GAY ENTRY INTO NEW YEAR

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28474, 2 January 1958, Page 7

GAY ENTRY INTO NEW YEAR

Celebrations In East And West (N.Z. Press Association—Copynpht) (Rec. 8 p.m.) LONDON, January 1. Differences between East and West were pushed into the background tonight by the gaiety common to all countries on New Year’s Eve. In Moscow and Warsaw, as in Western capitals and the Orient, people gathered to welcome the New Year with traditional noise and exuberance. Muscovites, experiencing unusually warm weather and a lack of snow, were celebrating in the traditional way with figures of “Grandfather Frost” carrying sacks of toys and decorated trees. Celebrations in London at the Dorchester Hotel included an appearance by the Pearly King and Queen and Princess of the City of London—traditional Cockney characters whose regalia is • covered with pearl buttons.

Thousands of revellers thronged London’s West End to greet the New Year. Singing and waving balloons, they packed Trafalgar square by the light of Oslo’s Christmas tree, an annual Norwegian gift to Londoners. Piccadilly Circus was also the scene of gay celebration. Its famous statue of Eros was boarded up as a precaution against those overcharged with New Year spirit More than 5000 people danced to the music of four orchestras at the Chelsea Arts Ball in the Royal Albert Hall.

The Savoy held a limelight ball in aid of the blind, with the New Year heralded by a fanfare from Household Cavalry trumpeters. The customary watch night service was held at St. Paul’s Cathedral and St Martins-in-the-Fields.

In Warsaw, beauty salons ano hairdressers were jammed all day as Polish women prepared to shine at one ot tonight’s 150 organised balls. The celebrations were the gayest since the end of the war. A procession of cars toured the city offering chocolates and fruit tu traffic police. West Berlin’s Freedom Bellgiven to the people by the United States after the Berlin blockade —heralded the New Year In Vienna trumpeters sounded the New Year in from the tower of the city wall. In many homes people followed the ancient custom of pouring boiling lead into cold water as midnight struck, and tried to tell their fortunes from the shapes the metal took.

For Frenchmen, there was no better way of seeing in the New Year than with knife and fork in hand and napkin under the chin. Thousands spent St. Sylvester’s night in restaurants with truffled turkey, champagne, paper hats and dancing. Doughnuts and punch took the Dutch to the threshold of 1956, according to an old tradition. At midnight ships in the harbour blew their whistles and in towns and villages fireworks exploded. In Peking the New Year* was greeted by the ringing of 2000y ear-old bells. Italians Celebrate

In Italy, people celebrated by hurling crockery and old pots from their windows, shooting revolvers and shotguns into the air and letting off giant fireworks. Families sat down to a huge meal lasting until morning. In Budapest, Hungarians forgot their cares in the traditional New Year’s Eve customs of dining off tender young pig and dancing the czardas to the strains of gypsy music.

Two of the most peaceful places on earth last night were the Norwegian townships, Toensberg and Sandefjord, in a fiord about 50 miles from Oslo. While the streets of Oslo were filled with dancing crowds, the women of these two prosperous fishing towns were praying for the safe return of their menfolk who are thousands of miles away with Norway’s Antarctic whaling fleet. Their turn to celebrate comes in the spring when the boats race each other in friendly rivalry back to Norway.