do love this city. It's funny, a month ago I'd been feeling kind of Brazil'd out and restless. But now that I am in the last phase of my stay here, I don't want to leave.

I'm feeling a little disoriented at the realization that the escolas are DONE. It is done. It is over. Everything I've seen them working towards for the last four months... all those rehearsals, all the planning, the costume design, the months of float construction, the porta-bandeiras practicing their flag dance, the thousands of residents learning the lyrics, the bateria diligently going to three rehearsals every week. Jonas drilling the bateria over and over not to rush the 7-boom entrance. Nana making all those long bus rides out to Padre Miguel. Beija-Flor's diligent paraders working on their choreographies every Thursday; Mocidade's robot ala practicing their robot moves every Saturday. Mestre Gil of Sao Clemente working with that skeleton bateria back in December, trying to get the Friday rehearsals rolling. And the guy on my street who plays the samba-enredo cd every day all day at top volume, so that the whole neighborhood can learn all the songs (like it or not). It's all over. Till next year.

Now they are all just waiting for the results. My dear Imperio Serrano is hoping against hope not to go down; but they know it looks very bad. It's not that they did a bad parade; it's that everyone else did such a sensational parade. Every year the parades get better and better, and this year was spectacular. And poor Imperio had the float jinx this year - doubly dangerous since it costs points both in the float category and in parade flow. Last year it was Rocinha who had the float jinx, and they went down.

Beija-Flor, Mangueira, Vila, Viradouro, and Salgueiro are all hoping to win. Mocidade, the grand old escola fallen on hard times, is just trying to stay in Grupo Especial; Estacio, the new arrival from Grupo A, is hoping to prove it's a true Especial escola.

Liesa's formal results will not be in till tomorrow, but O Globo (the major tv/newspaper media network of Brazil) has announced the results for the Estandarte de Ouro awards. These are decided by O Globo's own team of judges. The Estandarte de Ouro awards have no formal effect on an escola's ranking but are quite prestigious.

Estandarte de Ouro 2007

Best Escola - Beija-Flor
Samba (song) - Beija-Flor
Bateria - Imperio Serrano (yay! despite the float jinx, the bateria still rocks.)
Enredo (theme) - Unidos da Tijuca (the theme was photography)
Puxador (singer) - Wantuir, Unidos da Tijuca
Mestre-Sala (flag-bearer's partner) - Rafael, Vila Isabel
Porta-bandeira (flag-bearer) - Lucinha Nobre, Unidos da Tijuca
Commissao de frente (opening dance act) - Mangueira
Personality - Sebastiao Molequinho, Imperio Serrano.
Revelation (best debut, basically) - Alessandra, Portela's new porta-bandeira
Male passista (dancer) - Ruanderson, Portela
Female passista - Danuza Regina, Salgueiro
Ala das baianas (baiana hoop-skirt dance wing) - Salgueiro
Ala (parade section) - Bacalhau do Batata (Imperatriz)

Best escola of Grupo A - Imperio da Tijuca
Best samba of Grupo A - Imperio da Tijuca

Tomorrow: Liesa's final results.