Ethiopia had waited more than seven and a half years to join the third millennium so a three-hour delay last night was not going to spoil the party.

Thousands of people, many wrapped in Ethiopia’s red, green and gold flag, converged on Jan Meda park for a free concert due to be headlined by Teddy Afro, the country’s most popular reggae star. They had to sit and wait patiently as technicians adjusted lighting rigs and tested speakers as darkness fell.

Last night’s celebrations were the result of a quirk of Ethiopia’s calendar. Its new year is timed to coincide with the Nile floods in Egypt, and the Ethiopian Church has steadfastly refused to accept a 5th-century recalculation of the date of Christ’s birth. So while the rest of the Christian world believes that 2007 years have elapsed since the nativity, Ethiopia reached 2000 only last night.

The run-up to Millennium Eve was marred by accusations that ordinary Ethiopians had been priced out of the celebrations and that the Government had hijacked the date for its own political ends.

Bulldozers had put the finishing touches to the Millennium Warehouse, constructed at a cost of $10 million (£5 million), only hours earlier. There the elite of Addis Ababa spent the night dancing on a tarmac floor beneath an 8ft glitter ball. Women in sequined gowns rubbed shoulders with Western diplomats and African prime ministers. Tickets cost £85.

Meles Zenawi, the country’s Prime Minister, promised his people that the party would be the start of a new dawn. “A thousand years from now, when Ethiopians gather to welcome the fourth millennium, they shall say that the eve of the third millennium was the beginning of the end of the dark ages in Ethiopia. They shall say that the eve of the third millennium was the beginning of the Ethiopian renaissance,” he said.

At Jan Meda, the open-air venue for ordinary residents, jugglers and stilt walkers entertained the crowds as they waited for the concert to start. Children collected bundles of grass to take home to be scattered on the floor as a traditional symbol of fertility.

With the seasonal rains only just ending, the field soon turned muddy. Before long it was looking like the Glastonbury Festival in a bad year. “This is our millennium,” said one man, dancing to the thick thump of a reggae rhythm coming from the stage.

Sorry, what year did you say it was?

1428 the Islamic Hijri calendar began counting in the year of Muhammad’s emigration from Mecca to Medina

1456 the Armenian calendar counts years from 551 when the head of the church declared a new era

2550 Thai calendar counts years from start of the Buddhist Era, the day Thai Buddhists believe the Buddha died

Heisei 19 Japan divides time into eras, commonly associated with the reigns of emperors, and counts years passed in each one

4074 (year of the fire pig) the Chinese calendar began in the reign of the semi-legendary king, Huangdi

Sources: www.japanguide.com ; Webster's Almanac; www.biotechiworld.com ; www.armenianhistory.info

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