JR 21

I am back in NYC, safe and sound, and just read this article in the NYTimes about three million people on Copacabana today for today’s last mass by Papa Francisco, as he is referred to in Brasil.  And how do three million people get to the beach?  They march.  I took this unsatisfying foto from the bus yesterday afternoon on the way to the airport.  But now imagine this group with green tshirts, yellow backpacks, and national flags–and they snake around the bay here– filling a major avenue for at least eight miles . . ..

. . . here emerging from one of the tunnels leading to the beach.

Back a week and a half ago, this is how the main stage looked, and

here–taken yesterday–Copacabana with each of the white triangles in the distance . . . a booth for folks staffing the large screens projecting the proceedings.  The main stage here is the cluster of white triangles to then right of the tallest building on the beach.  Click here for a Rio Times article with foto showing this same beach last night.  But . . .

here’s what was offshore.

More on these Brazilian naval vessels in a future post.

More Brazilian posts still to come . . . at least through the end of July.