Tsunami-hit Asia marks a subdued New Year's Eve
The new year got off to a subdued start around disaster-ravaged Asia, where prayers frequently substituted for parties.
Even in places where fireworks displays went on as planned, officials made appeals for donations to the massive relief effort in the wake of the quake-tsunami tragedy that killed more than 120,000 people.
Sydney, Australia, which throws its biggest party of the year each December 31, said it was too late to cancel festivities that include big-ticket bashes around its glittering harbour and multimillion-pound firework shows from the Harbour Bridge.
Instead, many of the estimated one million revellers marked a moment of silence for the disaster victims three hours before the fireworks started, and aid agency Oxfam said donations had surpassed its expectations.
“The tsunami is on the back of everyone’s minds,” British tourist Mark Stiles said. “You could tell people were a little more reverent tonight; it was kept in people’s thoughts.”
In many places, people were too busy counting the dead, feeding survivors and combating the spread of disease to even think about partying.
In Indonesia, most government agencies cancelled fireworks displays and urged people to pray instead. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, in his annual year-end address to the nation, said now was not the time to celebrate.
“Let’s welcome the New Year without a party because now we are filled with concern and sadness,” Yudhoyono said. ”We are still mourning. Let’s pray together and hopefully God will not give us another disaster.”
In Thailand, parties were scrapped across the country at the government’s urging.
On tsunami-ravaged Phuket island, tourists and bar owners were not sure how to spend the evening.
“Too many people died here. I cannot celebrate New Year,” said German Rene Vander Veen.
Herve Boyomo, a Cameroon, arrived from Beijing to look for his sister.
Asked what he would do on New Year’s Eve, he replied: ”Stay in the hotel and pray, that’s all.”
A countdown party in Bangkok, which was to have featured Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and glamorous tennis stars Maria Sharapova and Venus Williams, was cancelled. Officials urged people to attend religious services instead.
But a group of Western tourists who survived the tsunami that battered India’s remote Andaman and Nicobar region decided to stay and celebrate the New Year in the exotic archipelago.
China Central Television cancelled its live New Year’s Eve gala programming out of respect for the disaster victims.
Hundreds of thousands of Malaysians flocked to mosques, temples and churches for special prayers. Government officials in the mostly Muslim country banned firework displays and cancelled public concerts and celebrations as a sign of mourning .
The Islamic sultanate of Brunei also scrapped New Year’s Eve festivities and held prayers at mosques.
Hotels and clubs in most Indian cities, except those in Madras, the capital of the southern Tamil Nadu state where tsunamis claimed more than 6,000 lives, were going ahead with their celebrations, although some toned down programmes and others decided to donate part of the money raised for relief work.
Paris draped small black strips of cloth along the Champs-Elysees today in a gesture of solidarity with victims.
Just like every other year, thousands of New Year’s revellers were set to descend on the famed Paris avenue. But Parisians said this year, the celebration was going to be a bit more muted.
“Our hearts will be in it a little less this year, when we think about all the victims,” said Marie-Caroline Lagache, 34. “It’s going to be a New Year’s Eve that’s a bit more lifeless.”
She acknowledged that the cottony, scarf-like strips were hard to notice, but “it’s done out of a good intention.”
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