Europeans began using euro coins and notes Tuesday in an unprecedented 12-nation changeover that will see more than 300 million people abandon their national currencies in an historic leap towards a more unified Europe.
Greece and Finland were the first to use the euro currency, with cash dispensers instantly switching to euro notes at midnight local time (2200 GMT), letting New Year's revelers buy their celebratory champagne with the new money.
Across Europe, politicians set out to launch the euro cash with purchases of flowers for their wives while the buttoned-down European Central Bank staged a rock opera and Athens put on a crown with lasers and fireworks.
Officials set the sky above the Acropolis ablaze and the night was filled with music as descendants of the mythical nymph Europa adopted the common currency, which will have the widest European reach since the Roman denarius circulated 2000 years ago.
In Helsinki, people formed a line more than 300 meters (yards) long to get into the central bank headquarters which opened exceptionally at midnight to distribute euro cash.
The euro launch was set for an hour later in eight other nations from Austria and Germany to France, