On Wednesday, when I arrived, Salvador looked like, well, Salvador.
I went to the Elevator Lacerda, and then I watched the sunset seated on what should have been grass but was grass burned under the sun at the back of Barra’s famous lighthouse.
When I came down the hill, the whole neighbourhood was bustling about.
This alone was unusual enough because Bahia is a corner of Brazil where people never rush—it’s just too hot and nothing is that important, after all. Besides, at 6:30 p.m., people are more likely to eat a moqueca de peixe than to be hard at work. Mind you, at 10 a.m. or 2 p.m. as well.
“I guess it’s starting,” I muttered to myself, almost reverently, admiring the endless row of grey portable toilets that weren’t there an hour earlier, the endless row of red Brahma coolers along the side, and the endless row of beer pallets on the sidewalk.
The next day, Barra and beyond were boarded up.
Then dozens of electrician teams came to remove the street signs and rewire the whole street light system.
“Why street signs?” a friend asked. “They’re afraid people will climb on them?”
“Because otherwise the trios elétricos, the sound trucks and floats, can’t get through,” I texted back.
I can’t even say it happened overnight—as far as I’m concerned, it happened in 48 hours, but the brainstorming and planning probably started 12 months ago.
Carnival is coming, and Salvador never stops thinking about Carnival because it throws one of the biggest parties on earth.
I only realized I would hit pré-Carnaval—Carnival before Carnival—in Salvador after booking my Airbnb. It was an accident, really, because I have other plans for Carnival.
“You’re gonna be there the weekend before Carnival?” Feng laughed. “It’s gonna be crazy. Remember, with Mark?”
“That was pré-Carnaval? Oh, shit.”
I did remember millions of people in the streets and thinking I would never do the actual Carnaval in Salvador because just pré-Carnival was absolutely insane.
“I guess I will pré-Carnaval in Salvador then.”
I kind of knew what I was getting into but not really. I checked the program on Friday—Fuzuê on Saturday, Furdunço on Sunday.
“Whatever that is,” I sighed.
Whatever that is, the events require the city to be boarded up and supplied with millions of beer cans.
Wish me luck, I’ll be right in the eye of the storm.
