It's Carnival, and this year seems like nothing out of the ordinary: blocos abound, lots of traffic accidents, men peeing everywhere, the fanfare of the Rio and São Paulo parades, rich and famous Brazilians and gringos flocking to the Sambodrome, massive crowds at Salvador's celebrations, and some of the nation's well-heeled fleeing the major cities for the long weekend. Then, this video surfaced a few days ago and quickly went viral:
The woman, a journalist named Rachel Sheherazade from João Pessoa, Paraíba, became a hit with her frank and critical take on Carnival, expressing frustration with the commercialization of the celebration and with public services that cater to drunken revelers but are in short supply the rest of the year. I was impressed with the video, since it's not too common to find an outspoken female commentator on TV in Brazil, especially talking about social issues or sensitive cultural issues.
Carnival can be surprisingly devisive; ask a Brazilian what he or she thinks about Carnival and you can get some interesting answers. Some don't like how everything stops, disrupting business, productivity and education. Others just don't like the excessiveness of the drinking and partying. It doesn't always divide down socioeconomic lines; like the video mentions, Carnival has become more and more expensive, and some of the wealthy and middle class simply go to different events, but still celebrate. Carnival may be one of the things Brazil is best known for, but it's not as universally beloved as you'd think.
This week has been full of interesting articles and events about Brazil, so here are a few I found.
Koni has opened in New York!
Well, not exactly Koni, but a definite cousin of the Rio cone restaurant fad. It's called K! Pizza Cone. (Read a review here) On Tuesday, I literally stumbled upon it and was so excited that I tried taking some pictures with my Blackberry, but they didn't come out so well. I know a few people who were interested in opening this kind of restaurant in New York, but it looks like someone beat them to it!
The NYT showcased a Brazilian photographer who took some really funky photos of blocos and street parties during Carnival in Rio. Rather than focusing on the glitz of the Sambadrome, he captured the heart of the party--and in black and white. It's worth checking out.
Seth Kugel strikes again with an interesting story about açaí in the Amazon and how the locals eat it raw without sugar or flavoring (he says, literally, that it tastes like dirt). In related news, we just found some frozen pulp at Whole Foods this week. Yum.
Lula is on a good will tour in Latin America, and his latest stop was in Cuba, where he met with the Castros and discussed trade, putting to rest any of the usual rumors that Fidel is no longer alive. Though the media reported jailed human rights dissidents had formally asked for Lula's aid, he denied any contact with them and never met with them. He did comment on the death of one of the dissidents, who died during a hunger strike.
This week, the Brazilian Senate approved a bilateral measure that would extend Brazilians' US visas to ten years, instead of five. This will also work the other way around, so Americans will get Brazilian visas that last ten years. It applies for tourist and work visas. Easier traveling for all!
The Secretariat for Women's Affairs wants the Devassa commercial with Paris Hilton pulled off the air, claiming it "devalues women" and is too sensual. Watch the video here and see for yourself, but other than being unbelievably stupid, the most offensive thing about it is that it in fact stars Paris Hilton.
I came across a couple of videos I wanted to share:
As I mentioned last week, the Rio governor made an interesting comment about Dilma while sharing a box with her and Madonna during Carnival, and it was apparently caught on camera, when he decided to give Joel Santana a run for his money. Given how much traveling he does and the amount of foreign dealings he has, I was honestly surprised.
Kibe Loco is always talking about Rebolation, and that seems to be a pop culture item I missed, so I looked it up. Turns out it's this type of club/rave dance to techno that became popular on the Internet, and then ended up as an axe song this past summer in Brazil.
And in case you missed it, here is the really creative Unidos da Tijuca, the samba school that came in first in Rio's Carnival competition this year.
"...Hours and hours of subversive American programming fill Cuba’s airwaves
each day, attracting millions of viewers on the island with shows like
“Desperate Housewives,” “Friends” and “Grey’s Anatomy.” How do they get
there? They’re broadcast by Cuba’s own communist government."
[Fascinating story about TV, movies, and media in Cuba]
"But perhaps the greatest impact will come down to the role and influence of the outgoing Brazilian leader.
President
Lula, having used his dominant position to get his candidate in place,
seems certain to exploit all his formidable political skills to ensure
that this was not a wasted effort."
[Overview of Dilma's life and career, and her upcoming run for president]
Yesterday, CNN had a small article attached to a photo gallery from Rio's Carnival where they referred to Rio de Janeiro as the capital of Brazil. (They also mentioned that the seven year-old sambista did dance in the parade with Viradouro, though she cried through part of it. Also, because of its overall performance, the samba school came in last place and was demoted to the second level of samba schools). I wrote about the mistake on Twitter, along with several others, and plenty of people left comments on CNN, and thankfully, they changed the error. But still.
In the last few weeks, quite a few gringo celebrities have made their way to Rio de Janeiro.
Beyonce was on tour in Brazil and did two shows in Rio, where she then took time out to shoot a video with Alicia Keys and visit Cristo. Sadly, the classiest celebrities were the first to leave.
After that, Madonna arrived to be with her boyfriend Jesus to attend Carnival. Maybe someone tipped her off that meeting with a presidential candidate during an election year is kind of, well, unkosher, since this time she made appearances with both major candidates, perhaps in an attempt to be impartial. She made a little trip to São Paulo to hang out with the Governor Serra to discuss setting up a branch of her NGO there, and then she spent a night at the Sambadrome hosted by the Rio governor and joined by Lula's chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff, who is also running for president. (She also brought two of her kids and Jesus along for the twelve hour bash).
