Today was going to be another day of chaos. At least the D'Mellos' were around this time so it wouldn't be so much like Christmas when the buck stopped with us. We ran around all day with Darielle trying to sell more tickets to people outside the resort, Vincent trying to get everyone's roles clear and me tying to make sure the guests we had were sorted out. Reception was chaos most of the day and we enlisted security to take tickets from people. Lancy was back as store manager so at least we didn't have to worry about Sam and his endless childish games of not buying what we need. Lancy just sends him straight back to the shops when he has checked the requisitions, something we never had time for. After a while of chaos Lancy asked me to help him build the old man. I asked him about it and it turns out it's an old Pagan tradition that, surprise surprise, was stolen by the Catholics! You burn an old man and in his pocket, or whispered in his ear depending on tradition, you put a list of everything you want to leave behind in the old year, too much drinking/shopping/smoking/coffee/etc. However, of course, with this being India you don't just burn him you fill him with firecrackers, fireworks and kerosene! I made his head and drew an old man face on it and stole some of the cotton wool from the first aid box for a beard and white hair. It was great fun.The evening went off well. The Rajasthani dancers came back and were just as terrible as before, I was made to do karaoke by Eve, who, along with one guest, were the only other people to sing - once again Nicole the performing seal to the rescue! Actually I don't mind karaoke now, maybe it's just because I know I'm leaving soon so if it's terrible we won't ever see anyone here again...After that they played 'housie' or as we call it 'Bingo'. The four of us, Darielle, Bryan, Vincent and I, decided that bingo was pants so we went to test out the cocktails. Nagraj was being cocktail barman and I had only given him a couple of training sessions, which really wasn't enough. He insisted on measuring the fruit juice with the shot glass for several drinks until I told him to just pour til it got to the top of the glass, he wasn't happy as he was following a recipe to the letter, but he cheered up when we proclaimed him a great barman (after one or two drinks!).At five to midnight we were dancing on the 'dance floor' i.e. the bit outside the restaurant that was usually the cafe which had been cleared and had a disco ball installed. I mentioned the time to Darielle and there was a flurry of action getting maintenance onto the roof for the fireworks. Sadly just before Darielle could begin the countdown a guest grabbed the mike and shouted happy new year, which the guys on the roof too as their cue to light everything! Drowned by the sound of all the fireworks being lit at once (we forgot to explain you should do it in series, it's hard to remember you have to tell people every single little point about their job)the DJ played the final countdown and we all wished each other happy new year. The man Lancy and I made was also lit at this point. I had mentioned that if you fill him with fireworks not just firecrackers things will blast off in all directions - but they didn't listen, they had, and the whole thing went off like a rocket with kerosene filled head exploding and flying off and fireworks going off parallel to the ground and setting light to the Christmas tree! It was great and there was much screaming and running around while people tried not to get impaled by rockets launching out of the man at every angle. Luckily no one was hurt, but Jummat did set light to his shoe trying to put out the tinsel from the Christmas tree.After everything was done most people went off to their rooms (actually the hundreds of people that were supposedly coming from other resorts never showed so pretty much everyone was gone by 12.15) and Vincent and I decided to pop to Paradise bar to let Jeff and Simon know we were off to China. This didn't go down too well as we had become regulars so everyone was feeling a bit upset...but we stayed out as long as we could until about 5am chatting and assuring them we would send postcards.