New Year's Eve

More than 18,000 LED lights have been lit, used as a Christmas tree decoration in California, believed to be the highest in the world, world agencies reported.

The thirty-five-foot white fir in front of Citadel Outlets in Commerce, California is also decorated with 10,000 ornaments.
With the LED lights on, the celebration of the Christmas holidays began.

The murder in London of a young Romanian whose girlfriend said he had come to England "looking for a better life" has jolted Britain out of its festive post-Christmas mood of complacency and made front-page headlines.

Injecting a somber note into the festivities, the New York City's Times Square Alliance, the business association that organizes the famous New Year's Eve party, paid a special tribute to freedom of the press, after a year in which journalists came under attack around the world.

67% of Bulgarians will welcome the New Year at home, another 17% will visit their relatives, 11 out of 100 will celebrate in a restaurant.

This shows data from a national representative survey of Exacta. Compared to last year, the proportion of our compatriots who will celebrate at home is decreasing.

Reporters will be the guests of honor at the New Year's Eve party in New York's Times Square on Dec. 31, in what organizers said was a celebration of press freedom after an unusually deadly year for journalists at U.S. news outlets.

Public transport services in Athens will be slowing down over the New Year's holiday, operator OASA announced.

On January 1-3 and 6, buses and trolley buses will run at less frequent intervals, according to the Sunday schedule, while on December 31, they will start pulling off Athens's streets by around 9 p.m.

Public transport services in the Greek capital will be reduced over the holidays to allow workers the chance to enjoy Christmas and New Year's with their families, operator OASA has said.

84% of Bulgarians will celebrate Christmas at home, 11% intend to visit relatives, and just 2% are to celebrate abroad, according to data from a poll conducted by the Exacta Research Group and quoted by the Bulgarian National Radio. 

Today, on November 30, 2018 (Friday) in the park in front of the National Palace of Culture, the lights of the festive Christmas tree of Sofia will be lit. 

Christmas lights on the tree will be turned on at 19:00 local time (EET).

Starting 17:00, a series of concerts and musical performances will take place on a stage put up next to the tree. 

As season's greetings are just around the corner, some housewives in Turkey's southern province of Antalya are busy making a large number of wreaths for Christmas and New Year celebrations.