Samba

Last night was the annual Samba Ottawa event at the park at the end of our street. Samba has its origins in Brazil, and of course Wikipedia can tell you far more about that than I can. My first experience with Samba was when I was living in Cologne, Germany in the early 90s. Cologne has a massive Karneval prior to Catholic Lent, just like Brazil does, so I would suppose this is the connection which brings Samba to Cologne. During the week of Karneval Samba bands roam the streets thumping their drums, playing their music, and competing to try to get the most number of people following them. At our annual even in Hintonburg, the Samba band plays stationary for a good while, then keeps the tradition alive by parading around the park once or twice, and then a short distance up the street.