Paris Hilton is also in Rio for Carnival, since she's being paid by Devassa beer to promote their brand. (I'm wondering if anyone told her what devassa means in Portuguese. I'd hope so, but assuming they did, it makes the whole affair even less tasteful). Meanwhile, at one of the sponsored events, she danced around ridiculously and got so drunk she basically couldn't stand up, giving a writer at Globo the opportunity to write one of the dumbest headlines of all time.
It's great that Brazil is attracting celebrities with Madonna and Beyonce's star power, and it will hopefully attract more celebrities along those lines in the near future, though hopefully not just for Carnival, and hopefully not just in Rio. The goal is for celebrities to take Brazil seriously, sort of like Beyonce did, as a (dignified) business opportunity, and not just a wild party. Because no good can come of this Paris Hilton business, not even a new hotel.
Addendum: Totally forgot but meant to include that Madonna decided to waltz out onto the avenida during Imperatriz's performance and created a huge scene and messed up their procession, which possibly made them lose points with the judges. Lovely.
And in a new detail thanks to Marina's tip, the governor of Rio, Sergio Cabral, supposed introduced Dilma as "the first female president of Brazil" to Madonna.
"After all the international furor the news stirred Brazilian 7-year-old
Júlia Lira will be the Carnaval Queen. A Rio judge has decided that the
little girl can parade and that she doesn't see anything wrong or
erotic about Júlia's participation."
[In the end, the Brazilian media has clearly avoided this story, which I find interesting, since usually they report on any stories about Brazil that garner lots of publicity abroad. It seemed intentional that the story was avoided.]
"Citing health reasons, the mayor has outlawed the sale of boiled corn
and freshly cooked foods like steak and shrimp on the sand. And for
still less obvious safety reasons, beachgoers are prohibited from
playing paddle ball or kicking a soccer ball near the water’s edge
between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Pets at the beach? Forget about it."
[Banning corn and churros but allowing mate? Public health is evidently not the real priority here. Plus, the real key to cleaning up Rio's beaches are better sewage control and better policing of petty crime, not policing vendors providing useful services and trying to make a living.]
"Quem é o advogado de 28 anos que venceu a mais célebre causa de direito de família dos últimos tempos – o caso Sean – e como ele viveu a maratona que antecedeu o embarque do menino para os Estados Unidos"
[A must read with amazing new details about the Goldman case from the fabulous and fearless Dorrit Harazim. Though it's essentially a glowing profile of Ricardo Zamariola, it also profiles the major players in the case and details the last few days of the case beautifully. This will hopefully be available in English soon on BSH]
Every year, there's at least one controversy surrounding Carnival in Rio, and sometimes it becomes a big international story. But I'm beginning to think that this year's samba school in question, Viradouro, purposely engages in controversy for publicity. If that's the idea, they're certainly getting tons of press, even if it's bad press. In 2008, they were at the center of a bitter legal battle to use a float made of fake dead bodies with a Hitler impersonator on top; they lost, and instead used a float protesting what they perceived as censorship.
This year's Viradouro controversy is that one of the head honchos at the Viradouro samba school has put his seven year-old daughter in a role normally reserved for fully grown women wearing just enough to cover their private parts. Not only that, the role of the rainha da bateria, the queen of the drum section, is usually held by a model, actress, or local celebrity.
The story exploded in the US news today, since the controversy has now become a legal issue and has landed at the illustrious Rio family court, which will decide if the girl is allowed to be in the Carnival parade. Meanwhile, the story hadn't made even a blip in the Brazilian press, but since it was all over the international news, it will probably be in the headlines today or tomorrow.
So here's my take.
First of all, before even touching on the story itself, we have to look at how the story is being portrayed in the American media. The big media outlets, as usual, resort to sensationalism and stereotypes, which is not new but nonetheless irritating. You'll notice that they tend to recycle each other's work, and as a result tend to focus on several themes, repeating the word "sexy" to describe the Carnival dancers and their dances as "sensual." They're also quick to point out that Brazil still has a problem of sexually exploited children.
That brings me to my first point, which is that American beauty pageants for children, in particular those for very young girls around 7 and under, are completely exploitative and in my opinion tend to sexualize little girls. It's truly ridiculous that a story like this would create such an outcry in one of the child pageant capitals of the world (though to be fair, Brazil is also really big on pageants, and Brazilians dominate the kiddie pageants in the Americas). To use those obnoxious stereotypes of the oversexed Brazilian women adds insult to injury.
The next point is that some argue that a child can't handle the very long hours, the physically difficult task of dancing, and the summer heat. What the American media failed to do was any background research on the matter. Every year there is a Carnival parade for children at the Sambadrome, when they all get dressed in costumes and dance and sing with kid's samba schools. I chaperoned one year, and while I agree the avenida is long and the weather is hot, the hundreds of kids who perform each year handle it just fine.
It seems the father thought it would be a cute idea to put a child in the role of the adult so that people would oo and ahh over how cute she is (because she's adorable), not to place her in the traditional role of a grown up samba dancer. That is, instead of using the usual beautiful model, he'd use a gap toothed kid to win over the judges. After all, Carnival is the time when the world stands on its head: black is white, rich is poor and up is down. So, in his logic, why not switch up Carnival itself by putting a little kid in the place of an adult?
That said, I understand the controversy. It is a little weird to see such a tiny girl doing some questionable moves, and her parents seem like the stage parent types (growing up as a dancer, I've met far too many). The question does arise, where do you draw the line?
But as far as the courts are concerned, unless the media stays on top of the story, there's a 50-50 chance the case will be expedited before Carnival, which starts next week. As we know all too well, the Rio courts, especially the family court where the case has landed, is very slow. So unless the samba school leadership decides against having the girl dance with them, it seems like a distinct possibility that she'll be performing for Carnival. If not, the school may have to bust out the censorship float again.
