My friend Noadia has a birthday coming up and I wanted to do something a little different for her birthday, so I got two tickets for the opera. "The Marriage of Figaro" was playing as the first opera of the season at the Theatro Municipal...and she'd never been.
I nearly had an anxiety attack, such was my desire to have everything perfect for tonight. First, because it rained, taking away all possibility of taking a bus or taxi (traffic in this city is ridiculous when there's the slightest bit of rain)...because we ran more than a half an hour late...because the bus that took us to the metro station tried to bypass the station all together...and because we arrived fifteen minutes after the printed performance time. But this is Rio de Janeiro, and thankfully, we weren't the last people arriving. So once I caught my breath, I was able to enjoy the show...
My friend was beautiful to see, totally enraptured by what was going on...she didn't ask me any questions, she later admitted, because she was too afraid to miss what was going on on the supertitles and be completely lost for the rest of the night! But there was a huge grin on her face and she laughed and caught her breath and sat open-jawed at all the right moments...and was the first person to rise when the curtain went down...
She also paid WAY more attention than I even did...and I had to explain about harpsichords and prima notte and got to feel sheepish when she remembered the names of some of the minor characters better than I did. Two things are for certain. One, it was a lovely night, and we both enjoyed ourselves immensely. And the second? Opera is just like a novella!
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