Friday - I met up with a fellow Googler, Meghan, whom I had never met before. It was pretty lucky for me that she had 2 friends who were supposed to come to Brazil with her but couldn't make it at the last minute, since Liz was coming on Saturday and I was planning on being all alone in Salvador. Meghan definitely knew where to stay in Salvador. She was in a sweet hotel overlooking the entire Ongina beach circuit and with a terrific view of the city. I'll try to get one of her pictures to post here. Our apartment was in a good location, but definitely lacked a view, and an air conditioner. It also had a nice Kamikaze shower. After checking out the beaches and getting some food, we set out for our first night of Carnival. It was absolute madness, but still lots of fun. At 9 pm, the streets were quite full of people. There were people walking through the crowd on a march to see the parade. The excitement comes with a huge trio electrico can be seen. You stop for a moment from fighting the crowd to dance to the music being blasted at you from 30 ft high speakers mounted on semi truck trailers. The music fills the streets for hundreds of feet and bright lights flash as the band which is set up on top of the huge speakers plays Brazilian music. It is quite an experience to hear those things go by. The trucks are surrounded by people who have bought abadas, shirts which allow them to be right next to the float and march along the street without fighting the crowd. For us, the waiting minutes between the floats were spent people watching. There are people in costumes, flamboyant gay men in tutu's and pink bras (I was grabbed several times by these guys instead of any girls), women in short shorts and tight shirts, men selling Skol beers for one real, vendors making curred cheese on a stick, and people running, jumping, and singing. Later on in the night, people start to get drunk. The worst part of roaming the streets without a place to be is that there are random fights that break out and you have to act quickly to avoid the swiftly moving crowds. There is also the time of night when everyone has to go pee and all the bathrooms are full and crowded, so anywhere works. The streets become soaked with beer sweat, rain, empty cans and bottles, and lots of pee. But the party goes on. It rages until 5 am or so, and finally the crowd thins out and people start to go home. We made it home at around 5 am, just in time to see the sun rise, and sleep the day away.
Saturday - I met up with Liz, who made it from San Francisco after a 26 hour journey to central america, Peru, and Sao Paolo. With Meghan's hotel connection, we managed to get ourselves an abada for the evening so that we could get into a camarote. This is a private party on the side of the circuit where you can watch the parade and the people from the comfort of a private area with drinks, food, and massages. The party started around 8 pm for us, and this was definitely the best night of Carnival. When the trio electrico's go by, you stand right at eye level with the singers in the bands and you get to dance and sing as they go by with all the rest of the people in your box. We met up with some nice people there and managed to talk to them for quite a while. I thought Liz was quite funny because though she couldn't speak a lick of Portuguese, she would randomly approach strangers and start talking to them in English. She got lucky a couple of times because they actually knew English, but often times she would just get smiles and nods. Though we ventured out on the streets for 10-15 minutes, we were much happier with the carnival in the camarote. And still, we got to bed just in time to see the sunrise and sleep the day away.
Sunday - We decided to check out another circuit of carnival called the Campo Grande circuit. This is the older and more well established circuit on a much narrower street. It started at around 1-2 pm and by the time we got there, it was madness. So, we decided to find the Ongina circuit again. We got to the start of it and found a Samba trio electrico without a bloco around it and we followed it for a couple of kilometers dancing all the way. I thought that by the end of it, I would have learned to Samba, but Liz said that I looked like a white guy doing the Samba, which I think means that I suck at it.
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