Happy New Year

English Week

• At midnight on 31st December, bells will ring out around the world welcome the new year. There also many other interesting new year celebrations and customs.

• In Europe many people prepare special food. Swiss housewives bake bread, rich in butter, eggs and rai sins. They also cook roast goose. People in Italy hold parties with salt pork and lentils on the menu.

• . Lentils are supposed to be lucky and bring money — perhaps because they look like small plies of gold coins. In Spain it is a custom to eat 12 grapes at mid night and toast the new year in champagne. Groups of friends visit restaurants in Turkey where they spend the night and give and get presents. Some in people Greece play cards, hoping that a win will bring them luck for a whole year.

• New Year myths and superstitions are very old. New Year means new beginning, so for ex ample in Italy people throw old clothes, broken cups and plates, etc. out of the windows. An old English custom was to burn juniper twigs inside a house while the doors and windows were closed — to fumigate the home and people for the coming year. When they couldn't stand the smell any more, they rushed out of the house, breathing in cold fresh air.

• In Scotland the first visitor in the New Year is very important. A 'first foot' as he is called, brings luck if he is dark haired or has a dark complexion.

• He should bring gifts of food, fuel and a bunch of evergreens to symbolize continuing life.

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• From Kotegova Nastya