Return to CALL resources page | esl_home index
Webheads: Main Page | Welcome | Students | Virtual Community | Online Class | Chat Logs
Next visit, start at http://www.netword.com/webheads

Writing Topic #9
Webheads' Plans for the Millenium New Year's Eve

Michael | Felix | Vance | Maggi

December 4, 1999

THIS WEEK"S TOPIC

What are you going to do on December 31st? Are you going to celebrate the new millennium? Maybe you're just going to stay home and watch TV or go to bed early? Or maybe it is just being ignored in your country?

Write and tell us if you are going to do anything special for New Year's Eve to celebrate the millennium. And tell us how you will celebrate.

I look forward to reading your replies. And let's see if we can't get everyone writing this time. This is an EASY topic!

New Year's Eve is huge in Australia, and this one especially because it's the end of the millennium. What am I going to do? Well what I wanted to do was go out in the desert and ignore the whole thing but no one would come with me. So I have 2 choices:

1) go to a party at the house of some old friends who always have a New Year's Eve party

2) go to my local beach and watch 3 lots of fireworks. Lots of the beach suburbs will have fireworks so if we're sitting on the beach at 12 o'clock we should see lots of fireworks.

I'll probably go to my friends' party first and then get back to the beach for midnight.

Do you think I should take my laptop?

December 5, 1999

Michael's reaction: Come on Felix. You can do better than this! Why will it be awesome?! What will you do there? Who'll be with you? etc etc!

Vance's reaction: What a stickler that Michael is! But on the other hand, yeah, the more we learn about each other, the more interesting we all become. So what about the rest of the Webheads? At least Felix was quick to reply! (Good going, Felix!)

Felix's reaction: ok ok Michael you won!!!

Generally I celebrate New Year's at the beach, with some friends.. We have drinks, foods (like roasted turkey), but mainly it's only drinking. This year I will be celebrating it at CUMURUXATIBA (http://www.geocities.com/zanibon/ ; now the url is correct). We are planning a get-together at a friend's beach house with about 40 more people (all of them are friends) then we are going to see the fireworks at the beach. Then dancing, dancing, drinking, drinking ic, ic, ic, ic.... Then a hangover. My wife is going with me this year (that's good) because she's Protestant and her religion doesn't allow her to celebrate it with drinks, dances, music, etc... But I convinced her to go (I think she's kind of afraid, you know, because after some drinks we are not THAT responsible for ourselves hehe).. But I hope it will be fun.

Felix

December 6, 1999

My plans are quite special. Ramadhan is about to begin in the UAE. This is a month where Moslems fast during the day, and westerners in Moslem countries are expected to refrain from eating or drinking anything in front of fasting Moslems. As a result, everyone tires easily at work and the workday is shortened.

However, I will be flying to Milan and Rome and then on to Caracas tonight. I will be in Venezuela for one week and the following week I plan to go to Tobago for diving. The diving is supposed to be very good in Tobago.

On December 23 I plan to fly to Houston where my wife, Bobbi, and both my sons, Glenn and Dusty, will join me. Bobbi and Dusty will be in the UAE until school is out for them (Bobbi is a teacher and Dusty is in the 9th grade). They will arrive in Houston on the 23rd as will Glenn, who flies in from San Francisco where he attends college. We will visit Bobbi's parents and mine, who all live in Houston. It will be the first time we have enjoyed Christmas together in years. I can't even remember the last time.

During the next week, Glenn, Bobbi, Dusty, and I will fly to San Francico where we plan to be for the New Year Celebrations. It will be crowded in San Francisco. There are many people in the streets, especially at Union Square. Not all these people are polite. In fact, some are violent, so it pays to be careful. Still we will be together as a family for New Years and that will be the most important thing.

In the next few days Bobbi and Dusty and I will return to Milan and spend a few days in Milan. We hope the weather will be warm and sunny when we arrive (hahaha). At least it will be warm and sunny in Abu Dhabi when we return on the 10th of January. This will be right after the Eid celebrations at the end of the month of Ramadhan. I should get home just in time to go to work.

I may not be back in touch until Christmas. I'll try to come to the Palace on Sunday Dec 26, though that's about 5:30 in the morning in Houston, and on my birthday too, so I don't know if I'll be up for it. I may not be back at the Palace class until January 16 because on the 2nd it's the same time in Houston, and on the 9th I'll be on an airplane.

But I'll read your emails when I reach Houston and send you a message now and then.

THE MILLENNIUM CALENDAR is a European Schools Project (ESP) in which Students from schools in Europe and elsewhere express their hopes and predictions for the new millennium in words and pictures. Links are revealed as the calendar progresses towards the end of the millennium. Like an advent calendar past and present links remain open, but links in the future won't open until the dates shown on the calendar.

ESP is an Internet-based network organisation of teachers, mostly within secondary education, throughout Europe and worldwide. THE MILLENNIUM CALENDAR, and a link to ESP Teleprojects where you may find classes interested in your Y2K postcard project, is at:

http://www.wordskills.com/esp-millennium

December 8, 1999

Since he is ahead of most of us I think he should just so the rest of us have advanced warning that they went down, down under. We would still have time to do something....LOL

There may be some problems but the best is we just enjoy the quiet and stay off the phones so the lines are not overloaded with people checking to see if they work. Sleep on it first.

I have just spent a lot of energy and money to move so I will spend it at home. It is also a tradition here to shoot off fireworks and I expect people will outdo themselves this year. I will join them and hope it isn't so cold. I am not going anywhere then. Just enjoy the moment....a big party is too much trouble and mess. I would rather sleep. :-)

I wish everyone finds what they seek this next year....

Maggi

Use your browser's BACK button to return to a previous page

For comments, suggestions, or further information on this page, contact Vance Stevens, page webmaster.

Last updated: December 8, 1999