Welcome to Carnaval in Salvador, Brasil

Tomorrow is the first day of the Carnaval. And we will be spending it here in Salvador! Before we go more into the whole Carnaval thing, this is what we have been doing the last couple of days;

After a good first day in Salvador, with salsa and samba and strong Caipirinhas, we had the next days ahead planned in order to see as much as possible before the Carnaval starts. On Saturday, 14th Febryary, and also Valentines Day, we went to the favelas with our new friend Cintia, who is from Salvador herself. We went by car, so there was no danger for us inside the favelas (favelas are poor areas where people live in very scarce conditions). The trip continued along the peninsula of Salvador and we got to see the beautiful beaches, the Bonfim Church and other sites of Salvador. After the little trip, we went home to get ready for something called the Candomblé, which was celebrated at a house in the favela, and performed by some friends of our guide Cintia. Candomblé is an African-originated religion, mostly practiced in Brasil, and originated in Salvador where we are now. We didn´t really understand the whole ceremony, but is was somewhat similar to a conformation of the Christian religion. There where ladies dressed in white dresses from this region, and they where dancing and singing to the drumsound of the holy drums. Several cleancing rituals where performed during the Candomblé and the person they where doing it for where given a name by the Gods. Somethins like that. Unfortunately, it was not appropriate to take picures.

On Sunday we to a beautiful place a bit north of Salvador called Praia do Forte. Here we visited a eco-preservation called Tamar, which preserved endangered seaturtles. From here we went to a beach a bit closer to Salvador, called Guarajuba. It was a paradise! Kristine also got the opportunity to try the local dish by the name Moqueca. This was a kind of seafood stew cooked with palm oil, where you could choose the different ingredients. It came with many additional types of food, all of them having a special taste of an unknown spice. She said it tasted good.

On Monday we decided to go for a little trip of our own. We took the local bus (very fast and VERY bumpy). We tried to find one of the beaches we had passed on Saturday, but we didn´t have any luck with us. Instead we walked for 2 hours on the beaches of Salvador, getting a wicked tan! It was beutiful, but sometimes very dirty and smelly. We kept on going and reached home at one point.



Tuesday was a wonderful day! We went on a boatride to visit two islands outside Salvador. The boat was nice, served Caipirinhas and fruits, and had people playing samba music. Here we got to know a very kind and nice fellow by the name Eduardo. He is from the south of Brasil, from Curitiba, and he taught us lots of interesting things about Brasil, Brasilians and Portugese. We met up with him after the trip and had dinner and some drinks. Unfortunately, he failed to meet us at the scheduled time the day after, probably due to having over slept! Haha, nice Eduardo(Your punishment is this picture of you on the blog hehe)! We will try to visit him when we go down south in Brasil.

The first island, Ilha dos Frades, was very remote and had very few inhabitants. The second island, the biggest in the bay of Salvador, called Itaparica, was nice and had a good beach. We had to go ashore by another boad, so we and Eduardo decided to just jump off the boat and swim to land. The water was so warm and later we found ourselves just lying in the water in order to stay warm. Thank you, Eduardo, for making the trip even better! Hope you got on your way to Paraty.


So... The Carnaval. There are several important words connected to the Carnaval and important to know in order to understand anything. Just so that you back home have a chance to understand the size of this party, there will be about 2 million people participating, and 400 000 will be a part of the 250 blocos. The blocos are groups of some sort belonging to a Trio Eletrico. This is a huge bus/vehicule constiting of speakers, dancers and artists. In order to belong to a bloco and walking around the belonging Trio Eletrico, you have to wear a shirt, called Abadá, designed especially for that specific bloco. We have bought two different Abadás in order to be able to be in two different blocos, one on Thursday and one on Saturday. People who are not in blocos are either in the Camarotes (huge, fancy VIP sections constructed by the road for the participants to have a good view of the passing people of the Carnaval) or just jumping around outside the blocos (often called pipocas, like popcorn jumping up and down in the streets).
The Carnaval is all about music, the artists, the people and most of all; having fun! We are very excited about what the Carnavals will be like, and we have a feeling we will be surprised by the size of the whole thing. As the next few days will be quite busy (the Carnaval starts tomorrow 19th February and ends sometime during 25th February), we will write about all our encounters and experiences during the biggest party of the year when we have gotten the chance to recuperate. Remember to stay safe, don´t carry large amounts of money, don´t put anything in your pockets and don´t wear skirts (as hands will be up them). I know we will!