CANBERRA:
With fireworks, dancing and late-night reverie, millions around the
world welcomed 2014 on Tuesday, gathering for huge displays of
jubilation and unity as the new year was arriving across 24 time zones.
In
Australia, fireworks sprayed from the sails of the Sydney Opera House
and the city's harbor bridge at midnight. Revelers in Dubai awaited what
was supposed to be the world's largest fireworks show.
In
Ukraine, anti-government protesters hoped to set their own record for
the most people to sing a national anthem at the same time.
Revelers
heading to New York City's Times Square could expect the annual ball
drop but no mayor this year. The new year was to be rung in by U.S.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor instead.
Closer to
the edge of the International Dateline, New Zealand bid farewell to 2013
with fireworks erupting from Auckland's Sky Tower as cheering crowds
danced in the streets of the South Pacific island nation's largest city.
Known
for glitz, glamor and over-the-top achievements like the world's
tallest tower, Dubai hoped to break another record by creating the
largest fireworks show ever.
Organizers planned to light
up the city's coastline with a flying falcon made out of fireworks that
would move across a massive man-made palm-shaped island alongside a
countdown in fireworks. Organizers say they will also create a burst of
light out of fireworks to imitate a sunrise and dazzle spectators with a
United Arab Emirates flag that could also break records for being the
largest ever made of fireworks.
The 6-minute extravaganza
will include 500,000 fireworks from 400 firing locations, all
synchronized by 100 computers from stations across the city, said
Barrett Wissman, co-chairman of IMG Artists that is managing the event.
Guinness World Record officials will be on hand to measure the scale of
the event.
Wissman said the display will cover 30 miles
(48 kilometers) of seafront. "It is really mind-blowing, the size of
this," he said.
In Sydney, organizers had expected to set
off 7 metric tons (7.7 U.S. tons) of pyrotechnics in 12 seconds. The
estimate appeared accurate.
"It filled up the whole sky," said Mona Rucek, a 28-year-old tourist from Munich, Germany.
In
Tokyo, five priests at the Zojoji temple used ropes to swing a wooden
pole against a large bell, sounding the first of 108 gongs to mark the
new year. Simultaneously, "2014" lit up in white lights on the modern
Tokyo Tower in the background.
Both Japanese and tourists
jammed the temple grounds for the traditional ceremony. Suburban
resident Juji Muto said he was curious to hear how the bell sounded. At
his age, the 75-year-old retiree said he wishes as every year for good
health in the new year.
China planned light shows at part
of the Great Wall near Beijing and at the Bund waterfront in Shanghai.
The city of Wuhan in central Hubei province called off its fireworks
show and banned fireworks downtown to avoid worsening its smog.
Pope
Francis used his year-end prayer service of thanksgiving to urge people
to ask themselves: Did they spend 2013 to further their own interests
or to help others?
In his homily, the pontiff asked people
to reflect if they used 2013 to make the places where they live more
livable and welcoming. Citing Rome as an example, Francis said the city
is full of tourists, but also refugees.
Britain planned to welcome 2014 with a mixture of futuristic fireworks, torch-lit tradition and worries about immigration.
The
United Kingdom is only one day away from lifting restrictions on
workers from Romania and Bulgaria, a prospect which has many on the
country's right worried. Britain's top-selling The Sun newspaper carried
a startling feature quoting Romanian bus passengers en route to London
as vowing to beg and steal their way across the country.
The
right-leaning Daily Mail reported that planes and buses from Romania to
the U.K. were "sold out" — a claim ridiculed by journalists who easily
found cheap flights online.
For people already in London, the New Year will give them the opportunity to literally taste the fireworks.
The
city's mayor — in conjunction with telecommunications company Vodafone —
said this year's explosive display would come packed with
peach-flavored snow, edible banana confetti and orange-scented bubbles,
allowing people to feast with more than just their eyes. The
multisensory display will also include scratch-and-sniff programs, LED
wristbands and fruit-flavored sweets.
At Berlin's
Brandenburg Gate, hundreds of thousands of people were starting to
assemble for what organizers say is one of the world's biggest outdoors
New Year's party, a traditional German gathering featuring jelly
doughnuts and sparkling wine.
More than 260 people had
been injured by firecracker blasts and celebratory gunfire in the
Philippines ahead of New Year's Eve celebrations.
Department
of Health spokesman Dr. Eric Tayag said he expected the number of
injuries to rise sharply as Filipinos commemorate the end of a year
marked by tragic disasters, including a Nov. 8 typhoon that left more
than 6,100 dead and nearly 1,800 missing.
"Many here are
welcoming the new year after losing their mothers, fathers, siblings and
children so you can imagine how it feels," said village chief Maria
Rosario Bactol of Anibong community in Tacloban, the city worst hit by
Typhoon Haiyan. "I tell them to face the reality, to move on and stand
up, but I know it will never be easy."
In Hong Kong,
pyrotechnics were fired near the Kowloon peninsula and from the tops of
seven skyscrapers. A British colonial-era canon was fired at midnight in
a tradition dating from the end of World War II.
New
Year's celebrations in Indonesia were widespread except in the city of
Banda Aceh where Islamic clerics prohibit Muslims from celebrating New
Year's Eve.
In New York City, outgoing Mayor Michael
Bloomberg, who hobnobbed with celebrities during past Times Square
celebrations, is sitting out this year's festivities to spend time with
family and friends. Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio will be sworn in at 12:01
a.m. Wednesday at his Brooklyn home.
Sotomayor, a New
York City native, will lead the final 60-second countdown and push the
ceremonial button to signal the descent of the Times Square New Year's
Eve ball in front of an estimated 1 million celebrants. (AP)
