Rio's Carnival celebrates hedonism
Pastor Dale Morgan
Tuesday February 20, 3:08 PM Reuters
*Rio's Carnival celebrates hedonism *
By Elzio Barreto
RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - Brazil's Carnival has always been a hedonist
raucous affair and beauty queen Angela Bismarchi took it another step
further on Monday night when her only item of clothing, a small patch of
glitter, fell off mid-parade leaving her completely naked.
Bismarchi was the talk of the town on the second and final night of Rio
de Janeiro's centrepiece Carnival parades, where full nudity is
officially banned even though many outfits leave precious little to the
imagination.
The young woman, queen of the Porto da Pedra samba school, was briefly
left entirely naked but for a few feathers and some body paint when her
"tapasexo", a tiny piece of material topped with glitter, fell away.
But Bismarchi quickly conjured up a thong and carried on dancing, later
laughing off the incident with an old Brazilian saying: "A well prepared
woman is worth two."
The night's parades featured thousands of spectacularly dressed dancers
deliriously shaking and singing their way along the city's Sambadrome to
a ferocious rhythm of drums.
"It's a thrill. I enjoy the people, I enjoy the costumes," said French
movie star Vincent Cassel, on his third Brazilian Carnival, in one of
the Sambadrome's VIP boxes. "The party here is really beautiful."
Thirteen samba schools from poor neighbourhoods parade over two nights
to compete for the title of Carnival champion, and are judged on their
floats, music and dancing.
The floats on Monday night included huge animals and songs honouring
African voodoo culture, and others devoted to photography and sports.
Porto da Pedra's theme was the struggle of South Africa's blacks against
apartheid. It included a huge statue of anti-apartheid hero Nelson
Mandela, sections of people dressed as tigers and a float representing
police repression.
In a parade paying tribute to the art of photography, the Unidos da
Tijuca samba school brought images of the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of
Liberty and Egypt's Pyramids.
Floats with giant statues of African warrior queens and Egyptian
pharaohs, presented by the Salgueiro samba school, left clouds of
glitter in the air as they passed.
The last school to take centre stage will be one of Rio's most
traditional, the Beija Flor, at dawn on Tuesday.
This year's celebrations were held amid a surge in violence in Rio's
slums with dozens killed in police gunfights with drug traffickers and
turf battles between rival gangs.
The dead included a leader of the Salgueiro samba troupe, gunned down
with his wife in their car as they left the school's training ground
last week.
A government crackdown intensified in the days leading up to Carnival
with police occupying some of the city's slums, knows as favelas.
Banners along the Sambadrome had calls for peace emblazoned on them on
Monday night. Despite the violence, officials say about 700,000 tourists
descended on the city for Carnival.
(Additional reporting by Andrei Khalip)