[guide.chat] new year around the world as it happened
- From: vanessa <qwerty1234567a@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "GUIDE CHAT" <guide.chat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 1 Jan 2013 12:59:42 -0000
very knowledgeable, here is how the world brought in the new year in time order
from new years eve to new years day, some are comical like put a grape in your
mouth on every chime of the clock to midnight.
Fireworks, party poppers and champagne at the ready.
New Year's Eve celebrations around the world: as it happened.
11.10 In Auckland the celebrations are well underway with Kiwis being serenaded
by "Legendary New Zealand funk rockers Supergroove" - no I haven't heard of
them either.
11.15 The Indian armed forces on Monday cancelled their New Year celebrations
while many hotels and bars scaled back parties in the wake of the gang-rape
which has shocked the nation.
The Indian army, air force and navy have decided to cancel all the parties
planned to welcome the new year. They want to dedicate the last day of the year
to the gang-rape victim," a senior defence ministry official told AFP.
In the capital, where the horrific crime took place on December 16, leading
private members' club Gymkhana, where top officials and ministers are often
seen, cancelled its party as did the Press Club in the capital.
The five-star Ashoka hotel in New Delhi also closed its popular nightclub,
while other bar owners were quoted in the media as saying they were scaling
back festivities.
A student prays during a vigil in Ahmedabad.
11.30 In Pakistan Rob Crilly, our correspondent reports, the celebrations are
being held amid tight security.
Pakistanis are sending their 2013 text message greetings several hours early
in case the country's mobile phone networks are turned off later to prevent
mobile phones being used to detonate bombs.
11.50 Celebrations are already underway in Sydney, where fireworks are lighting
up the city's skyline for the 9pm family show
Preparations for Myanmar's New Year celebrations.
11.56 People take part in the celebrations under the Harbour Bridge.
12.00 Special cause for celebration at Myanmar - or Burma to you and me - where
the country will see in the New Year with a grand fireworks display in a
celebration unprecedented in the former military-ruled country.
Thousands were expected to attend the celebration at a large field in Yangon
against the backdrop of the city's famed Shwedagon Pagoda, where the Myanmar
public will get its chance to do what much of the world does every New Year's
Eve.
12.05 Meanwhile Malcolm Moore, our Beijing correspondent, reminds us that the
Chinese New Year - when the Year of the Dragon gives way to the Year of the
Snake - takes place on February 9. Those who want to celebrate the western
calendar are having to dig deep with the city's finest restaurants offering
special menus at up to £150 a head.
12.31 Indian revellers celebrate in Amritsar.
12.40 Dancers take part in parade in Bali, Indonesia.
12.48 Take a brolly if you are seeing in the New Year outdoors in Britain
tonight. Forecasters are warning that the UK's celebrations will be dampened by
a continuation of the downpours that have soaked the country over the festive
season. Many parts of England, Wales and Scotland remain under flood alerts,
and some areas are expected to see as much as 33mm (1.3ins) of rain falling
today. However, the start of 2013 is set to bring better news, as the weeks of
heavy rain give way to cloud, dull skies and light showers.
13.04 Our Moscow correspondent, Tom Parftt, reports that Russian revellers are
expected to gather in Red Square, where there will be a firework display over
the Kremlin later. He writes: "In Moscow, where snow is falling as the
temperature hovers around -7C, shoppers are making their last desperate
purchases before rushing home to their families. New Year is a more important
event for Russians than Christmas - a low-key event marked on January 7
according to the pre-revolutionary Julian calendar - and gifts are put under a
tree on December 31st, just as they are in the West on December 25th."
13.19 Fireworks explode over Sydney Harbour as it turns midnight
13.29 2013 will ring in the changes in very different ways around the world.
Hung-over Russians will wake up to a "new and troubling reality" on New Year's
Day, when beer becomes classified as an alcoholic drink for the very first
time, reports Tom Parfitt in Moscow. Read the full story here.
13.30 Spectacular scenes across Sydney's famous Harbour.
13.05 Lasers light up the sky above Victoria harbour in Hong Kong.
14.30 Over on the other side of the Atlantic, there may be little for American
politicians to celebrate this year. Our correspondent Raf Sanchez reports:
"Washington DC is not famous for its night life at the best of times but this
year the city is in the shadow of the $600 billion fiscal cliff. As the rest of
the world is ringing in 2013, many on Capitol Hill will still be frantically
working to reach a deal. If we get a breakthrough then it's time to party like
it's 1999 (when Bill Clinton and the Republican Congress balanced the budget -
keep up). If there's no deal, then there's only time for a couple of grim beers
before we all go back to our desks in the morning."
15.10 Meanwhile, hundreds of people celebrate the traditional San Silvestre
Swim at the Mlagros beach in Tarragona, northeastern Spain
15.10 In Japan, Shinto priests leave the worship hall of Meji Shrine after a
ritual in preparation for the New Year. Some three million people are expected
to visit the shrine to pray for their health, happiness and property during the
first three days of 2013
16.34 Celebrations continue across Asia, with people gathering at Kuala
Lumpur's Petronas Towers to see in the new year.
16.34 Pictures are starting to come in from Hong Kong, where a huge firework
display in Victoria Harbour helped welcome 2013.
17.10 Fireworks are launched from the Taipei 101 building in Taiwan.
7:23PM GMT 31 Dec
Venezuela cancels celebrations as Hugo Chavez health flags
Britain expects washout New Year as flooding countinues
Record turnout expected for Hogmanay in Edinburgh
18.05 One person who will not be enjoying New Year's festivities tonight is
Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state. She is expected to spend New Year's
Eve in hospital after doctors discovered a blood clot linked to a concussion
she suffered this month.
