Exactly two years ago Rio de Janeiro’s carnival and their majestic parades ended after a week of collective euphoria; a party that that same day went from joy to panic, when the first case of covid-19 was confirmed in Brazil and in Latin America.
Two years after the virus took the lives of some 650,000 people in the countryRio is optimistic and although this year will not have the traditional party in the streets by the pandemic, the parades of the Sambadrome are confirmedas well as a series of events that seek to bring back the joy of carnival.
“The worst is over”assured Luis Carlos Magalhaes, president of the Portela, which with 98 years since its foundation and with 22 titles behind it, is one of the most recognized samba schools of the Rio de Janeiro Special Group.
For Magalhaes, who also chairs the Independent League of Samba Schools (LIESA), organizer of the carnival parades, the hardest part was the uncertainty.
“Making a carnival is making commitments, it is concluding contracts and that the pandemic is complicated, “he said.
It has not been easy for the cariocassince a large part lives off the tourism that comes to Rio every year to enjoy what is considered the greatest open-air spectacle on the planet.
According to the National Confederation of Commerce (CNC), the losses for the sector due to the absence of the carnival last year were 4,412 million reais (865 million reais), 45.3% less than in 2020. A figure never seen before.
The small businesses and the invisible professionals who brighten up the party (artisans, designers, carpenters, welders, seamstresses and mechanics) have been the most affected, since most of them are low-income people whose livelihood depends on the carnival. Things, however, will start to turn around this year.
More parades and for all pockets
Postponed until April, after not being able to take place in the days before Ash Wednesday as is tradition, due to the pandemic, this year the city will have the official carnival parades, which will be between April 21 and 24 and a mini-show, which starts this Saturday night and ends the next day.
According to Magalhaes, people since January were in carnival “mode”as usual, and many people -especially in Brazil- had already planned for the party and even bought plane tickets and booked hotels to enjoy the show.
After the initial date of the party was postponed, the popular saying “if they give you lemons, make lemonade” was heeded.
Thus was born the Rio Carnivala mini parade in which the 12 samba schools of the Special Group will present the songs composed by each one of them to accompany their parades and that synthesize the theme chosen by each group for this year.
The ‘minifesta’, considered a kind of pre-carnivalwill be integrated into the city’s permanent activities agenda and from now on it can be enjoyed every year in Rio, according to the LIESA president.
With costs between 35 and 50 reais (between 7 and 10 dollars), much more accessible than those of the Sambadrome, which range between 100 and 4,000 reais (between 17 and 700 dollars), the ‘mini parade’ that will perform in the samba city It will be “a new attraction for the Carnival,” said Magalhaes.
The big difference this year is that of the traditional carnival, only the parades that take place “behind closed doors” will be enjoyedafter the “blocos” -the bands and comparsas that animate the party in the streets of the city- were suspended due to the restrictions of the pandemic, which require the complete vaccination schedule, something impossible to control in open spaces.
In 2020, more than 2.1 million tourists -of which nearly 500,000 foreigners- visited Rio during the party and left 9.74 billion reais to the city (about 1.909 million dollars, at current exchange rates), according to the merchants’ association, a record for the city in which Until then, the number of visitors had been increasing consecutively.
That year, the sambadrome gathered some 300,000 spectators in four days -a large part of them foreigners- but the greatest mobilization took place in the streets, with the parades of 450 blocos that were accompanied by more than 7 million people throughout the city.
For this 2022 the strategy is focused on the national public and although gains will be seen in relation to last year, they will be 33.7% below those of 2020.
Source: Eluniverso
Paul is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment and general news. He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established herself as a respected voice in the industry.
