Carnaval Opening: One of the Craziest Things I've Ever Done or Seen

Hey guys! Gary D. does it again with a great story about the controversies surrounding Carnaval this year, and not just the Holocaust thing. Click here to find out about what other problems have gone on.

Last night me and my Canadian friend, and her Canadian friend that is going to be a new volunteer at the NGO, headed over to meet up with the kiddies and NGO director of the ballet school to get ready for the kids parade. It was hard to get to because a lot of streets were blocked off, but miraculously we found everything and found a handful of kids half in costume sitting on the sidewalk.

Initially, I thought that the Children's Parade--despite the fact that it opens Carnaval in the Sambodrome--was not as big a deal. For example, until yesterday I didn't realize that it is just another version of the main, adult Carnaval parade, complete with samba schools, samba school songs, the drummers' band, floats, and the craziest costumes you've ever seen. Just this time with little people.

Our kids were separated into two groups: the Baianas (Bahian ladies), complete with head wraps and hoop skirts, and the Emperor's guards, complete with incredibly ornate long-sleeve sheath with cape and short pants and flags and hats. So after awhile, the director gives the volunteers tee-shirts and off we go to the Sambodrome.

It was a pretty short way to the actual location, except the closer we got, the more people there were to plow through, and there were parts where we literally had to sprint to stay with the group. Imagine thousands and thousands of people--parents and volunteers and many many children, all in costume, trying to force their way into one place. One very narrow place. I'm not sure I've seen more chaos in my whole life, not even at mass political protests in DC or Buenos Aires or at one of Latin America's largest concerts in the DR. But in the end, the chaos miraculously straightened itself out.

Somehow, we found our place in the line with our samba school, and the kids finished changing and us gringas desperately took pictures of pretty much everything we saw: the ridiculous floats, the incredible costumes, and the kids in masses of dolphins, cats in a garbage can, scales of justice, chickadees, and soldiers, to name a tiny tiny few. I've never seen so many different costumes in my life in one place, and never have I seen so many original or elaborate or crazy ones (imagine the adult parade!).

So we helped the kids with their costumes and the director handed out photo IDs for the kids to loop around their necks, in case they got lost (apparently, kids in other schools did, since the announcer mentioned several times that Fulano so and so should report to the meeting area immediately to pick up his lost Fulanito.

Though we'd already reached our spot, it was still chaotic, since thousands of people were pushing past us to get to their spots, or to get into the stadium, or go I don't even nowhere, with vendors selling out water with only beer and Coke left (a LOT of drunk parents were there. but apparently, at the ballet, many parents refuse to attend any events organized by the ballet if beer won't be present). The kids, amazingly, seemed unphased, since many of them had done the parade before. They huddled in a group, danced around, made jokes, and were surprisingly well behaved.

So then we waited. And we waited some more. And we moved up a little bit. And then a little bit more. FINALLY, we were the next samba school in line, and we got everyone ready to go. The director was practically having a coronary, which would get worse later when we entered the Sambodrome and the kids needed two tries before they started their dance correctly. Me and my Canadian friend were standing on either side of the director to keep the kids in a line and help orient them during their dance. We were with the guards' group, the older girls who did a dance routine literally down the entire block in the Sambodrome. Which I think is something like almost a mile long. It was REALLY tiring, and all we had to do was walk backwards. We were in the front of our samba school, so they were the first to be seen by the media, which flocked to the pista, where we were, sometimes trying to push me out of the way and me giving them dirty looks like "HEY WE'RE TRYING TO MARCH HERE!"

And we got a few times to actually samba but a lot of the time we were moving and it was a little harder to dance. The event was free and thousands and thousands and thousands of people were in the stands. Then suddenly it was all over and the kids were stripping off their costumes, and we slipped out and the girls went to meet their friends and I went home to pass out on my bed. The parade started at 5 and went til a bit after midnight, and I had only been there for the last three hours. Imagine all the things to see! Tourist hint for Carnaval: the kids' parade is just as amazing, and is completely free.

You can see the complete album in my new album on the sidebar, and I'll try to get some of the videos up on Youtube at some point. I highly recommend Globo's photos, and if you click here and then click on VEJA GALERIA DE FOTOS in the middle, you will get about 12 awesome pictures of the other schools. Apparently the rival ballet NGO had girls on pointe. That has got to hurt.

The first picture is from Globo because it is adorable, and the rest are mine, some of our kids and some of the others.