On December 31, 2000, I went to Palace Square with a number of friends from my university, and several thousand celebrating Russians, to ring in the New Year. Russians viewed the new millennium as a chance to put the failures of history behind them and start fresh. They also viewed it as an opportunity to get rolling drunk. Despite the freezing temperatures, the scene on the street was wild. Everywhere people were singing. Champagne was sprayed as much as it was drunk, and fireworks whizzed throughout the crowds. I took this picture of two exuberant women dancing in the middle of Nevsky Boulevard. during the first minutes of the new Millennium. We joined in toasting the arrival of the New Year in each subsequent time zone till it reached California. Sadly Russia's fresh start was tainted just a few minutes after midnight when a stray firework ignited the renovation materials around the statue of Victory. Fire trucks were unable to reach the statue, which is perched above the Tsar's triumphal entranceway to Palace Square, and the national monument was over eighty percent destroyed before the fire burned itself out.