Brazil: Carnival! (videos)

Saturday, March 5 marks the start of carnival in Rio de Janeiro. It’s party time!

According to Wikipedia: The Carnival of Rio de Janeiro is the biggest carnival in the world, and the biggest popular party on the planet, according The Guinness Book of World Records 2010. The Rio de Janeiro Carnival is also considered the world’s most famous.

Carnival is celebrated all across Brazil and elsewhere in the world but surely is associated with the country of Brazil. Wikipedia explains:

Carnival is the most famous holiday in Brazil and has become an event of huge proportions. The country stops completely for almost a week and festivities are intense, day and night, mainly in coastal cities. The consumption of beer accounts for 80% of annual consumption and tourism receives 70% of annual visitors.

Euronews – Mar 5/2011

Dancing in the streets of Rio

The keys of the city have been handed over to King Momo – it must mean its carnival time in Rio de Janeiro. Youngsters got the party started as children from 17 samba schools paraded through the streets of the Brazilian beachside city. The schools work with 40,000 children from some of the poorest areas, teaching dancing but also art and other projects. The children threw themselves whole heartedly into Friday night’s show in front of a cheering public.

The people in Brazil go all out for this carnival. Check out some of the floats and the costumes in the following videos (narration in Portuguese):

Desfile – Rosas de Ouro – Parte 2 – Carnaval 2011

Desfile – Rosas de Ouro – Parte 5 – Carnaval 2011

Santa Catarina: 25 dead

At least 25 people have been killed when a truck collided head on with a bus. Police said the truck overturned coming around a curve in the highway in Brazil’s southern state of Santa Catarina early on Saturday. The truck then slide into the oncoming lane and slammed into a bus carrying nearly 50 people. The driver of the truck was killed along with two dozen on the bus. Another 17 were injured and taken to hospital. The truck was carying a load of wooden boards which were scattered across the road blocking traffic for several hours as authorities dealt with the accident. Local Santa Catarina officials have declared three days of mourning.

2016 Summer Olympics

Rio is the host city for these games to be held from August 5 to 21, 2016. This will be the first time the olympics are held in South America. Of special note for these games is that golf is going to be included, the first time since 1904 since it was dropped after the games in St. Louis that year.

Brazil: 5th largest economy?

Several papers are making this announcement however that remains to be confirmed. Most current sources of information like Wikipedia’s list of countries by GDP only have numbers from 2009 and they show Brazil ranked 8th in the world. However, things change and sometimes they change quickly. After all, the United States is currently listed as number one – yeah, like almost 3 times bigger than the number two spot – but pundits are making some wild or not so wild guesses that China could be overtaking her American counterpart in the next ten or fifteen years.

References

Wikipedia: Rio Carnival

Wikipedia: Brazilian Carnival

Wikipedia: Carnival

The Carnival of Rio de Janeiro is the biggest carnival in the world, and the biggest popular party on the planet, according The Guinness Book of World Records 2010. The Rio de Janeiro Carnival is also considered the world’s most famous.

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