April 5, 2025

What would you do for your wife? How much is too much? How much is too little? Is there anything you wouldn’t do? I forgot to mention your wife is pregnant. You are overflowing with love. Like many pregnant women your wife is having cravings. But she isn’t craving ice cream or pickles. She’s craving the tongue from an ox. Is there anything you wouldn’t do?

You’re a ranch hand and she wants to eat the tongue of the ranch’s most precious bull. Would you do it?

This is the story of Chico and his pregnant wife Catirina.

Chico sneaks into the field to kill the ranch owners most prized bull, slices off the bull’s tongue and serves it up to his wife as any loving husband would do. However, the bull is sacred, and the town is in uproar. Luckily, a native priest is able to resurrect the bull. The ranch hand is forgiven, and the entire community celebrates.

Each year in June the people of Parintins join together to retell that story a little wilder each year in the festival of Bumba Meu Boi (loosely translated “Beat my ox”) It is one of the largest annual festivals in Brazil only the Carnival festivities in Rio de Janeiro is bigger.

Two teams compete against each other in a 35,000-seat stadium built in Parintins specifically shaped like a bull’s head. Bio Garanpido, the red team, competes against Bio Caprichoso, the blue team in an all-out music, costume, float, dance battle that last three days. The competition is so fierce that the blue team refused to drink Coca-Cola because the can was red. Parintins is the only city in the world that also sells Coca-Cola in blue cans! When the competition begins the stadium is perfectly divvied between red and blue supporters only wearing their teams’ colors. As the winners of each event are judged by audience applause, opposing team supporters are deadly silent during each 2-hour presentation so as not to cheer for the other team.

Why is this festival so significant to the people of Parintins?

It originated in the 18th century. It is a form of social criticism. It reflects the plight of Brazilian lower-class communities that were left very little from the wealthy and forced to live dreadful lives. It was through these rough conditions that Bumba Meu Boi was born to bring joy to these deprived communities, as well as to provide men with an internal form of rebellion. These communities consisted of slaves and rural workers. So, from the start, Bumba Meu Boi was created from people of mixed origins. This is significant because it cuts the festival from any racial ties.

The festival is more than just entertainment. This is a story of how people make sense of the world around them. It is a story of love, loyalty and redemption that helped a community find connection. This is not a story about a stolen tongue. It’s a story about a promise kept; a vow honored that ends in 35,000 people dancing, drumming and like the bull rising from the dead.

Traditions often start as small acts of devotion but end up as celebrations of a promise made good. That is Bumba Meu Boi.

Chongae and I were privileged to be invited to a reenactment of the festival by the Bumba Meu Boi festival committee. Here are some photos and videos.

Thanks for traveling with us.