The Carnaval bus

I tried to go get my Sambodromo Monday ticket today from Bruno's apartment in Botafogo. I had this stupid idea that I could get from Lapa to Botafogo and back in three hours, in time to go to the Sambodromo for my Imperio Serrano parade. BAD IDEA. I forgot that it's Carnaval and that, in terms of traffic, the city is a snake pit of bloco parades.

The bus I hopped on in Lapa was immediately accosted by a huge, rowdy crowd that had just finished the massive Bola Preta parade. Dozens of laughing, singing people in ridiculous outfits crammed onto the bus till it was completely, completely jammed. The bus wasn't even able to move at first, there were so many people still milling around in the street, but finally the bus driver tentatively inched the bus out into the crowd and nosed through it. A guy with a bullhorn in the middle of the bus announced dramatically "O ONIBUS ESTA PARTINDO!!!!! PELO AMOR DE DEUS, SEGURE A MAO!!!!!" (The bus is leaving! For the love of God, hang on!) and everybody screamed with excitement and made dramatic motions to grab for something to hold onto.

The bus wheeled out into the road heading south and the bullhorn guy started singing a drinking song about cachaça, Brazil's sugar cane rum. The entire bus starts singing along. Literally everybody is belting out the song at the top of their lungs. It turns out to be a very helpful instructional song: (you've got to imagine a guy with a bullhorn singing this kind of drunkenly at very high volume)

VOCE PENSA QUE CACHAÇA E AGUA...
MAS CACHAÇA NAO E AGUA NAO...
CACHAÇA VEM DE ALAMBIQUE...
... AQUA VEM DE RIBEIRAO."
(You think cachaça is water... but cachaça is not water, no...cachaça comes from a still... water comes from a river.)

They sing it several times through and by the third time I've got it and I'm singing along too, though I have no idea what an "alambique" is and have to look it up later. Thanks for the little lesson about cachaça! That was very informative! That song ends and we segue naturally into the top 2 crowd favorite escola songs, Salgueiro's "Explode coração" and União de Ilha's "E Hoje", which we sing ALL THE WAY THROUGH, EVERY SINGLE WORD - yes, the entire crowd knows both these two immensely long escola songs absolutely rock solid. Even though they're drunk.

Our singing bus is proceeding happily southward through Rio's avenues when the crowd spots another bloco and shrieks with joy. The bullhorn guy yells through his bullhorn: "BUS DRIVER! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE STOP THE BUS AND LET US OFF! WE HAVE TO GO TO THAT BLOCO! IT IS A VERY GOOD BLOCO!" and the bus stops, and all the partiers pile out.

Five minutes later the bus gets stuck in another bloco, this time trapped in an actively parading bloco. We're trapped for an hour. No hope of getting to Bruno's house now. I hop on the metro and try to head back to Lapa.

OK. Forget about the Sambodromo ticket, I'll get it later. I'm just trying to get home now and pick up my Imperio Serrano outfit. The subway arrives at the Cinelandia station, my stop. My first clue that something is going on at Cinelandia comes when the subway car doors open. Picture the scene: You're in a subway car, by the doors, waiting for the doors to open; the subway car glides into your station, the doors open, and ten feet in front of you you see a solid wall of THIRTY HUGE FAT GUYS dressed in MATCHING WHITE TUTUS, SHINY HOT-PINK WIGS AND HOLDING PINK HULA-HOOPS, and they all look at you and say (this is a direct quote):

"RAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

And they all literally RUN at the open door of the subway car at TOP SPEED. (They're each trying to be the first person on the subway car.) They do not notice the 1 person (you) who is trying to exit.

It kind of reminded me of those battle scenes from Lord of the Rings, or possibly the Battle of Agincourt from Henry V. It was truly an epic charge. (Perhaps if the French had had those thirty guys in tutus, they would have won the Battle of Agincourt.)

I did the only thing I could do - crouched down, put my fists in front of me, bent forward and ran full tilt at a small 3" gap between two of the guys. I hit them hard, kind of punching them both in the stomach and forcing them a bit farther apart from each other, and just barely managed to burst through.

I made my way through a crazed crowd in the subway station up to opens into what is normally a serene plaza facing the opera house. It was INSANITY out there. The entire subway station was walled off with chainlink fences and security guards, with another chainlink fence funneling several hundred singing, chattering people to the ticket booth. As I exited the station and made my way outside the fence, I saw the need for the fences. There are HUNDREDS of thousands of people in the plaza. HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS. Jammed elbow to elbow, dancing and singing. They're not violent at all - it's just that there's so many of them. I can't believe the chaos. I'd forgotten that the Cinelandia station, and its plaza, are the end of the Rio Branco bloco parade route - apparently this idea of closing off the Rio Branco for bloco parades has been, oh, a wee bit popular! There are hundreds and hundreds of beer vendors too, whole bars have appeared that did not exist before - entire buildings seem to have been constructed. People are miling around in all kind of crazy outfits. Most shockingly, part of the beautiful old sculpture in front of the subway station has tumbled to the ground, most likely knocked down when a few hundred thousand people climbed up on top of it to dance.

The great thing about this crowd is that they're not aggressive, they're not angry, and they're not even really that drunk. Despite having accidentally broken the statue, it's not a mean crowd. After all, they weren't trying to knock the statue down - they were just trying to dance. Everybody's in a great mood. Because it's Carnaval!!!

However, it takes me 45 minutes to squirm and push through the crowd to get back home. I'm almost late for the Sambodromo! I put on my bizarrely lovely Imperio Serrano newspaper costume, which (oddly, for a newspaper costume) includes a two-foot-high golden crown covered with colored streamers, and set out on the fifteen-minute walk to the Sambodromo.

Everybody I pass, and I mean everybody, from truck drivers to homeless men to little girls, says to me as I pass:
"A Rainha!! E a Rainha!"
(The Queen! It's the Queen!)
I love this city so much.