How do you celebrate the New Year ?

usually cussing under my breath at my noisy neighbors

Midnight fireworks on the harbour, viewed from the beach with friends And lots of hugs and Happy-New-Year! ing.

Also there's picnics.

Well this is Britain so the pub is usually involved As Billy Connelly once said, Hogmanay is like Christmas only with any religion around to knacker up the proceedings.

If not the pub, then a party.

So anyway, usually there will be themed fancy dress, and a band/disco, and a bagpipe player (have no fear Amazing Grace WILL be played) and Auld Lang Syne at the appropriate point. Then everyone kisses everyone else with varying shades of enthusiasm. Someone will have arranged for the first-footer (visitor) to be a dark haired man carrying coal. We watch the council fireworks.

Then...actually then the pub stays open till 3am and everyone goes home knackered but happy.

ETA: Not this year though because I have to bloody well work! The shame! Will be home just in time for midnight, so will watch Trafalgar Square shenanigans on telly

I thought the first footer was supposed to bring booze. Is the coal just because it's fuel, fuel for the hearth? I'm only vaguely aware of first footing but I always liked the idea.

And not because of booze, either.

Large glass. Massive bottle. At around midnight, ignore glass, focus on bottle. Happy New Year.

I think live bands in pubs/bars are popular here... often there are music festivals or concerts available and usually each town has an event on for the kids that will have live music and comedians on stage and fireworks and possibly carnival rides and things as well. They will often make a big fuss over the fact that we are one of the first countries to tick over into the New Year when they do the countdown.

I don't really have a personal tradition... my favorite New Years so far was a bunch of friends having a bonfire on the beach. Drinking is often involved. This year I expect I'll be watching a countdown on TV and trying to come up with something witty to put on Facebook.

One year I had some friends visiting from Boston and I took them to see a live band in an Irish pub... pretty much because we couldn't get in anywhere else.
At the stroke of midnight in Kiwiland, in an Irish pub, what do you think the band started playing?
Sweet Home Alabama.

Global citizens?

I don't remember where this is from, but I like to observe a custom of not taking anything outside on New Year's day, not even trash, but instead, bringing things in. I sometimes even do a little ritual of putting money outside the door so I can then bring it inside.

This is meant to establish a trend I suppose but I can't say it has ever worked noticeably.

But the idea of marking the first day by doing things you want to do and experience more of during the year feels nice.

FIL goes to bed at 10 pm so Mr. Putt and I whisper the countdown to each other very, very quietly. And then the next day we go back to our own place in Oxford, so yaaaay!

Kylabelle said:

I thought the first footer was supposed to bring booze. Is the coal just because it's fuel, fuel for the hearth? I'm only vaguely aware of first footing but I always liked the idea.

And not because of booze, either.

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I think that's it yes -- coal = warmth or something

I'm not sure booze would be turned down

JadeRisley said:

Listening outside my window at others celebrating I'm isolated and never been to a new years party sadly

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Well, most of them are not all that such of a much, unless you enjoy getting blind drunk. In my mostly misspent youth, I lived for a brief time in Baltimore, and we always had to go bar-hopping every New Years Eve - which meant visiting maybe 10 or 12 different little working class bars, each of which laid on a spread of some kind of food, and we had to have drinks at each one, and then we got really really sick and lost a couple of days.

meh.

I'm sure there will be folks hanging out online here, probably including me, so there's likely to be some company that way.

Mr Flibble said:

I think that's it yes -- coal = warmth or something

I'm not sure booze would be turned down

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My friend who lived in Scotland for a while said the first footers always brought a bottle of Scotch. I was oohing over the custom and she was deflating my delight. "Buncha drunks" was her message.

Oh well.

But I think the hearth fire was let go out, and the first footer brought the fuel for the new year, maybe? In the tradition....

Kylabelle said:

My friend who lived in Scotland for a while said the first footers always brought a bottle of Scotch.

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What she probably meant to say was "the Scots always bring a bottle of whisky" (I keed I keed). Different places have different things to bring in, or sometimes the footer will bring a selection.

Down here it's always coal for some reason. Not sure why -- it's usually warm enough that my roses are still in bloom at New Year *checks* Yup, still got a few roses.

Cella said:

usually cussing under my breath at my noisy neighbors

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Come to Uganda. The next time someone talks about sleepy African villages I'm going to laaaaaaaaaaaugh.

I live in a pretty cosmopolitan area, so last night was mostly thumpy afropop music spilling over from the local outdoor concerts with a bunch of cheering at midnight. My guess is the New Year isn't that big a deal deeper in the villages since most people had their family get togethers and huge meals at Christmas.


ETA: Regarding fireworks, I lived in Iowa until I was 30, where it is commonly -20 C that time of year. My first New Years in Mississippi, where it was 10 C on New Years Eve, the sky suddenly lights up at midnight and I freaked out for a few seconds.

My personal tradition is a New Years Day bird watch and nature walk, but it's looking rainy today so I'm not sure it's going to happen this year.

Chris, that's hilarious, and I can so picture it!

I have a problem right now though. I have to decide which thread to populate at the stroke of midnight. It's like having several different bars, or rooms at a party, and not knowing which one....

!!

There are two New Years in Hong Kong: the Western one and the Chinese one.

Western one: parties, fireworks, and a countdown to the modern calendar's new year. One night and, some of us, New Year's Day.

Chinese one: approximately one week's worth of family get-togethers, celebratory meals, lots of mahjong, friends getting together, huge fireworks displays in the Harbour and plenty of smaller fireworks in the villages.

Lion dances, fire crackers, greetings of fortune, wealth, happiness. Dragon dances on some of the islands, but certainly on the Mainland.

In short: the traditional holiday lasts about ten days, but starts on the Lunar Calendar's last month's 28th day.

Exhausting, but fun.

I used to try to eat twelve grapes at midnight. Now I don't stay up that late and drink my grapes--s6

It's customary here to go to a flight of stairs with 12 raisins in one hand and some money in the other, right before midnight. As the clock begins to strike, you eat one raisin, make a wish, and go up one step, all with each strike. After the 12 strokes of midnight, you should have gone up 12 steps and eaten the raisins.

Going up the steps symbolizes moving up in life. The money is to start the new year with money in hand. The raisins have to do with making the score right - it's related to the fact that if you count the lunar months instead of calendar months, you need to balance it out in the end.

It's also customary to wear a brand new piece of clothing on January 1st, again to start the new year with something new in the hopes that it will bring more abundance in that year.

My great-grandmother was wont to let the doors open upon the strike of midnight to let in the new year and let out the old year. A sensible tradition if one were still in Wales, complete idiocy on the Canadian prairie. My great-grandfather (a Welshman himself) would cuss profusedly at my great-grandmother when she tried porting that over.

Nowadays, there is nothing special on NYE apart from some drinks and pretzels. There is a ham dinner on New Years Day that we traditionally have.