Nuns in hot pants, nuns in full habits and even nuns with bushy mustaches — the motley band of costumed revelers gathered to celebrate the first day of Carnival, joining one of the growing number of roving street bands that take over Rio de Janeiro during the five-day party.
The "nuns" are all followers of the Carmelitas, a group started in 1991 by friends who gathered for soccer and drinks just outside a convent of Carmelite nuns. Jokes about the sisters escaping to join the party gave rise to the band, which parades twice: at the beginning of Carnival, when the nuns supposedly escaped the convent join the fun, and on the last day, when they returned to their cloistered existence.
"We're keeping the tradition, remembering the first nuns who jumped the fence," said Eliete dos Santos, 25, who was out with five other costumed "sisters" as the partying began Friday.
While the public face of Rio's Carnival is the famed two-day parade of samba groups, which can each spend more than $5 million on extravagant costumes and floats, its heart lies in these roving groups of irreverently costumed, mostly inebriated partiers who create a free, open-to-all street Carnival. Their cavorting is likely to hit a fever pitch Saturday.
A revival over the past 10 to 15 years has given the roughly century-old tradition of street bands a new swagger. This year, 424 of them registered with the mayor's office. Countless others, some little more than a group of good friends with a band and some beers, don't even bother with the legalities.
About three weeks before Carnival's official kickoff, they start parading around town, tying up traffic and playing traditional tunes or their own, wacky theme songs composed to make fun of the year's news, politicians, celebrities, or anyone who strikes their fancy.
This being Carnival, there are only the loosest rules. Generally, they congregate on a street corner, a bar or a square. Once their following swells to a sufficiently animated band of revelers, they perform a short circuit around the neighborhood, drawing along the dancing masses.
Their names reflect their idiosyncrasies. Some carry monikers that point to their geographical origin in the city: "Suvaco de Cristo," literally translated as "The Armpit of Christ," is based in a neighborhood more or less underneath the outspread arms of Rio's Christ the Redeemer statue.
Many of these roving street bands go for laughs with impossible to translate names that make not-too-subtle references to two favored Carnival pursuits: making out and drinking. "Come with me, I'm easy," "I've stopped drinking, but I haven't stopped lying" and "Poke her and she'll jump," are among the tamer examples.
For the Carmelitas, nuns reign even though all are welcome. Marcelo Carvalho, 34, dressed as a protesting Egyptian in a tunic and sign saying "Down with the mummies" tried to talk some of them into a change of habit.
"Islam is where it's at," he told the costumed nuns. "After all the scandals, you can't shame the Catholic Church anymore. Try a new religion!"
The "Carmelitas" band entices thousands through the steep, cobble-stoned streets of Santa Teresa, one of Rio's most picturesque neighborhoods. Some bands call out to small but specific crowds.
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