Have you ever went to any carnival events?

02/18/23 @john8670.  I've always loved street Carnaval, although you do have to keep your wits about you, and your wallet in your front pocket.  Here in Manaus it's pretty easy to find where the street bands are playing -- often, you just have to listen -- and the locations are searchable online, too.

Call me old fashioned (guilty as charged, I suppose), but when the escolas retreated off the streets and into to Samádromos, they pretty much lost me.  Part of that undoubtedly has to do with the fact that here, Carnaval generally falls in the middle of the rainy season, so an evening at the Samádromo practically guarantees getting soaked, probably several times, with little hope of escape and none of cover.

@john8670 l have been to a few of them from Recife and Olinda to Rio. My wife and l actually danced with a school at the Sambadrome in Rio. The schools have a deal where you can pay a fee and join them. You get a replica costume and you dance in a “special” group apart from the actual school. The guy leading the procession put us on the front row. After we finished he said “ you dance pretty good for an American”.

Not sure if that was a compliment or not. 😂

With all that being said, l really don’t care to go to another. Too many drunks and people urinating in the street. Lots of petty crime. I will just watch the highlights on YouTube.

Unfortunately, it is a part of Brazilian culture I do not connect with. Growing up in Brazil with my adopted Brazilian mother (Niteroi) I would do lots of teenage things across the river in Rio. At the time it was so adventurous (nightclubs, apartments, the unofficial expat cafe at Copacabana etc.) that Carnival was an unnecessary extra.

Later when I met my wife from Northern Brazil, I learned that Carnival was not something she believed in, and we passed it by for religious reasons.

Roddie in Retirement

@john8670 No! I have been coming to Brazil since I was 10 years old and I stayed in Niteroi (across the water from Rio). I live in Northeastern Brazil now.

Neither me nor my Brazilian wife have been to Carnival, it is against her religion.

Roddie in Retirement