{"id":1958,"date":"2016-02-11T16:59:58","date_gmt":"2016-02-11T22:59:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/?p=1958"},"modified":"2019-07-29T13:13:52","modified_gmt":"2019-07-29T18:13:52","slug":"carnival-in-the-interior-february-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/?p=1958","title":{"rendered":"Carnival in the Interior, February 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

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An earlier post on \u201cCarnival in Rio de Janeiro and the Interior\u201d describes some of the differences in celebration in Brazil.\u00a0 It can be read as a reflection on the celebration that is a preview of sorts for this photo description of a trip to two towns in the interior of Maranh\u00e3o \u2014 Mirinzal and Central do Maranh\u00e3o.<\/p>\n

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\"IMG_1693\" — The fastest route is a ferry across a bay from the island of S\u00e3o Lu\u00eds (the \u201cIsland of Love\u201d they like to say on the signs entering the city). The ferry is close to, or part of, the Port of Itaqui which serves as the shipping point for vast amounts of mineral ore by mining giant Val\u00e9.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0387\"$ <\/a>
This is \u201cCarnival\u201d \u2014 but in this settlement near Central do Maranh\u00e3o a community group dances the Tambor da Crioula much of the night. His shirt reads \u201cSon of Saint Benedict,\u201d the black saint revered in Tambor da Crioula, most black churches in Brazil, and often in the U. S. as \u201cSaint Ben\u2019s.\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0393\"$ <\/a>
Tambor da Crioula in the heritage way \u2014 men playing percussion while (only) women in wide, flowered skirts dance. The concession to popular entertainment is the wall of speakers behind the drummers. This guarantees that the rest of the village knows of the celebration. There are no known noise ordinances in rural Brazil.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0712\"$ <\/a>
The drummers for the \u201cBoi do Carnaval.\u201d This is an unusual celebration in Central do Maranh\u00e3o that blends the ox\/boi from the Bumba-meu-boi tradition with other celebrations. The sound truck amplifies the singer who came especially from another village to sing with the procession. From the Bumba-meu-boi group in Guimar\u00e3es, this cantador shares the special status of \u201cthe voice\u201d of the celebration.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0707\"$ <\/a>
As in the heritage Bumba-meu-boi celebration, the ox\/boi dances in the streets and is \u201cteased\u201d by young boys.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0784\"$ <\/a>
Later others join in taunting the ox<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0822\"$ <\/a>
No one actually seems to get hurt, but the horns are usually from a real bull<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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An interesting element that we had not expected was the importance of these massive speaker systems.\u00a0 Really huge ones are mounted on trailers.\u00a0 Smaller ones are mounted in the back of pick-up trucks or even in the hatchback of small cars.<\/p>\n
They are portable street parties and can mobilized crowd for a demonstration or street parade through town.\u00a0 They are not hampered by any noticeable noise pollution ordinances and may play all night.<\/p>\n
This one was across the street from our hotel \u2014 which was open to the street side.\u00a0 The sound was inescapable.\u00a0 The bass speakers shook the bed, and the mid-range speakers and tweeters rattled the glass.\u00a0 These are very sophisticated sonic devices and have become important to celebration in the interior.<\/p>\n
They were first seen in parades in large cities, but are now a commercial venture in their own right.<\/p>\n
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$\"IMG_0826\"$ <\/a>
In the town of Mirinzal a \u201cbloco\u201d marches along with a pared\u00e3o<\/em>, a wall of speakers that create a devastating sonic weapon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_0856\"$ <\/a>
The parad\u00e3o, or large wall, or speakers. This celebration had three of them, creating zones of totally chaotic sound waves that only young people full of beer seemed able to survive<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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$\"IMG_1719\"$ <\/a>
Last night this bus station was filled with huge walls of speakers (pared\u00e3os<\/em>). Today all that is left of the Carnival is the televised version of the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro. From Mirinzil it seems as far away as all the other fantasy television that is beamed to them in the telenovellas day after day<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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\u00a0 An earlier post on \u201cCarnival in Rio de Janeiro and the Interior\u201d describes some of the differences in celebration in Brazil.\u00a0 It can be read as a reflection on the celebration that is a preview of sorts for this photo description of a trip to two towns in the interior of Maranh\u00e3o \u2014 Mirinzal … Continue reading Carnival in the Interior, February 2016<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-folk-culture-and-spiritual-practice-in-maranhao-brazil"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1958"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2019,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1958\/revisions\/2019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}