 | Fireworks explode over the 200-year-old Wat Arun Temple on the Chao Phya River in Bangkok as part of the New Year celebrations Saturday. Asia and the South Pacific welcomed the new millennium with fireworks, dancing and fun, while the rest of the world put on their best clothes and prepared to party. click to open  |
 | Vietnamese drummers beat 200 drums celebrating the new year and the new millennium in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, early Saturday, Jan. 1, 2000. click to open |
 | President and Mrs. Clinton watch parachutists descend during the opening ceremony of America's Millennium celebrations in Washington Thursday Dec. 31, 1999. Celebrating the dawn of a new century, the president asked Americans to "take just a little time to dream" about the future. click to open |
 | Fireworks explode over the Century Altar in Beijing Saturday, Jan. 1, 2000. During the festivites, President Jiang Zemin pressed a button lighting a new eternal flame, dubbed "the Sacred Flame of China." State media said the flame was brought to Beijing by torch runners 45 kilometers (28 miles) from Zhoukoudian, where the remains of prehistoric "Peking Man" were found in the 1920s. click to open |
 | Fireworks explode over the Century Altar in Beijing Saturday, Jan. 1, 2000. During the festivites, President Jiang Zemin pressed a button lighting a new eternal flame, dubbed "the Sacred Flame of China." State media said the flame was brought to Beijing by torch runners 45 kilometers (28 miles) from Zhoukoudian, where the remains of prehistoric "Peking Man" were found in the 1920s. click to open |
 | Fireworks light up the medieval Cite de Carcassonne castle in southwestern France, Friday Dec. 31, 1999 hours before the new year. click to open |
 | A 42-foot traditional Tongan boat called a Kalia sails towards the first new millennium sunrise near the Tongan capital Nuku'alofa Saturday Jan 1st 2000. The first day of 2000 began as clocks in the tiny island states of Tonga and parts of Kiribati in the Western Pacific rolled through midnight local time, 14 hours ahead of midnight Greenwich Mean Time. click to open |
 | Japanese Shinto priests make their way to a New Year ritualcelebration at Meiji Shrine in Tokyo Friday Dec 31 1999. Hundreds of thousands of people will visit the shrine for the millennium celebrations later in the evening. click to open |
 | Welcoming Year 2000: Pope John Paul II blesses the faithful as he arrives on a mobile 'chariot' in the St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican to celebrate the Te Deum prayer, Friday, December 31, 1999. At right, the bronze statue of St. Peter. The Pope, in an unprecedented midnight appearence in his apartment window overlooking St. Peter's Square, will bless faithful for the new millennium. click to open |
 | Thousands celebrate the new year with fireworks in Seoul earlySaturday, Jan. 1, 2000. click to open |
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