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Published: April 10th 2006
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Last Night of Carnaval
Getting ruined, I mean 'ready' for Marky, Patife and Fatboy Slim. Take a good look at the twat on the left. My 28 hour bus ride north left Rio at 9am on the morning after Rolling Stones. My plan had been to stay up all night in the hopes of having a decent kip on the journey. As it happened I'd sneaked into the hostel I'd already checked out of and slipped into a coma on the pool table. Waking up at 8:50 I realised I had a problem. Rather conveniently, the only reason I made the bus at all was because unbeknown to me summer time had just ended and the clocks had gone back.
After God knows how many weeks in Rio my body must've been pleading with me for a break as I slumped into my seat and slept for 24 hours straight!
Salvador's a cool city. It's Brazil's third largest city and was originally its capital (from 1549 to 1816). A large proportion of the inhabitants are descendants of slaves and managed well to preserve their culture and religion to the present day. Though originally ordered to convert to Christianity by their masters, slaves just gave Christian names to their deities and got away with it. Still very popular all over Brazil's north-eastern Bahia region is
The Old Town
A few of us even managed to get out and have a look around the old town after Carnaval had finished. Capoeira, a non-contact martial art where two guys exchange mock spinning kicks somersaults and cartwheels: a cool little spectacle when done well.
Although I didn't know it when I made the booking my hostel was in a prime location for Carnaval in the southern district of Barra. There are two procession routes, one up in the old town with Samba displays which is geared towards the family then the route that runs along the beach in Barra. Here, from about 8pm to 4am a very slow parade of
blocos - double decker buses seemingly made out of the world's biggest loudspeakers - makes its way along the coast road. Each bus has a 150-or-so yard long cordon around it, giving you the choice of standing around on the pavements jumping around as each bloco stops in front of you - known to the locals as popcorn - or buying a T-shirt for a particular bloco, that allows you to pass in and out of its cordon and move down the road with it as you please. Meanwhile quite efficient teams of six military policemen run around breaking up fights and dragging people off. The whole thing's expensive, violent and
Second night of Carnaval
Most of the photos I have of Carnaval are from before we went out each night. We all took disposables out on the nights themselves but mine was pilfered on the first night and it never really crossed my mind to replace it. absolutely mental! It's mad to see a party go on for six whole nights - each afternoon I'd wake up around 4pm and the streets outside the hostel would already be absolutely packed with people.
Over the course of the six nights I was popcorn twice, went to three blocos and one camarote. The latter involves spending the night in one of the big bars that overlook the parades. In between passing blocos well-known DJs lay down more banging tunes. The one I went to - Mana Banana - had a very good reputation. It covered four floors and even had its own private beach out the back. Some Brazilian friends managed to get us T-shirts for R$250 each (about £65) but you have to go to more upmarket ones before they start throwing in free food and drink.
To be honest I kind of viewed this week as the biggest party of my life and fancied pushing myself while my body was still young enough to take it. Well, if something's worth doing...
While most of the locals took it easy at times, had nights off here and there, we just went absolutely mental. Essentially off
our faces every minute of every night. OK, so a lot of what went on would be best left unsaid on a blog like this (by the way, Mama, how
are you?!) but rest assured there were obscene amounts of dancing hugging kissing and periods of utter overwhelment at how ridiculous everything was!
They'd saved the best till last, too. The bloco I'd been meaning to buy a T-shirt for all week had Fatboy Slim supported by far-and-away my favourite Brazilian DJs, Marky and Patife. By the time I finally tried to buy a shirt for it, the price on the street had gone up to £100. Instead, friends of mine spent a couple of hours stitching together the offcuts from everybody else's T-shirts to make one for me. Check out the photo of us all; through no fault of the girls I looked ridiculous but skilfully avoided getting kicked out of the bloco even once. The night itself was just mental. And a spot of divine intervention brought us close to tears; at the exact second that Fatcheeboy Sleeem's name was announced (over some sickeningly heavy drum n' bass) the heavens opened and you wouldn't believe how fucking
crazy everyone went. It was the loudest, sickest drum n' bass I'd heard for far too long and I was loving it!
So come about 6am there was no way I could take any more... Carnaval was finally drawing to a close and against all expectations we'd survived its entirety! I reckon any longer and I'd have been posted home in a box! I've never partied so long, sweated so much, never laughed so hard. And I'll definitely be coming back, too, as I reckon it could be the ideal getaway for a couple of weeks once I've finally started a career proper.
A couple of days lingering around watching the city slowly emerge from its mighty hangover and I should have been ready to carry on northwards to Recife and Olinda, and then into Amazonia for a long boat ride into Colombia but I was still waiting for a replacement camera to arrive in the post. One of my great ideas had been to buy a camera from a website and have a friend post it from the States to Salvador since all electrical equipment is taxed to death in South America. My other idea had been
And Again...
Liv, Sara, Hayley & Steve all looking rather proud of themselves for some reason. to have an iPod posted home to England, where my brother diligently put about 5,000 stolen songs on it and posted it out to Salvador too. That had worked so well I was overflowing with confidence that my camera would be with me any day soon. And seeing as I'd need to go back to Salvador to collect it I saw no harm in heading back down south with half a dozen people from Carnaval, ostensibly for some detox...
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bonfuckingjourno u mentalist
graybo you are all skinny! is that cos u dont have yo mamma's freezer at your disposal and you're finding it difficult to get people to provide you with a breakfast of a *customised* black sausage pizza followed by an all-day-breakfast-sandwich "chaser" ? and your hair is no longer quite so stupid as in the last pic! i HARDLY WECOGNISE you! "OVERWHELMENT" haha i see youre continuing the ironicalistical customisationism of words. hasta luego guapo (and apparently guapa DOES work for a boy with this exp fank u v much), muchos amores xxxx ps. jus found out with a week to go that there is after all a sous terrain drum n bass scene in france, and within easy reach, bollocks! ive been spending my clubbing nights (all four of them given the excitement involved) on a revolving dancefloor listening to butlins holiday-style MCing and fucking techno xx pps it's your turn to email x