The articles written by the PÚBLICO Brasil team are written in the variant of the Portuguese language used in Brazil.
Free access: download the PÚBLICO Brasil application at Android or iOS.
Portuguese Ana Garcia, 44 years old, always told her closest friends that one day she would have a space to host a samba circle. Every time she brought it up, listeners gave her a huge discount. After all, what would a native Lusitanian, early childhood educator, who had never set foot in Brazil, do at the head of a place where batucada was the big star. Ana knew that she often spoke to the winds. But the idea was embedded in her mind.
While that dream was being nurtured, every Thursday, Ana had an obligatory stop at Cais do Sodré, right after leaving work. “This place doesn’t even exist anymore, but I used to go there every Thursday. Everything to listen to samba, taste Brazilian food, feed on the joy of that environment”, he remembers. It was years and years of the same routine. “I didn’t get tired. In fact, that samba, the people who attended there, only made me feel good”, he adds.
Four years ago, passing in front of a little-used club in Alfama, Ana thought: “Maybe the time has come to have my samba house”. He spent days and days thinking about that idea, until he found the courage, went to the local administration and proposed the deal: he would occupy the room at the top of the building, which had been empty for some time. To her surprise, the answer was positive. Ana was about to open Sambalfama, in the stronghold of Portuguese fado.
The first batucada Friday was a success. The following week, more people showed up. And so, Sambalfama started to make a name for itself. “But the reaction came”, highlights Ana. “Merchants in the region, representatives of some fado houses, began to complain about the movement, the noise, the music that caused excessive joy. There were many attacks. At first, he hit everyone, and that only provoked more attacks. One day, I decided not to respond to any provocation anymore. Everything calmed down and coexistence became more peaceful”, he reports.
Difficult path
When she looks back at the entire journey covered, the small but firm-spoken Portuguese woman says emphatically: “It was so worth having insisted on my dream, even though many didn’t believe it was possible to achieve it”. She adds: “Sometimes it has been a painful path, but most of the time it has been a good one. When we have an idea for growth, many obstacles will appear. It’s life.”
Ana makes a point of making it clear that she does not want to be labeled a samba night businesswoman. “I don’t want to be that person. I just want to have a space where people feel at home. And this is what actually happens at Sambalfama”, he points out. “We combine samba with feijoada two Saturdays a month. And, every Friday, we have our samba circle”, he adds.
The desire to maintain a very familiar atmosphere, as if it were an extension of the regulars’ home, means that Ana almost always maintains the same formation as the group that performs there. “It’s almost all family. Some samba dancers are children of the lady who makes the feijoada. This makes things easier. Everyone arrives, knows how to set up the stage, the sound, the lighting. They know how I like things”, he emphasizes.
The homemade recipe has been working. “We are standing firm, always with a well-attended house,” he says. But there is an additional concern to ensure that samba does not go out of tune: security. “Our house is frequented by many families with young children. They know every corner of the house and feel at ease, which allows mothers to have fun. That’s the difference I want to maintain. People need to feel good and safe in the places they choose to have fun”, he highlights.
Samba heals
Several artists passed through Sambalfama, but one band, in particular, knew how to use the space appropriately to jump into the public’s lap: Grupo Gira, made up only of women. The audience that started to follow them became so large that they had to move to a larger location. “They are very talented artists”, highlights Ana. The house also provided a stage for Karla da Silva, one of the most sought-after Brazilian singers in Portugal. “But she has a very busy schedule, with several presentations across Europe. There was no way to stay in the house”, he adds.
Ana likes to remember what she calls the new beginning of Sambalfama. I had barely opened the house when the new coronavirus pandemic hit. It was almost a year with the house closed. But February 2021 arrived and, with the pandemic situation more under control, she decided to promote a carnival. “We invited a samba school from Sesimbra, Carvalho em Pé, and there were three days of lots of samba. We went out through the streets of the neighborhood, people joined us, as they were thirsty for fun. It was beautiful,” he says.
Carnival, by the way, entered the Sambalfama fixed calendar. “I know very well what people felt at that carnival, after so much suffering. We know that, in their personal lives, everyone has problems, they have bad days. This happens to me”, he points out. “But it’s incredible, when I arrive at the samba house, I stay in my corner, observing the environment and, suddenly, the problems disappear. Joy takes me. I don’t know how to explain what happens, but it’s an indescribable energy. I can say, with all sincerity, that samba heals”, he says.
Ana still dreams of visiting Brazil. “That time will come,” he says. For now, she is convincing the people who attend Sambalfama that that house, so full of the Brazilian style of being, stems from the desire of a Portuguese woman who dared to enter the heart of fado and show that, in music, there are no barriers, that everyone the sounds complement each other. “Art should always bring people together, never push people away”, he concludes.
