Key Points
Omisoka!
Hogmanay!
Festival Day!
Whatever you call it, this is the last day of the year, according to the widely-used Gregorian calendar. For some, it is a day to clean and get ready for the New Year, and for others, it is a day of feasting and festivities. In 2020, celebrations will almost surely have to change because of the global pandemic, but let’s check out the usual
Montserrat is a Caribbean island, and today is one of the most important days of the Festival season (which is like the Carnival or Mardi Gras celebrations that occur in February or March in other nations). Festival Day (December 31) is the day of the Festival Troupe competition. For several weeks, there have been masquerades and music and competitions to select the Festival Queen and King. On January 1 there is a parade of all the troupes in the competition.
In Scotland, Hogmanay is characterized by “first-footing,” which means visiting people with gifts of food and drink immediately after midnight. The gifts are supposed to be symbolic of luck for the coming year.
A lot of Hogmanay customs involve lights and fire. Fireball swinging is described on Wikipedia:
WARNING: Don’t try this at home!
“This involves local people making up ‘balls’ of chicken wire filled with old newspaper, dried sticks, old cotton rags, and other dry flammable material up to a diameter of 61 cm. Each ball has 2 m of wire, chain or nonflammable rope attached. As the Old Town House bell sounds to mark the new year, the swingers set off up the High Street… swinging their burning ball around their head as they go for as many times as they and their fireball last. At the end of the ceremony any fireballs that are still burning are cast into the harbour.”
Wikipedia reports that the 2007/2008 Hogmanay event was attended by 12,000 people, and that the event is now streamed live over the Internet. Presumably that includes the musical acts before the fireball swinging, and the fireworks after!
In Japan, Omisoka is marked by the year’s biggest housecleaning followed by the year’s biggest dinner. At midnight, many families visit a Shinto shrine, where large cast bells are struck 108 times (to represent the 108 earthly desires that cause human suffering).
Kids’ New Year
Sparkling apple cider
, noisemakers, streamers, confetti, and maybe even a midnight balloon drop are great fun for kids who aren’t normally allowed to stay up until midnight!
Here are some ideas for making a balloon drop.
An idea from a parent is unrolling bubble wrap on a hardwood floor and jumping onto it at midnight.
Some parents celebrate the New Year at someone else’s midnight. For example, with a countdown-to-midnight and ball-drop televised from New York City airing at 10 p.m. Mountain Time and 9 p.m. Pacific Time, kids can experience the excitement of the New Year but still get a full night’s sleep.
New Year’s Fortunes, Predictions, and Resolutions
Another warning: Make sure everybody “gets” that fortunes and predictions are just for fun, no magic at all…
Write fun fortunes and tuck them between layers of a cake, with curling ribbon sticking out all around the cake so family members or friends can pull out a random fortune. Or play magnet-fish with the paper-clipped fortunes being the fish. Fortune cookies or simply drawing fortunes out of a bowl are some other possibilities.
Finally, write some New Year’s resolutions. Try to be realistic and specific, and it will be much easier to fulfill your resolutions!
Also on this date:
Ōmisoka in Japan
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Birthday of sculptor Selma Burke
International Day of Solidarity of Azerbaijanis
Plan ahead:
Check out my Pinterest pages on:
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January holidays
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January birthdays
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Historical anniversaries in January
