A byootaful Life

Ahhh, the New Years Eve celebration in Times Square! It was the reason we were in New York and the reason we were huddled in what was essentially a barriered-off mosh pit with hundreds of other people, rugged up against the cold night and preparing ourselves for the seven-hour wait until midnight, when the giant ball would drop, fireworks would explode and we’d kiss under the stars, welcoming in 2011 with a bang.

Even though there were estimated up to a million people jammed into Times Square, it wasn’t very loud at all. Or cold. I guess all the body heat kept us warm. We were too far back from the stage to hear the music from the performers on stage, so I put on my big lens and zoomed into the television screens to figure out who was singing. We came up with a random guy who sort of looked like Keith Urban crossed with Billy Ray Cyrus, the Backstreet Boys and Ke$ha. We spent most of our time playing a card game that didn’t require sitting down or a table. Some people had brought camping chairs and snacks but we didn’t plan ahead that well – we didn’t have any food or drink, which was probably a good thing since we wouldn’t be able to take bathroom breaks.

Six o’clock marked the raising of the ball ceremony, then every hour after that had it’s own mini countdown, complete with mini fireworks. It was actually a good idea, since it kept us all entertained and got us all practicing our ‘countdown chanting’. The time flew quickly, especially with our card games taking about 15 minutes each. With a couple hours to go, they released confetti, which turned the crowd into eager crazy people, grabbing at the strips to catch some. Yeah, we were being entertained with confetti – it showed just how bored we were!

This picture says it all – pretty much the same view and the same people, except this time there’s confetti, wooooo! Oh, and we either moved closer to the front barrier of our section, or I zoomed in. I’m pretty sure we moved closer. Apparently more than 1 tonne of confetti was dropped over us and we decided that whatever colour we caught was going to be our colour for the year. I think I ended up with red, so 2011 is either going to be really romantic… or really angry.

Phill was on video duty because he was taller and could get a clear shot of the ball as it dropped. Unfortunately he forgot about the ball for part of it and got distracted by the countdown screen, but well, you get the gist. Oh, and there isn’t an echo – for some reason there was a second countdown underneath the top one that counted a second or so earlier than the other, so some people were following the bottom one while others followed the top. Go it? Now enjoy!

We managed to leave Times Square without much fuss. There were rumours that the subway wouldn’t be operating and we figured it if was, it would be jam packed anyway, but we took our chances and headed down to the station and caught the first train that came through and it was thankfully empty. We all gathered together in one of our rooms with bags of chips and some drinks from the corner store, talking and laughing and letting the buzz calm down, before heading to bed, absolutely exhausted yet again.

I’m glad we did it – the atmosphere was absolutely awesome and we’ll keep the memories forever, but next year we’ll be watching the countdown on television from the comfort of our warm home, snuggled on the couch with our wineglasses in hand, most likely reminiscing about that time we spent new years eve waiting for the ball to drop in Times Square.

Stay tuned for day three!