Keeeeeeeeeee!

It's Wednesday and I'm almost recovered from the weekend and almost ready for the next one. During weekends, in the two months before Carnaval, the major escolas (Carnaval parade groups) do technical rehearsals - trial parades, really - in the Sambodromo, the samba parade stadium. They don't have the floats and costumes yet, but all the paraders come, and the flag-bearers and the passista dancers usually have some kind of outrageous outfit just for the rehearsal, and there's often one or two tiny floats (made special just for the rehearsal). So all in all it's quite the show. This year even the Grupo A (second tier) escolas are in on the fun. Most Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from now till Carnaval, there will be 3 escolas in a row doing free practice parades at the Sambodromo every night: one Grupo A (second tier) escola followed by two of the big-time Grupo Especial (first tier) escolas. It is all free, free, free, and you better believe the people are showing up! Crowd estimates are running at about 70,000 per night.

So on Sunday night I trotted off to the Sambodromo to see two of the Grupo Especial escolas, my dear Mocidade (fallen on hard times but still close to my heart) followed by the reigning champion, Salgueiro.

I arrived too late to see the Grupo A escola (Santa Clara) but I got there just in time to film the warm-up of the Mocidade bateria (to be posted later). As they headed off down the parade route I discovered that most of the Sambodromo sections were UN-BE-LIE-VA-BLY packed, what the Brazilians call "super-lotado" (super-full). People were squished side-by-side on every single seat. I couldn't even find a place to squish myself into a standing-room-only spot. So I extricated myself from the crowd (this alone took 15 min) then ran all the way down the side of the Sambodromo to a fenced-off area by Sector 11, a precious spot where I knew the bateria would eventually pull off and park itself for about 15 minutes while some of the paraders moved by. (It's called the "recuo", sort of a parking spot for the entire 300+ person drum band.) It's the best place to get a really close view of the bateria.

The fence around the bateria recuo, unusually, been closed almost an hour earlier than necessary. I was perfectly happy to be there, knowing the bateria would be along eventually, but I was surrounded by a knot of upset Brazilians who'd been counting on being able to run right through the gate to the other side of the Sambodromo. They kept calling the security guys over to argue with them about why the fence had been closed so early. It turned into a great Portuguese lesson in expressions of extreme frustration: "For the love of God, man! I can't believe you've closed off the gate an hour early! Look at the parade route, it's COMPLETELY EMPTY! What on earth possessed you guys to close the gate this early? This is completely ridiculous!" Also a lesson in Portuguese expressions of pleading: "Please, please, please can't you let me through? I'm parading with Salgueiro next! I'm a musician with Santa Clara! I'm a composer with Imperio Serrano! Look, here's my Salgueiro t-shirt - my Imperio Serrano card - my cavaquinho - " It was hopeless. The security guys were completely implacable. (Though I have to give them credit, they were unflaggingly polite to everybody, even though they were barraged for almost a full hour with pleas ranging from tears to fury.)

A lot of the people had just been trying to cross the parade route to get to the only sector of the Sambodromo that still had any seats left. It was tantalizingly visible, tantalizingly close, just across the parade path from our closed gate. The crowd kept pointing woefully to the empty seats, and the security guys kept saying "No, you can't go through. You have to go around," (Tthis is like telling somebody they have to walk all the way around the outside perimeter of the outer parking lots of a gigantic football stadium, just to get to the next section of seats over from where they'd started.)

Finally the security guys started conferring with each other, and with their boss, and with their boss's boss, and a decision was reached: They were going to open a whole new section - right next to us - and RIGHT ON THE PARADE ROUTE! We'd be right down at eye level with the passistas! (This was the section where, during the actual Carnaval, the very rich people would have their little private tables.) "See that door right over there?" said the security guy to everybody. "We're opening it now! There's nobody in there yet at all! Go, go, go!" There was a huge cheer from the crowd, including me, and we all raced around the corner and to the excitingly open door, a huge excited stampede, and I went racing along with them, and -

WAIT A MINUTE. What the hell was I doing?? I had already been exactly where I wanted to be! At the bateria recuo! I didn't WANT to be in the new section! But somehow I'd gotten so swept up in the excitement of the moment that I'd raced with everybody else to the new section.

I reversed course and fought my way back against the flow, like swimming against a tide of very excited salmon. I finally reclaimed my original spot (to the puzzlement of the security guys, who'd gotten to know me rather well at this point - they'd noticed I was the only person not complaining). And I waited.

