RIO DE JANEIRO – Around this time last year, Rio de Janeiro’s main Carnival venue was a cauldron of glittering, scantily clad bodies packed together and swaying to the beat of the drums.
But last weekend the only trace of samba at the venue, the Sambódromo Parade Square, was a few melancholy verses that Hildemar Diniz, a composer and carnival lover named Monarco, strapped through his mask after being vaccinated on Covid19.
“There is great sadness,” said Mr. Diniz, 87, who was immaculately dressed in white. “But it’s important to save lives. People love to party, to dance, but this year we’re not getting around to it. “
In good times and bad, Rio de Janeiro’s famously boisterous carnival endures and often thrives when it gets particularly difficult.
People partied hard in 1919, during the war, hyperinflation, repressive military rule, runaway violence, and even the Spanish flu, when Carnival was considered one of the most decadent in history. Official calls to postpone it in 1892 and 1912 – due to a garbage collection crisis and to mourn the death of a statesman – were largely ignored when people in costume flocked to the streets.
This year is the only thing that weakly keeps the spirit of Carnival alive: online events by groups that traditionally put on extravagant street performances.
“It is very sad that Rio does not have a carnival,” said Daniel Soranz, the city’s health minister, last Saturday morning in the middle of the Sambodromo, when older residents were vaccinated under white tents. “This is a place to celebrate, to celebrate life.”
Gabriel Lins, a medical student who was among the dozen of vaccinees, remembered the two times he came to the sambodromo, a parade route flanked by 56,000-seat bleachers where samba schools put on elaborate, obsessively choreographed shows. He also misses the street festivals known as the blocos, which meander through virtually every neighborhood as thousands of drinks throw back, kiss strangers and dance in minimalist costumes.
“This is very, very strange for those of us who are used to Carnival,” said Mr Lins on a muggy, rainy morning. “Carnival brings us joy.”
Around him, after almost a year of fear and suffering, Brazilians were finally armed against the virus. “But today should also be a day of joy,” he said as people lined up for their recordings.
Marcilia Lopes, 85, a Portela Samba School facility that hasn’t missed a Carnival in decades, looked more relieved than happy after receiving her first dose of the China-made CoronaVac vaccine.
She was so scared of contracting the virus for the past year that she refused to leave home for anything. On her birthday, she asked her children not even to bother buying a cake – she didn’t feel like partying. So this year Ms. Lopes misses her beloved carnival, but stoically.
“I am at peace,” she said. “Lots of people suffer.”
As a second wave kicked in in the past few months, local officials across the country canceled traditional Carnival celebrations, which typically generate hundreds of millions of dollars in tourism revenues and tens of thousands of temporary jobs.
Rio de Janeiro officials had hoped they could hold Carnival by the end of this year if the cases fell as enough people would be vaccinated. Given the limited vaccine supply in Brazil, which this week forced Rio de Janeiro to suspend its vaccination campaign because it ran out of doses, that prospect now seems unlikely. New variants of the virus that scientists believe will accelerate the spread of infection are also adding to uncertainty, as are questions about the vaccine’s effectiveness.
Marcus Faustini, Rio de Janeiro’s culture minister, said there was no painful way to adapt the mega-party for this era of social distancing, painful as it is to get through the carnival season without the hype.
“There would be no point in holding this party at this point and taking the risk of causing a spate of cases,” he said. “The most important thing right now is to protect life.”
Cariocas, as the residents of Rio de Janeiro are called, are not known to be rule-hunters. That’s why the city has put together a task force of around 1,000 police officers tasked with roaming the streets and social media looking for carnival speakeasies.
While authorities have closed some underground gatherings and boat parties, the vast majority of traditional carnival party organizers appear to be obeying the rules. Maybe surprising there Some official restrictions on bars and beaches that have been overcrowded in recent days and where a city mask mandate is rarely enforced.
City officials expect hotels, which often sell out during Carnival, will see 40 percent occupancy this week. Popular tourist destinations, including the Christ the Redeemer and the Sugar Loaf, are open and receive hundreds of visitors every day.
Leo Szel, a singer and visual artist, mourns for a year without a carnival, which is particularly painful after months of mourning, isolation and gloomy news.
“For me, carnival means a break, like an autonomous temporary zone that is almost anarchic and where there is freedom,” he said.
While several popular street party groups have streamed recorded events in the past few days, Mr Szel said that he and his colleagues from Block Sereias da Guanabara, which is popular with LGBTQ revelers, have not raised money to produce an event online.
They are in the thousands who suffer financially from the loss of the street parties that have been planned for months and employ an army of choreographers, set designers, costume makers, performers and salespeople.
“It’s bleak,” said Valmir Moratelli, a documentary filmmaker who has recorded the latest carnivals hit by an economic downturn, waves of street crime and the city’s recently deceased evangelical mayor who cut funding for the samba parade little to hide his contempt for the days of hedonism.
“People are destitute, without costumes, miserable,” added Moratelli.
Mr Diniz, the composer, said that all of the pent-up frustrations and sadness Brazilians feel will fuel a carnival for the ages when it is safe to celebrate again.
“It’s so eagerly awaited,” he said. “People thirst for joy.”
Lis Moriconi contributed to the reporting.
