The MPL victory celebration fused workers’ movement symbolism with personal euphoria.

Evidence

Mayara and the MPL, who had barely slept for weeks, absolutely lost their minds. They were delirious with victory. They drank, they cried, and they hugged each other tight. “We never gave up, we never gave up,” Mayara said as she embraced a longtime friend. They belted out protest slogans, some now a decade old, that had marked the history of their fight: “Ei MPL, qual é a sua missão? Abaixar a tarifa e fazer uma revolução!”—“Hey, MPL, what is your mission? To bring down fares and create a revolution!” Mayara called up Senator Eduardo Suplicy, a little bit tipsy, and sang “The Internationale,” the song of the international workers’ movement, to him over the phone. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 425

Categorization

• CANDY: Drunk activist sings the Internationale to a senator over the phone as a victory call — a vivid, telling scene in a short anecdote.