Revellers dressed as cavemen, Arab dancers, pirates and a host of other characters took over downtown Rio de Janeiro's main avenue yesterday as the world's biggest street party lurched into full swing.
Tens of thousands of people jammed the elegant Avenida Rio Branco for a street party led by the Bloco Cordao da Bola Preta, one of the many social clubs whose celebrations form the heart of Rio's Carnival.
The road ran with beer and urine as people danced en masse to the samba beat of a band playing atop a truck. Many people had awakened with hangovers after Friday night's parties - or had not gone to bed at all.
The five-day Carnival, a blend of traditions from Portuguese colonists and African slaves, is Brazil's most important celebration and is famed the world over for the extravagant parades by top samba groups and scantily clad mulatta dancing queens.
But its true spirit is found in the street parties in which anyone can join, though preferably wearing a silly hat and clutching a liquid refreshment.
"Happiness, beer and women," said Udo, a 30-year-old administrator, when asked to sum up the significance of carnival.
He and a group of friends were dressed in leopard-print cavemen outfits, stopping now and then to shake their clubs and leap in the air. He planned to be on the streets till the end, he said.
Ana Paula, a 31-one-year-old seamstress, and her friends were dressed as Minnie Mouse in spotted dresses and mouse ears.
"Well, we've just come from a Minnie Mouse party," she said.
For her, "Carnival is a way to celebrate our city, our country, our culture."
The extravagance and joyfulness of Brazil's Carnival often belie the grim realities of life in Latin America's largest country, which suffers from a huge gap between rich and poor and rampant criminality and violence, not least in Rio itself.
But under President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's government, the country has enjoyed an economic boom that has created more jobs and eased poverty.
Rio though remains afflicted by violence largely related to drug trafficking in the slums, or favelas. About 9,500 police were on duty in the streets and security officials have pledged to guarantee a peaceful Carnival despite an ongoing crisis in the force over pay and conditions.
Meanwhile a samba group that was banned from presenting a Holocaust tableau in its parade said it would change its display to a protest for freedom of expression.
Viradouro planned to feature a pile of model dead bodies on a float with a Hitler figure standing over them when it marched in the Sambadrome stadium tonight.
A judge barred the display on Thursday after Jewish groups petitioned that it was inappropriate to commemorate the genocide of the Jews by Nazi Germany in a festive parade featuring semi-naked dancers.
In reaction, Viradouro called the move intolerant and an act of artistic censorship. Other parts of the parade would highlight the suffering of Brazil's Indians and African slaves, it said.