Celebrations kick off as world rolls towards New Year
Hundreds of thousands of revellers watched fireworks burst over Sydney Harbour for New Year’s Eve, while in Japan thousands scaled Mount Fuji to catch the first glimpse of the sun in 2007.
Sydney, one of the world’s first major cities to see the dawn of the new year, held a preliminary children’s fireworks display at 9pm local time (10am Irish time), before the main event at midnight.
Organisers have promised the largest fireworks display ever seen over the harbour in celebration of the 75th anniversary of the iconic Harbour Bridge’s opening, which will take place in March 2007.
The bridge, described by the federal government as the world’s largest using steel-arch construction, will be a platform for some of the 100,000 pyrotechnic devices in today’s show.
“It’s going to be a big display,” said International Fireworks director Fortunato Foti.
Authorities expect a crowd of one million to gather at the waterside for the display and festivities, with media reporting some people staking their claims to the best vantage points before dawn.
In Japan, millions were expected to spend the evening in front of televisions, watching a hand-to-hand combat tournament that in recent years has secured a firm spot on the New Year’s Eve programming calendar.
The Japanese National Policy Agency said it anticipates the country’s major Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines will receive nearly 95 million visitors over the first three days of the new year, as people offer prayers for peace, health and prosperity in one of the few religious rites in which most Japanese regularly partake.
Many temples invited people to erase their pains and sins from the old year by ringing their bells at midnight.
Zojo-ji – a temple near the 1,092ft-tall Tokyo Tower – expected up to 10,000 people to gather for its countdown and bell-ringing event, temple priest Tatsuo Yoshida said, although only 432 will be allowed to ring its bell.
Japanese police also expected more than 15,000 people to go mountain climbing, some on the famed Mount Fuji, to greet the first dawn of the new year.
