The bloco parades begin

This past Saturday was the first real taste of Carnaval. It was the Saturday that is just two weeks before Carnaval, which in Rio means, it was the Saturday when all the bloco parades start. It's the unofficial start of the "extended" Carnaval that Rio celebrates - beginning 2 weekends before Carnaval and going 1 weekend after. (Because one weekend of Carnaval just isn't enough!)

I spent all Friday night playing with Cubango (more about Cubango soon. I have got to write a whole separate post about their street rehearsal.) Like most escola rehearals, the rehearsal started after midnight and ended about 3am - yes, I said the rehearsal STARTS after midnight, yes, that is life in Rio. I got separated somehow from my friends at the end of Cubango rehearsal, thought I remembered the way to the bus stop but apparently didn't. Long story short, I walked for over an hour through Niteroi searching for the bus station. Dodging pigs! Enormous pigs! Mama pigs with little piglets running at their feet! Daddy pigs! Running around loose on the streets! This isn't a rural type of area, either - it was a completely urban area, all concrete and asphalt and tall buildings. With pigs running around loose. And then packs of wild dogs came running along and started chasing the pigs. Much barking and squealing. This was all under a full moon... a memorable scene, to say the least, and it made me glad I'd done my Long Walk To Nowhere, just to see the dogs chasing the pigs under the full moon.

Eventually a taxi came along. I was pretty sure I was getting close to the bus station, actually, but my feet were getting pretty damn sore (my feet aren't that used to walking miles in flip-flops) so I flagged him down for a quite expensive cab ride back to Rio. Hey, it is for exactly these occasions that I keep a 50-real note tucked in my bra.

I got home at past 5am, and then woke up at 11am, very bleary and confused, to hear somebody pounding loudly on my apartment door. I staggered over to the door, half-asleep and limping, and looking very lovely, I'm sure, with extra-puffy eyes and my hair sticking out in all directions like a giant dandelion puff. I opened the door to find my friend Ben saying brightly "You ready to go see the choro in Laranjeiras??" (Ben from Seattle, the great trumpet and conga player, a friend from way back in my VamoLa days). Oh riiiiiight... the choro....in Laranjeiras.... riiiiight...... Ben started to say "You still want to go?" but I interrupted him with "Yes yes yes, of course I still want to go! Just give me two minutes!" Park Ben at the computer to check his email. Quick shower. Dress. Flip-flops. Cup of coffee. Grab my bag. "Let's go!"

On the way out the door I paused. We were only planning to spend maybe two hours at the choro, and then come back to our respective homes. I had nothing else planned for the entire day, except for a Jorge Ben Jor concert that wouldn't start till midnight. But I suddenly thought "This is the first day of Extended Carnaval. Things happen during Carnaval....you get caught up in unexpected parades... suppose I don't get home for 24 hours?" I grabbed a few extra supplies - extra cash, a few tiny maps of remote corners of Rio, my drum belt, my Banga and Monobloco id cards. Just in case. You never know.

We made our way to the free Saturday choro. For any choro fans who come to Rio - this is a little Saturday morning street market on Rua General Glicerio, in Laranjeiras. Almost every neighborhood here in Rio has 1 day a week when a bustling fruit-and-veggie market suddenly appears on the streets. It's a different day in different neighborhoods, and at this particular neighborhood, a tradition has arisen of having a free performance by a great choro band every week. Free! Did I mention it is free? It's free! 11am-1pm.

The choro was, indeed, superb. I was newly inspired to start memorizing choro tunes and building pandeiro accompaniment that will go nicely with each particular tune. We had a wonderful time there, ate shrimp pastries and had fresh-ground sugar cane juice (OH MY GOD. It is SO GOOD. This is the way sugar was meant to be eaten! Fresh squeezed with the chlorophyll and everything!)

Ben split after that to go check out another bloco up in Lapa, and I was planning to head home, but, on the walk to the subway station, Ben and I spotted a truck unloading drums. Of course we had to go over to investigate, and who should it be but Odilon Costa! Former mestre of Grande Rio and Salgueiro and Beija-Flor! Author of the revered book "O Batuque Carioca"! I'd been hoping to arrange some more lessons with him, so I trotted up to say hi and to ask about the lessons. He was looking particularly perky and happy, singing and dancing around in a rather un-Odilon-like way (I know him mostly in his persona as mestre of Grande Rio - stern, focused, professional, and a bit formidable. But this year he's taking a year off from mestre-dom and he sure seems to be enjoying it!) He was setting out a large pile of drums, and I realized this must be his famous bloco. Odilon runs a little bloco that only parades once, and for which he hand-picks all the players. Only the best play, the top-end guys from the escolas all around town, and so it is supposed to be one of the best blocos in Rio. But I'd never found them before!

