In the "rainforest-cloaked sierra" on the edges of Rio de Janeiro, hot air balloon "fanatics" risk much to send "enormous kaleidoscopic creations into the skies", said The Guardian. Police helicopters fly overhead to shoot the balloons down and the balloon makers face three years in prison if caught.
The annual tradition was brought to Brazil from colonial Portugal, originally as part of festivities honouring Catholic saints. In the 1950s it "took roots" in the working-class suburbs around Rio de Janeiro, where its popularity persists despite it now being illegal.
The unauthorised manufacture, transportation and launching of hot air balloons was banned in 1998. There are genuine safety concerns behind the ban, not least the threat of fires or explosions caused by collisions with power lines. But the ban "has done little to curb the craze", added The Guardian. There are "hundreds, perhaps thousands" of crews competing for domination of the skies.
The "baloeiros", hot air balloon makers working in secret communities in Brazil's teeming favelas, "risk everything to create and fly their masterpieces", said Al Jazeera. But to the authorities the baloeiros are simply "delinquents". Taking part in the outlawed subculture means "evading government threats and bounty hunters".
In a nation riven by gang warfare, crime and corruption, it's easy to scapegoat a relatively powerless community, many of whom live in the country's underprivileged slums, said Danish filmmaker Sissel Morell Dargis, whose documentary "Balomania" premiered this year. "It's a symbolic act," she told Variety. "Everything about the balloons is so symbolic that even the repression becomes symbolic: it's an art form for people who don't have access to art, who don't have access in general." | 
