Happy New Year! Welcome to 2006...

So we have the whole crew in town, my flatmates Almira and her twin sister Jobina, Almira's boyfriend Mustafa, and their friend Imran in from London. We spent our entire 2pm breakfast discussing jusy exactly how we going to be organized and where we were going to be to get the best view of the Sydney fireworks above Sydney Harbour bridge. Then we got a text from Dougal, a guy I met for about an hour in a bar in Vietnam who lives in Sydney, he and his buddies were doing a slow pub crawl through a suburb very close to ours, called Balmain.

So much for our well-laid plans - we hoped a bus and joined the guys for a drink, and we eventually ended up at one of these great old tile-fronted bar/hotels they have in Sydney. Called the London bar, all the bar staff was dressed as characters from Alice in Wonderland (save Minnie Mouse and Pocahontas, but hey) and the front deck had a spectacular view of the Sydney Harbour bridge. You know how it goes - after a few cold beers, I wasn't going anywhere - why fight the crowds downtown when I can hang out on a pub deck and see a great view? I lost Almira + entourage, who had tickets to a local nightclub, so they headed downtown to brave the crowds and try to find a taxi cab.

It was a really fabulous night, the 38 degree day had cooled to a bareable 28 degree evening. We all grabbed our drinks, stood on the balcony and whatched the 10 min children's fireworks at 9pm, and counted down the main fireworks at midnight - toasted happy new year, and it was all over. (and now is when I really hope there aren't any aussies reading this) I don't know what I was waiting for - the fireworks were good... but not great. I have seen much better displays at the Symphony of Fire in Vancouver. These fireworks were over so fast! I guess it isn't fair to compare - we have some world-class entertainment at home. What was interesting, is they loaded up a giant heart light board on the Sydney Harbour bridge itself, which pulsed, and changed colours during the show and leading up to the fireworks. It was a spectacular night over all - and it really is a new treat to be hot and in flip flops for New Year's.

Almira + crew did just fine - narrowly avoided some girls trying to start fights in the streets. The cops were everywhere - making sure there was no trouble as usual, but it seemed like the City really just enjoyed themselves last night.

Happy 2006!