While Dubai is busy prepping for its Downtown Dubai New Year's Eve Gala, London is likewise occupied with its own itinerary in welcoming the New Year.
London has been known to come up with its own explosive and extravagant fireworks display although this time around, only about 100,000 people will be able to catch a glimpse of what will be up this time around.
"There is only enough room for 100,000 people to really enjoy the display – that's the reality," says Jim Donald of Jack Morton Worldwide, the company in charge of this year's fireworks display event.
This year, 400 different kinds of fireworks will be used to produce 10,000 explosions. They will all be fired from the London Eye, three barges and 14 pontoons.
But it is not all about lights and explosions, it is also about music. Darryl Fleming will have the inevitable task of trying to blend in the fireworks with the soundtrack.
Construction of the display started last December 27 and will be working up to the last minute before the New Year actually comes.
The whole system will be controlled using GPS where a signal would be sent by satellite to start the firing.
"We can't get to the Eye until it closes at 5.30pm on New Year's Eve," he says. "Then we've got three and a half hours to rig 1,200 fireworks. That's the most nerve-wracking bit for me."
Expected to benefit from all these efforts are the nearby bars, hotels and restaurants, all of which are expected to be filled before the year ends and the fireworks display start.
While various countries like New York, Sydney, Paris and Rio are expected to hold their own, an annual tradition by London makes it one of the closely monitored events other than Dubai. So the question now is on which display would be better? Right now it seems like London and Dubai are something to watch out for.
The London Eye fireworks can be watched live via the BBC One broadcast while a live stream of the Sydney NYE fireworks can be seen at the official YouTube Channel.
Watch last year's London New Year fireworks 2014 below:
