03 January 2007

New Year's Eve 2006



Since the cool kids have a slide show up, I certainly need to follow suit. ;>

We had a good NYE. My friend Kat returned from the US that evening. We chatted and watched a movie at her flat. Then, around 11 p.m., we headed over to Palace Square. it was snowing and just georgous out. After getting through the security, we found the crowd to be MUCH smaller than we'd anticipated. The square was only 1/3 full. There were lots of families there. There were people dressed up as all sorts of things--animals, superheros, Dyed Moros, etc. There were also many "young people" roaming about. Kat got bumped by a groups of pickpockets (I really think I've seen two of them at work on Nevsky) but her Jersey instincts kicked in and nothing was taken.

We watched some singing by local children and saw many different Santas from all over the world come and greet the crowd. The North American one said, "Hi. How are you?" We listened to the St. P mayor talk about St. P in 2006. And then, at 11:55 we watched Putin's speech. As the speech ended, the clock in Red Square started chiming midnight. (Since we didn't know that was how it timed out and there was no countdown it took us a few minutes to realize it was midnight.)

Fireworks galore!

Then, as the crowd shifted to one that was more PARRRRTY-oriented, we went home. Not a bad way to say goodbye to 2006 and hello to 2007.

5 comments:

Elle said...

Sounds like a grand time. I would have loved to see that myself.

Holly said...

I also would have loved to see that in person. Ok, now I have to get a cool slide show! LOL

Rhyne & Jake said...

Happy 2007!! I hope you have a wonderful year and that d2b will be celebrating with you next NYE!

Thank you so much for sharing all the "inside" view with us this year!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I think I like the slide show thing too...your night sounded great. I'd love to be there for that...minus the pickpocket kids

Betsy said...

And a very cool kid you are!! Thanks for giving us that inside glimpse of the Russian celebration!