As Raf Sanchez, our Washington correspondent, explains, blood clots are
sometimes linked to extensive air travel. In her four years as America's top
diplomat Mrs Clinton has kept up a punishing schedule, visiting 112 countries
and spending the equivalent of 86 days on her Boeing 757.
In 1998, while she was still First Lady, Mrs Clinton was admitted to hospital
with a blood clot behind her knee. She was treated with blood thinners but
later said the incident "was the most significant health scare I've ever had".
18.09 the Eastern Hemisphere is enjoying New Year's, Fireworks went off from
the Taipei 101 building early on Tuesday as the island country of Taiwan
welcomed the year 2013.
18.18 Fireworks over the Marina Bay in Singapore.
18.18 If you're Tunisian, don't count on celebrating New Year's with the same
vigour as others.
Sheikh Beshir Ben Hassine, a hardline preacher from the Salafist movement that
has achieved growing prominence since the Arab Spring, warned that the exchange
of New Year's greetings is un-Islamic.
Sharing the feast days of the infidel or even sending them greetings to mark
them is a big sin.
Wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy New Year is forbidden by Islam.
18.11 Venezuela has called off its public New Year's Eve festivities after the
government said cancer-stricken Hugo Chavez had taken a turn for the worse.
The streets of Caracas were quiet as amid news Chavez had developed "new
complications" from a respiratory infection after undergoing his fourth
cancer-related surgery on December 11 in Havana.
18.29 The countdown is on for India, although the festive mood in New Delhi has
been somewhat marred by the death of a young gang-rape victim.
Hotels, clubs and residents' associations in the Indian capital decided to
cancel planned festivities and asked people to light candles to express their
solidarity with the victim whose plight sparked public rallies for women's
safety.
"Let there be no New Year celebrations across the country. It will be a major
tribute to the departed soul," said Praveen Khandelwal, secretary-general of
the Confederation of All India Traders.
This picture from Mumbai, India, shows the lighting of an Old Man effigy which
symbolises burning the past and getting ready to start a happy New Year without
bad memories of the past:
19.00 Pakistan joins their traditional rivals India in the new year. The One
Pound Fish man, whose novelty song nearly hit #1 in the UK Christmas Charts
(well not quite), has a message for us all.
19.52 North Korea also joined in with the New Year festivities. A year ago the
reclusive country was in mourning over the death of its former leader, Kim Jong
Il. Today it celebrated the accession of its new leader, Kim Jong Un, and the
recent launch of a satellite into space by firing cannons in the capital
Pyongyang at midnight and putting on a fireworks display over the Taedong
River, the Associated Press reports.
19.55
Burmese people celebrate during the first ever public New Year countdown.
20.29
Fireworks start at the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.
20.31 Crowds are already building up along the banks of the River Thames in
central London for the ever-popular New Year fireworks display organised by
Boris Johnson, the Mayor. This will cap off a packed year of celebrations in
the capital, including the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations and the Olympic
Games.
The Metropolitan Police warns there will be long queues for public transport in
parts of central London after midnight as people head home, and revellers are
advised to avoid certain stations like Waterloo and Charing Cross if possible.
20.51 This New Year has been much better for Kenya's tourism industry than the
last one. A year ago resorts along the country's Indian Ocean were taking a
battering after Judith Tebbutt, a British social worker, was kidnapped from a
luxury resort by Somali pirates. A Frenchwoman living on Lamu island, 60 miles
south of Kenya's border with Somalia, had also been taken hostage.
Our correspondent Mike Pflanz is on Lamu tonight, and reports a very different
picture now: "The resort, a playground for European royalty and Hollywood
stars, was near empty then. Today, there is not a bed to free in the Swahili
village's smart private houses and boutique hotels.
"Locals - mostly Muslims whose wives and mothers are dressed in full hijab -
are gathered on the beach alongside Western tourists preparing to pop Champagne
corks. Dhow captains, waiters and hotel owners are again preparing to celebrate
a bumper festive season."
21:33 In downtown Dubai, the fireworks were centred aroung the Burj Khalifa,
the tallest building in the world.
The skyscraper is more than 828 metres high.
22.23 Hogmanay celebrations have kicked off in Edinburgh. Pete Irvine, artistic
director, says: "It's really, really busy here tonight - probably busier than
we've seen it in some time because the weather is so good.
"There's a moon in the sky, it's actually not cold and it's not raining.
"We've been very lucky with the weather and I think we are going to be very
lucky with the crowd and all the performances tonight on many stages."
22.50 Jim Kerr of Simple Minds, who are headlining Edinburgh's Concert in the
Gardens, tells BBC Reporting Scotland: "We have played some iconic gigs, like
Live Aid, but I think when they built Edinburgh, they built it with Hogmanay in
mind, because it's perfect for this kind of event."
22.58 Mayor of London gets ready to party.
23.10 Our Madrid correspondent Fiona Govan sends this from the Spanish capital:
"In Puerta del Sol, the square at the heart of Madrid, crowds have gathered in
the rain to celebrate New Year, peering from beneath their umbrellas at the
clock tower that will ring in 2013.
"In Spain the tradition is to place a grape in one's month on each of the
twelve chimes at midnight to ensure good luck for the New Year. People are
clutching their handfuls of grapes and their bottles of Cava in anticipation.
It's freezing...and wet."
23.14 Crowds gather on Westminster Bridge in London.
23.52 JONATHAN POW New Year's revellers in York, where the banks of the river
Ouse burst after today's heavy rain.
00.01 Big Ben and the London Eye in London just after midnight.
happy new to you and your family and friends, thinking of you as i always do.
from
Vanessa The Google Girl.
my skype name is rainbowstar123
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