Sambadrome and Metropolitan Church

After we left the Christ the Redeemer Statue, we drove by the Sambadrome, where all the activities for the carnival in Rio take place. The Rio Carnival is said to be the largest in the world. Unlike New Orleans, the Carnival doesn't consist of street parades. Rather, all the activities take place within the Sambadrome outdoor arena. People gather there dressed up in costumes to view floats and celebrate before Lent begins. Various groups are responsible for the floats. In New Orleans, they're known as Krewes. In Rio, there are different classifications of groups, but they aren't called Krewes. They have the fancier groups and the less so, and are classified as divisions, according to Guilherme. He used the example of American college football, like Division 1, Division 2, etc. These groups decorate floats to display within the Sambadrome. The only street activities are street parties that happen within neighborhoods, with as many as two million people out on the streets every day. The Sambadrome was not open to the public at this time, and there were gates closing it off, so we didn't get really good pictures. I just snapped a few as we passed by, so I apologize for the poor quality but this was the best I could do.





After the Sambadrome, we drove around downtown and Guilherme pointed out some of the buildings, like the Opera House, the first synagogue in Rio, and the Petrobras building, home of Brazil's national oil company. 

But perhaps the most interesting sight we saw in downtown Rio was the Metropolitan Church. The church is dedicated to St. Sebastian, who is the patron saint of Rio de Janeiro. The Metropolitan Church is very unique architecturally: it is based on the Mayan architectural style of the pyramids. The opening at the base of the conifer shaped church is open air - no doors, people just walk in from outside. There are 4 stained glass windows and they are 210 feel tall from floor to ceiling. If you count standing room, the Cathedral holds 20,000 people. It's such an amazing building; I'll just let the pictures tell the rest of the story.





Looking up


Mass was taking place while we were there, so we got to enjoy some more beautiful Portuguese hymns. We also visited a nativity scene that was set off to one side, inside the church.



Outside of the church was a bell tower, and next to the bell tower was a replica of the Christ the Redeemer Statue. We've been seeing replicas of this statue all over town, obviously an important icon in Rio.



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