Another year - another post

The new year has arrived, and in Boston there is a tradition of "First Night" events that take place during the last day of the year. This year was no different, even though it snowed on the morning of December 31st, many events took place around the city. Concerts and shows were everywhere. I did not go to these morning and afternoon events because I helped a friend move (from the forth floor to the first floor of a house with no elevator, this because he and his wife just had a baby). Yes, it was quite a sight - four Israeli doctors of chemistry working as movers, carrying stuff down the stairs. It was pretty tiring but we moved his whole apartment in an hour and a half.

I went to the Boston Commons park in the evening to watch the Parade, the fireworks and the ice sculptures that the TV news kept telling about. When I arrived to the park I found out that there where only three ice sculptures and that I have seen all of them on TV. I really expected to see more sculptures than what the TV presented, alas, there where none (you can see one of the sculptures of Da Vinci creating the Statue of David in the picture).

The Parade was nice, and long, trying to imitate a Brazilian carnival but with American patriotism. Among the floats of dancers, bands and puppets, the Boston police, the fire department and other emergency services also presented and got a big round of applause from all the proud Americans who seem to really love their emergency services guys. (I wonder if that would have worked in Israel, since we don't seem to like or appreciate our police officers and fire fighters). But the Americans have a soft spot in their heart for those guys.
At the end of the precession joined a protest against Israel and for the Palestinians in Gaza. This was not planned by the organizers of the parade, but a very large group of Palestinians and Americans carrying the Palestinian flags and signs calling to Free Gaza just joined the parade and, thus, were given a very large exposure. I guess that is one of the reasons that Israel is not very popular. Our foes know how to expose their views and ideas, while you do not really hear the Israeli side of the story. (But that really carried me off the new year's story, so back to it...)

Later came the fireworks, which were pretty standard, and they even had some problems of fireworks that went off too early and fell to the ground while still burning. But the area of the mortars was cleared from the audience and no one got hurt. You can see one of the successful pictures I took (there weren't many).

I thought of staying in the city until midnight for the second fireworks in the harbor and I took a stroll to the harbor (which is much further than it appears to be on the map). When we got there it was way too early and there was nothing to do but wait. I did not survive the wait and at 11pm I decided I have waited enough and went home to see the fireworks on the TV. It was very similar to the ones I've seen in the park and I was happy that I did not wait in the harbor.

That's it. That was my new year's eve. It started snowing again on Saturday and it snowed until this evening (Sunday). I still decided not to sit at home for such a long weekend and I went to work on Saturday, which was a great idea since MIT was empty and quiet, and the city was also pretty abandoned due to the snow, so I had a relaxing walk to the train (the T) in the evening after work with white all around and silence in the air.
For those of you who wonder how MIT looks like - here is a night picture of the main building.
I'll try to take a picture tomorrow with the grass all covered with snow, but I can't promise.

Any way - I wish all of you a happy new year, may all your wishes come true. Bye, until next week.