Get It Off Your Chest or a Samba for Obama

Carnaval is a few months off, but a bloco in Ipanema has already released their samba...and it's in honor of President-elect Obama. Of course, who else could it be? I suspect that 2009 is going to be a very interesting year for street carnaval in Rio; I'm anticipating many more songs, costumes, and Obama masks (those should sell like hotcakes!)...and Bush jokes, naturally! The samba starts with these words: Desem...Bush! É coqueluche, essa febre de Obama se alastrou no mundo inteiro, which translate more or less as "get it off your chest, it's all the rage, this Obama fever has caught around the world." I have to explain that the final syllable of the verb desembuche is pronounced, more or less, like bush. Get the pun?

I might have helped spread the infection; I've been wearing my Obama t-shirt since the primaries and now sport an Obama '08 button on my straw basket. My photos have been on MSNBC (this one taken on election night by an AP photographer) and UOL, the Brazilian news site from São Paulo.

Now all I have to think about is my costume for next February's celebrations, which will be post inauguration! I'll have a lot to sing about...we all will!!

Photo credit: Maria Ester Rabello. Thank you so much for this!