So of course I had to stay and watch them.I watched Odilon's group for about an hour but then realized I was running out of time if I wanted to head back up to Lapa. So I tore myself away, dashed to Largo do Machado - OH LOOK! IT'S ANOTHER BLOCO! I stayed and watched them for a while.

HEY! BANDA DE IPANEMA IS ABOUT TO START! I suddenly remembered that one of the most famous blocos in Rio, Banda de Ipanema, was doing their first parade today. I hopped on the subway and zipped to Ipanema. Bloco de Ipanema's one of the more famous blocos, particularly well known for its drag queens and other fun costumes. Here's a little taste:

It seemed to be very popular to pose with these two fake "cops", pretending to be threatened by them for a bribe:


I really need to get a better outfit. I feel very underdressed.


A beautiful bride:


Two particularly lovely drag queens: (yes, these are men. Except for me, I mean)


Another drag queen - this was a GREAT outfit:


A Carmen-Miranda type drag queen:


Jungle dude:


WHAT A GREAT MAKEUP JOB. Why is it that drag queens do a better job than actual women with makeup?


I am actually not sure of the gender of this person, but it's sure a great outfit. Oops, I did not get all the feathers in the picture:


I backed up to try to get all the feathers in the picture:


I backed up some more and still could not get all the feathers in the picture:


My second favorite pic of the day:


And my very favorite picture of all. Portland folks, look who I ran into! In the middle of a crowd of hundreds of thousands of people!

It's Beto!!!! (dancer extraordinaire from Pernambuco, who, very fortunately for us Portlanders, now resides in Oregon.)

And then a phone from Brian Davis - he was up at the Sambodromo with Bruno! I charged up the Sambodromo at 7pm, saw Estacio de Sa, Porto da Pedra and Portela, ran into my friend JP but could not find Brian and Bruno to save my life. I kept getting tantalizing phone calls from them - "we're at the entrance gate!" "Now we're under the Bradesco sign!" "Now we're right in front of the Grande Rio camarote!" and I kept running around and running around the Sambodromo, and I mean running, up and down and front and back. I found at least six different gates that could all be considered "the entrance gate" (entrance to what exactly? There's 3 entrances to the runway and a different entrance gate for each of the 13 sectors), I found 3 or 4 Bradesco signs, but never found Brian and Bruno.

However, I did get to see an extraordinary moment when, as the Porto da Pedra bateria was warming up, all of Setor 1 started booing and making big thumbs-down signs and HURLING objects onto the runway, the part of the runway right in front of the bateria. Water bottles, beer bottles, and these were being thrown FAR, like, football passes. Water bottles flying fifty or sixty meters. They were actually trying to hit somebody! What on earth was going on? The bateria was in my way and I couldn't quite see. Next morning the papers had the story: A famous actress, who apparently is not actually from the Porto da Pedra community, had somehow convinced the directors to bump the current queen of the bateria (who IS from the community) out of her position and let the actress take her place. The poor girl who was being bumped had burst into tears at the change and the crowd had become enraged and started throwing bottles at the actress, who was actually forced to run for cover. The girl-from-the-community, looking stunned and grateful for the crowd's support, was restored to her spot, and rightfully so.

Hey! It's almost midnight! Time to head to Jorge Ben Jor! And that, it turned out, was the single best concert I have ever been to in my entire life. I was EIGHT FEET from Jorge Ben Jor! Looking very Mr. Cool in plain white shirt and shades. If you don't know Jorge Ben Jor... he is the author of a set of several dozen brilliant old-time funk classic Brazilian songs. His songs are intensely popular here in Rio, especially at Carnaval time, when it seems like every other song that every bloco plays is a Jorge Ben Jor tune. (Filho Maravilha, Do Leme ao Pontal, Taj Mahal, Santa Clara, and on and on and on.) His songs have this rootsy groovy funk riff to them that I adore. And he sang all his great hits, all those classic funky Brazilian songs that I've been playing all these years in Monobloco and Banga, all my very favorite songs, and the whole crowd was deliriously singing along. I danced for, oh, another five hours maybe?

I didn't get home till 5am. I'd been running around, chasing bands, following blocos and escolas and dancing in parades for sixteen hours straight. My feet were so sore I haven't been able to walk right for the two days since then - so sore I started worrying that I wouldn't be able to walk for the Cubango street rehearsal the next day.

And that was just the first day of Extended Carnaval.