And finally they arrived! The whole Mocidade bateria, wheeling off the parade route and marching right at me!! TOP volume!! And man, they sounded good. I'd been worried about them - Mocidade's been on a sad downhill slide recently, and they also recently lost/kicked out their wonderful Mestre Jonas. I'd heard reports that the Mocidade bateria in December has been horribly ragged. A lot of people are betting that the once-great Mocidade will finally fall from Grupo Especial to Grupo A this year. But they sounded great! Swinging, solid and exciting. (Drum geek notes: They've added frigideiras, I noticed. And I re-re-re-confirmed that Mocidade has reversed surdo tuning - lowest surdo plays the 1, middle surdo plays the 2.)

It was just so good to hear them again. And such a relief to know they can still swing, despite all the recent problems.

After Mocidade finally wheeled back onto the parade route and marched away, I crept into the newly opened section of the Sambodromo and found a tiny spot close to the parade route. (Since I'll be visiting Salgueiro later this week, I wasn't quite as anxious to get a close-up bateria view at the Sambodromo.)

There ensued an IN-TERM-IN-A-BLE wait for Salgueiro. An hour and a half inchhhhhhhed by. (during which, I later heard, the Sambodromo fire chief was having an argument with the Salgueiro president about some illegal fireworks that the bateria set off during their warmup. This morning the newspapers said the firemen are now threatening to shut down all the Sambodromo rehearsals for persistent violations of the fireworks regulations!)

We waited and waited and waited. I finally folded up my legs and scrunched down to squat on a tiny little corner of ground. There was a family next to me, the mother sitting on the ground, a teenage daughter sitting down too, the dad still standing. I gradually became aware that there was another daughter, a very tiny girl hiding behind the dad's legs. I could see her peeking out at me between his legs. She have been about three years old. She was absolutely adorable (this was one of those completely gorgeous black Brazilian families - all of them with that smooth, gleaming, perfect skin, and the daughters tidily dressed in cute little flowered outfits with ribbons in their hair).

She started peeking at me between her father's legs, then disappearing, then reappearing on one side of his legs, then disappearing again, then appearing on the other side. It was hide-and-seek! Her eyes started crinkling up with smiles as she got less and less afraid, and more and more curious, about me. I started giving her big surprised smiles every time she reappeared, and she started giggling and getting bolder. She started making a tiny little sound each time she peeked at me: "eeeee!"

I could just barely hear it, but it was clearly an "eeeee."

She got louder: "Eeeeee!" What was she saying?

She got bolder, laughing now, and now it was clearly "Keeeeee!"

She disappeared. Reappeared. "Keeeee!" Giggles.

Disappeared. Reappeared. "Keeeeeeee!" More giggles.

Disappeared. Reappeared: "Ah-keeeeee!"

AHA! She was saying "Aqui!" ("Here!") This must be what Brazilian kids say instead of "peek-a-boo"!

"A-Quiiiiiiii!"

So we played the Aqui game for, I don't know, ten more minutes?? She was the sweetest little thing!

So now I know what to say when I'm playing peek-a-boo with a little kid in Brazil!

And then we started hearing a distant thumping. The bateria! Salgueiro was approaching! We all stood up, and the father picked up the little girl and swung her up on his shoulders so she could see. We couldn't see anything yet, but slowly they got closer and closer. Slowly the chords of the cavaquinho became audible. There came a moment when the chords got clear enough that all of us suddenly realized where in the song they were, and, simultaneously, as if we'd rehearsed it, the ENTIRE CROWD burst into song. There must have been 5000 people in my section, and BOOM, everybody started singing the 2010 Salgueiro song, at the top of their lungs, at the exact same moment. It was stunning.

Stunning flag-bearers in their full amazing costumes whirling around. An amazing dance troupe of men all painted black, who were leaping around enacting some sort of story about slavery (I think - they had some chains, anyway). A set of jet-black girls all dressed up in Disney outfits - a jet black Snow White! It was great! Two little floats with crazy-sexy passista dancers dancing like wildfire on top. The (mostly black) crowd loved it. (I, meanwhile, was transfixed and confused by the concept of black people in blackface, because the dancers were almost entirely light-brown people who'd been painted to look like they were dark black. A mesmerizing visual, and one you'd never, ever see people do in the U.S.)

Then came the bateria. Salgueiro BLEW ME AWAY. But more on that later - 'cause I'm going to visit them at their home quadra tonight.