I was in Dam Square in the middle of Amsterdam as
the millenium changed. Along with 200,000 other people. It was
crowded, but I'm a veteran of Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras,
so this wasn't too bad to walk through.
Amsterdam put on a huge show, with big video monitors to
broadcast the stage show with a great sound system. I was 50 feet
from the stage. I went out to eat at a Greek restaurant Bill and
I discovered, earlier in the evening and then made it to Dam
Square by 10:00.
2 of the biggest singing stars entertained. But the songs were
mostly in English. I guess you can't beat Louis Armstrong, and
other great American composers and performers for their songs.
"I see skies of blue..."
Amsterdam has a long Asian tradition of Fireworks. On a personal
level. Everyone has them! Firecrackers, bottle rockets, noise
makers, M80s, and superbig suitcase size firecrackers that make
noise for a minute or more. And they set them off everywhere.
Including in the middle of the crowd. They were going off from 10:00
pm until after 3:00 pretty much continuously. Even during the
show, the personal fireworks were going off, over your head,
around the corner, behind you, everywhere! At Midnight, the
official main fireworks went off. Totally cool!
At work the next day, my coworkers told me most people wore older
clothes so they didn't need to worry about the bottle rockets
burning holes in them. Didn't know about that. I did have to wipe
down all my clothes due to the numerous champagne showers I
walked through.
The first Y2K problem everyone had was their cell phones not
working. But it was primarily a problem of several thousand
people trying to use their phones at once on one cell. I couldn't
get a network signal until I left Amsterdam and was back in
Hoofddorp.
They shut down the trams, so I had to walk back to the ring road.
It took an hour. But it was a nice night. I got home around 3:00
am. It was a lot of walking and standing around, but I'll always
remember the Millenium change as my first New Years in Amsterdam.
I feel totally lucky!
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