By late Tuesday, the senses are already naturally overloaded. The packs of people stepping over one another. The aerosol cans of glitter and green foam that everyone assures you will come right out. The heat.
Like us or anything else that stays in the sun this long, it all molds together until you can't tell this thing from that one. But it's definitely all in there and when I hit it with a hammer, here's what I can tell you about Carnaval.
Mark says we're going to have brunch at his place and then walk to the bloco. The 11 am start time is pushed back to 12. We arrive around 1. Bread, deli meats and cheek kisses as folks keep strolling in. Irina gets out little tubes of paint and woah, she's really good at this. One guy's forearm becomes a snake. One guy's chest, a garden. One girl's bicep, a flag. My shoulder becomes Irina's face.
It's probably 95 degrees out and no one's phone works because there's 10,000 of us standing in front of the park. I try over and over to call Evan. Dani wants to hear the band, but the sound system on their truck is only good when you're beside it or in front of it. We're behind it. My phone's hot enough to start a campfire. I stand on a fence to try to see Evan. A husband sits his wife down beside us. She's not looking good.
Some people in the group need to pee, so we commandeer the traffic circle in front of the store to pass the time. One guy has two bells that he hits to no rhythm or melody and the Brazilians among us sing old Brazilian songs. We morph into a conga line. Out of everything, this story has the most variations depending on who tells it.
The Panthers lose the Super Bowl. One guy at our table has some North Carolina flags. Turns out we know a few of the same people from Raleigh.
There's probably another 10,000 people at this David Bowie-themed bloco. Women dance two stories up atop the truck and something about their swaying is dystopian like that nightclub early in the Matrix. I'm trying to find Tah and Emily and them and my phone is getting hotter. Men pee against any two pieces of structure that form a corner.
Night after night of sleeping on the covers. Our oscillating fan rattles away serving leftover air.
A mother walks by holding the hand of her four-year-old daughter. Tears pour down her little face.
We make it back to Mark's just beating the rain. His speakers are insanely loud. We jump around to Rihanna.
Five floors up, a couple holds out the window some watermelon-sized water balloons. Everyone goes wild. A group of guys lift their friend up and spread her out--one with each arm and leg kind of thing. The couple high up steady their outstretched arms. The balloon locks in over her exposed stomach and they let go. I think there's no way this isn't going to hurt.
A girl points at me as I scooch through the crowd and says, "You. Come here." I smile and wave her off, my wedding band hitting the sunlight. "No, no, no," she says, "YOU. Come here." Her friend holds out a joint. I use all my goodbyes and keep moving.
None of our usual pizza places are delivering. Dani falls asleep on the bed. Evan closes his eyes on the couch.
Even though I end up carrying one friend on my arm for twenty-some minutes, it's still one of the best parties I can remember.
The bloco ends at a giant square where a massive concert stage is about to awaken. The sun creeps past the skyscrapers around us. Centro is not where I want to be at almost any hour, but especially not this one. I'm the only person in the group looking around. I distract the homeless-looking guy trying to talk to us with some of my drink and work my way out of the crowd, up some old steps, to the next road. My cell is cooking and the stray cabs occasionally wandering this way keep getting snatched by parties further up the line. A small family huddles at the bus stop. Bodies of the less fortunate call it a night on mattresses of cardboard. I hit the taxi app on my phone. The music a few blocks away can't compete with the silence around me. I look down at my battery and hope it's got enough.
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