Fire festivals
Bonfires, blazing tar barrels, torch processions and fireworks: celebrations where fire is the whole point, from Shetland's burning longship to Valencia's burning monuments.
Púca Festival
Halloween goes home to its Celtic roots with fire, myth and music in County Meath
Lewes Bonfire Night
Burning crosses, flaming barrels and exploding effigies: Britain's wildest November 5
Ottery St Mary Tar Barrels
A Devon town runs blazing tar barrels through its streets on its shoulders
Edinburgh's Hogmanay
Torches, a castle-lit street party and Auld Lang Syne at Scotland's New Year
Sydney New Year's Eve
Fireworks pour off the Harbour Bridge as one of the first big cities greets the new year
Up Helly Aa
Torch-bearing 'Vikings' burn a longship through a Shetland winter night
Chinese New Year (Spring Festival)
Red lanterns, reunion dinners and firecrackers as China welcomes the lunar new year
Nyepi & Ogoh-Ogoh
Bali parades giant demons through the streets, then falls silent for a whole day
Las Fallas
Valencia builds an open-air museum of giant satirical sculptures, then burns it down
Thrissur Pooram
Caparisoned elephants, duelling parasols and a dawn of fireworks in Kerala
Orthodox Easter in Corfu
Philharmonic bands, candlelit processions and clay pots smashed from Venetian balconies
Tenjin Matsuri
A hundred torch-lit boats and 3,000 fireworks turn Osaka's river into a stage
Yi Torch Festival
Torch parades, Yi wrestling and mass bonfire dances turn Chuxiong into a fire city
Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance
A 67m dragon of smouldering incense snakes through Tai Hang's lanes for three nights
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