By
Steve Muchoki
May 6th, 2024
The world gets excited when the enormous Rio Carnival seems near. Now, when less then a month is remaining to welcome worlds biggest carnival and festival, let us see what cryptocurrencies, and especially Bitcoin, have to do with it.
A renowned traditional samba school named Imperatriz Leopoldinense is going to perform during the 2019 ‘Carnaval do Rio de Janeiro’, where the school has chosen its theme on ‘Money.’ In the festival, which will begin from 2nd March to 9th March, the school will be featuring the story from the first metal coins and paper bills to modern day cryptocurrencies. The theme is named ‘Give Me Some Money.’
The intention behind choosing such a theme for the performance is to explain the bonding between human and money. The site of the samba school already shows some glimpses of the parade performance of the immense carnival. The school was established in 1956 and has been a famous winner in the competition of such performances during the carnival. However, since 2001 the school could not get the winning title. This time, having such an influential theme of money, including Bitcoin, the school strongly hopes to win.
The samba school gave details about their performance, saying:
“Our story is about money and its relationship with humans from their invention to the present time. It is, without a doubt, one of the most important instruments in the economic life of nations and people. Imagine what life would be without money. How could we buy and sell, receive and pay, stock up and save for the future, if it did not exist?”
From Ancient Coins To Digital Currency
The performance school will look at how money minting came to be during ancient times, also looking at the issuance of paper money in the 10th century in China.
From here, it goes on to portray the early day exchange relations that mainly involved the Indians. Another aspect that will be covered by the performance will be on the coins minted in Brazil during the early slave days.
The choreographers will draw attention to the saving and investing of money through bank deposits, financial instruments and other means. They will also highlight with humorous critique many of the socio-economic challenges of societies such as social divisions and income inequality that countries such as Brazil continue to face.
Imperatriz’s dancers will conclude their performance at the Rio Carnival with the topic of Bitcoin. “We’ll end the parade talking about a future already present through cryptocurrencies – a digital resource system designed to function as a medium of exchange,” the samba school says in the announcement, noting that a growing number of companies on a global scale have begun to use Bitcoin in the years since the creation of the cryptocurrency.
Brazil in the Money
While some people have pointed out the irony in Imperatriz Leopoldinense’s choice of theme given the seemingly financial difficulties that the carnival was experiencing, it does not hide the fact that Brazil, in general, has been rising to the world of digital currencies as of late. Its supreme court recently ruled giant bank Banco Santander from freezing out Bitcoin Max exchange account last year. And since then, more than 30 percent of Brazilians have shown interest in Bitcoin according to a study.