The euphoria broke out this Friday at the Sambadrome of Rio de Janeirowith the start of the first carnival parade, which with its self-confidence and fantasy promises to make us forget the two years of “darkness” due to the Covid-19at least for two nights.
Some 70,000 people rose to their feet as they entered the Imperatriz “escola” with its dazzling floats and its bedecked army of dancers who swayed their bodies in unison, visibly excited to reconnect with the public after the last carnival of 2020.
On the same catwalk that served as a vaccination center during the pandemic, princesses with feathers and wings, kings and queens with rotating crowns dragged attendees into a dreamlike world of samba.
“I didn’t think that (carnival) would go back to what it was before the pandemic. I didn’t believe in the return of this joy,” said Elisabet de Souza, while listening to the last instructions for her group of dancers before parading.
More than 660,000 people have died from Covid-19 in Brazil, a figure surpassed only by the United States.
Many Brazilians lost a loved one during the health crisis, exacerbated by long delays in the vaccine distribution campaign, which President Jair Bolsonaro, a skeptic of the disease, opposed.
They were “two years of much darkness in the world, each looking for himself”. Tonight “we have the chance to show that we are happy even with all the problems,” said Latino Suarez, 45.
“Brazil without carnival is not Brazil,” said this man who traveled from Sao Paulo to parade for the first time with the “escola” Imperatriz.
