Carnaval Capers
Over 40,000 members of the security forces are patrolling the streets of Rio this Carnaval to make sure that while the merrymaking goes with a bang, it is the right kind of bang. Compared with events in Rio, Salvador, and Recife the São Paulo Carnaval is a feeble affair.
John Fitzpatrick
No Dancing in the Street for Lula
The Carnaval is almost on us once again and politicians are heading back to their home areas to dance in the streets and mingle with the people. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, however, will spend his first Carnaval as President in Brasília although he has received many invitations to attend parades all across the country. This shows great devotion to duty, since, in this writer's view, any sane person would use any excuse to escape from the sterility of architect Oscar Niemeyer's monstrous blot on the Brazilian landscape.
Cheap Thrills in São Paulo
São Paulo is not a Carnaval town. Despite the fact that millions of Northeasterners live here, the Paulistano is still not really in tune with the Carnaval. There will be parades, of course, but compared with events in Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Recife etc the São Paulo Carnaval is a feeble affair. The mayor's office will be distributing 100,000 free condoms in the city's sambadrome, which might attract a few cheap thrill seekers, but no one would dream of going to São Paulo for the Carnaval. As usual, the attention of the world will be focused on Rio de Janeiro.
Cariocaphobia I
If you ever want to irritate someone from São Paulo then start praising Rio. Within a minute your listener will start telling you how dangerous Rio is. (At least three people were killed in the rehearsals for the São Paulo Carnaval last week but don't remind him of this.) Then he will tell you how lazy the Carioca is. The Carioca only wants to hang around the beach all day and do no work. He also speaks with a loud voice in a ridiculous accent.
The fact that Rio is the symbol of Brazil worldwide is another irritating point. The Paulistano will grudgingly admit that Rio is in a beautiful location, but will be quick to tell you about the good points of his native city. Once he starts praising ghastly buildings like the MASP modern art gallery, boasts about the number of great restaurants or quotes statistics on how much of Brazil's wealth originates from São Paulo it's time to head off to one of the few places in São Paulo worth visiting—the—airport and catch a flight to Rio...
Bang Bang Brazil
Once you have arrived in Rio de Janeiro this year don't be surprised if you hear a few bombs exploding or the rattle of machine gun fire above the sound of the drums. For the second time in six months, the gangs which control the drugs trade and terrorize the population of the favela shanty towns, have decided to show the country who is boss in the "marvelous city".
Over the last few days these gangs have forced businesses across much of the city to close down, have set fire to buses and cars and threatened punishment to those who do not follow their orders. They have also set off some bombs and machine-gunned buildings. A number of people have been killed in incidents linked to this unrest. Over 40,000 members of the security forces, including several thousand troops, will be patrolling the streets to make sure that while the Carnaval goes with a bang, it is the right kind of bang.
Cariocaphobia II
To irritate the Paulistanos even more, the alleged leader of the unrest in Rio, Luiz Fernando da Costa, has been flown from Rio to a prison in São Paulo state. This gangster, known popularly as "Fernandinho Beira Mar" (Seaside Freddy), is approaching legendary proportions thanks to his activities as a cocaine dealer in Brazil, Colombia and Paraguay.
All decent law-abiding folk will be glad that he is shut up in a maximum security jail and although the Paulistas will be annoyed at having to feed and look after him, they can, at least, have the satisfaction of knowing that for a Carioca like Beira Mar, having to pass the Carnaval in São Paulo must be a fate worse than death.
Beer Cheer
The Carnaval is big business and offers a perfect opportunity for companies to get great publicity at relatively low cost. For about three days there is virtually non-stop coverage of the event on television. Newspapers and magazines publish supplements and special issues. The beer and soft drinks companies, in particular, put enormous efforts into selling their products and publicizing their brand names. They pay out large sums to sponsor samba schools and Carnaval parades. Their brands and logos are everywhere.
Brahma beer hires a special spectator box at the Rio Carnaval and packs it with "celebrities". All the guests obligingly don tee shirts bearing the company's name and the media obligingly takes pictures in the belief that a group of grinning faces is somehow newsworthy. I recall once seeing four pages of photographs of this particular company's party in a magazine. Every photo had the company name plastered across the front of the subject. The advertising director must have been the happiest man in Brazil to gain so much publicity at so little cost.
Bom Carnaval!
Wherever you are bom carnaval, especialmente para os brasileiros no exterior.
John Fitzpatrick is a Scottish journalist who first visited Brazil in 1987 and has lived in São Paulo since 1995. He writes on politics and finance and runs his own company, Celtic Comunicações— www.celt.com.br, which specializes in editorial and translation services for Brazilian and foreign clients. You can reach him at jf@celt.com.br
© John Fitzpatrick 2003
You can also read John Fitzpatrick's articles in Infobrazil, at www.infobrazil.com