Faking It

February 2009

We were in Brazil the week of carnival, which is celebrated differently in each part of the country. In Rio, there’s the samba parade; in Salvador, huge trucks with music performers on board cruise the streets followed by countless dancing foliões, as carnival revelers are called; in a city called Rosário in northern Brazil, the highlight is a contest where the best costumed donkey and cart win a highly coveted prize – a 21-inch TV. Canoa Quebrada didn’t have much of a carnival, but the neighboring town, Majorlandia, was the epicenter of all celebrations in the region: a stage was set up in the main area in town and throngs of foliões kept jumping to the sound of music. Now, I’m a rock & roll gal, samba is not my thing and, to be honest, those hopping foliões looked just like a bunch of deranged kangaroos to me…

But carnival always has its surprises – one night we were having dinner and heard a band further down the street playing not only samba, but several other Brazilian rhythms such as baião, forró, axé and frevo. They were playing very well and when we went to check them out, we found out that all band members were Scandinavian! Yet another Twilight Zone moment. Even more bizarre, there were half a dozen Scandinavian women dancing samba. I’ll say this upfront: I can’t dance samba; I can only fake it. And the Scandinavian gals were also faking it. But I have to admit - those milky white blond things were faking it better than I ever could…