Right! So! I think it posted! For technical reasons I cannot back up and proofreader, nor view the actual blog, so damn the autocorrect glitches and full speed ahead. I'm sitting here pecking away on my iPhone because I got here two and a half hours early to save seats for a bunch of friends, including two who are playing in the bateria (400-person drum band) of Portela. (These two are Dudu Fuentes, one of the brilliant musicians of the band, and Carnaval parade group Banga, and his wife Olivia, a dear friend who for many years has been one of my most helpful and informative samba contacts). They've just shown up, and all their friends, a chattering horde of friendly Brazilians. Helicopters are hovering overhead - a robotic camera is zooming along an elevated track above the parade route - the lights are blazing. The sound system abruptly roars to life with the Brazilian anthem, and then the Rio city anthem. Everyone's singing along enthusiastically - despite the reputation of Grupo Especial as being too overpriced for local Brazilians to afford any more, in fact the crowd around me in Sector 7 is mostly Brazilian. Mostly middle class, true, but heart-and-soul cariocas nonetheless. Most have saved up all year to buy a ticket for just 1 of the parade nights - the night when their favorite samba escola, the "escola of their heart", is parading.

BTW, this year's fire resulted in Portela and Mocidade swapping nights - Portela was switched to Sunday and Mocidade to Monday - causing tremendous chaos among Portela and Mocidade fans who'd already spent a month's rent on a ticket for the other night. The directors of both escolas arranged a meeting where Portela and Mocidade fans could exchange tickets. Dudu and Olivia also caught in this net - they'd known they would parade on Monday with the Portela bateria, and bought Sunday tickets to watch the other parades. Then Portela was switched to Sunday! So their huge bags of costume pieces are sitting all around us; they'll have to miss half of tonight's show because of having to dash out to play in the Portela bateria (of course, then they'll be IN the show, but that's a different thing.

The first escola of the night, Sao Clemente, is lined up at the end of the runway; I can just see their first float. I can hear a distant, faint thumping that must be the bateria, already playing (the sound system's not on yet).

Now the sound system comes back on - the singer hollering " SAI CLEMENTEEEE!!!", the cavaquinho and guitar blitzing away. The song starts! My god, the whole crowd around me is all singing along. The fireworks go off - Sao Clemente is officially starting. The huge clocks along the Sambodromo all set to zero and begin timing the parade (god save any escola that goes over it's allotted time.)

THE BATERIA STARTS. (This time they're miked). Drums! Fireworks! Here comes the parade! Eighty thousand people on their feet singing along. I have to go now.