Welcome to day 5 of Carnival, aka “the purge.”

This is not some kind of ancient Brazilian tradition by the way, but my nickname for Mardi Gras, Rio style.

Just picture it. By Fat Tuesday, people have been partying 24/24 for five days straight—plus pré-Carnaval weekends that started after Christmas. The must-have Carnaval accessory is a plastic cup with a crossbody lanyard, refilled on the go (on the bloco?) with copious amounts of beer, boozy cocktails and energy drinks. The streets have seen millions of revellers, food and drink vendors, floats, sound trucks and more. No one have been sleeping much. Garbage have been accumulating. It smells of pee everywhere.

Rio de Janeiro, cariocas and foreigners are basically a complete mess. Well, mostly the latter, lack of experience, of course.

On the last day of Carnival, anything goes.

There was almost no bloco on Monday, there was a ton on Tuesday. We skipped the one in Copacabana we could hear from the apartment and headed straight to Centro for a fun Carnaval-themed exploration of streets I normally wouldn’t wander in with Mark—or at all. There’s safety in numbers during Carnival!

We walked through Cinelândia, and along the main avenues. I went to check out the Catedral—no, it wasn’t designed by Oscar Niemeyer but by Edgar de Oliveira da Fonseca, who gave it a unique style based on Mayan pyramids. We ended up at the aqueduct and wandered around the streets of Lapa.

I explored Rio Centro many times before the pandemic (and during business hours…). It’s never been the cleanest or best area to stay but it was safe enough. I found it creepier and sadder than ever this time, with tons of people sleeping in the streets, crumbling buildings and a general feeling of desperation.

We moved on to Glória where a new major bloco was just starting at the Aterro do Flamengo. We crossed the huge park, bumping into other blocos, and ended up at the Praia do Flamengo.

Now what?

We needed a break and Mark was ODing on blocos. We went back to Copacabana, took a shower and figured out a plan for the evening.

The plan was to take as little as possible because it was going to be complete chaos. We left Mark at the apartment as well—“Have fun, guys!”—and went out partying with just a phone and some cash.

Yeah, don’t expect great pictures here.

Feng wanted to see Ipanema one last time—the Banda de Ipanema was playing again. Like, eventually. For now, it was just tons of people completely drunk, wandering around, looking for food and more booze, plus police everywhere.

“I see. All the police are here, protecting the rich… so none in Centro, I’m guessing?”

We took the subway and went to the Aterro do Flamengo bloco for a while, then walked to Centro, home of discarded Carnival costumes, drunk samba performers, and lost revellers. We crossed it all the way to the Museu do Amanhã to the sound of random fireworks.

At least, I think it was fireworks.

It was a hell of a Carnival.