I see a bunch of eight-year-olds in pyjama, walking the street.
I see another group with hats, crowns and a box on their heads.
I am in Barcelona. It must be Carnival time.
I grew up in Spain, where Carnival, like in so many countries with Christian (and specially, Catholic) traditions, is a big deal. The tradition of Carnival builds on pre-Christian era rituals, but it became intertwined with the start of lent, as a brief interlude when ‘tot val / todo vale / anything goes’, before the supposed forty days of restraint (‘la Quaresma’).
“Per Carnaval, tot val” poster by Victor Bregante,
combining the popular Carnival phrase ‘everything goes’
with an invitation to respect each other
In places like Barcelona, it is classic to start Carnival by encouraging kids to do things ‘al revés’ (upside down). Schools propose small dressing transgressions that build up throughout the week until the formal launch of Carnival on Fat Thursday.
“On Monday, come to school with your socks over your trousers”.
“On Tuesday, come in pyjama”.
“On Wednesday, bring something over your head”, and so on.By Friday, once the King & Queen of Carnival have been introduced, it is the time to come up to school with a full costume.
These are simple things that make a huge difference to kids, as they are allowed to reimagine what’s normal or what is not. They could also make a difference to adults.
I had the opportunity to experience the Carnival in Rio, sitting at the Sambódromo for over eight hours to witness the most spectacular parade I have seen in my life. The funny thing is that I also experienced Carnival in São Paulo, and I had even more fun there: in Rio, I experienced ‘awe’. In Sao Paulo, I experienced simple joy and laughter, lots of laughter, as I compared notes with my new Brazilian friends and colleagues around our messy attire improvisations.
Within the Spanish context, in Barcelona, the tradition of Carnival is not grand and sophisticated as it is in Tenerife, Cádiz, Badajoz or Sitges. In my home city, Carnival is treated as ‘popular culture’ and it is about community involvement. Carnival is about celebrating your neighbourhoods and letting people take the stage, disguised in as well-crafted or messy concoctions as they may fancy.
It is many years since I was in last in Barcelona for Carnival, and I have enjoyed a lot spending time in the ‘barrios’ (neighbourhoods) as kids and adults took on the streets on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. One of my favourite ‘comparsas’ (Carnival group) has been a collection of Danish butter cookie boxes filled with sewing props (it is a classic item in most Spanish households: using empty metal cookie boxes to store your needles, ribbons, scissors and measuring tape).
On Ashes Wednesday (‘Dimecres de Cendra), Catalans take to the beaches and parks to bury the sardine (‘enterrament de la sardina’) and we may also see many Carnival widows, crying out loud as the Carnival King (Carnestoltes, in Catalonia) has died at the hands of la senyora Quaresma (Lady Lent) who has come to enforce the end of excess and the start of containment.
Today, in Spain and in countries with pre-lent traditions, is Carnival Tuesday (Dimarts de Carnaval) and cities like Sitges present their highlight parade, la Rua de l’Extermini (Extermination parade), a fastuous final display of excesses preceding the death and funeral of Carnestoltes tomorrow Wednesday.
I have missed quite a lot these traditions, and all the food surrounding them (coca de llardons, botifarra d’ou i truites on Fat Thursday).
On Fat Thursday, I chuckled as I overheard some tourists complaining that they had abandoned their luxurious cruise ship group in order to experience the ‘Arribo’ (the launch of Carnival). They expected a fastuous show, but instead, it consisted of just a small group of animators and a bunch of kids and teenagers in homemade disguise. I laughed. Yes, this parade was not a Barcelona international highlight (as it will be in Sitges tonight, or as it is in Rio or Tenerife) : it was an expression of Carnival as a grassroots festival, just a bit of fun and a bit of irreverence that placed the local neighbours at its heart, without much effort to translate it beyond those in the know, or those who are willing to love it.
Just place your socks over your trousers. Wear your pyjama outdoors. Have a little laugh, poke some fun at the powerful, eat your egg botifarra and make some mind space to cope with everything that is hard and constraining. We all need it.
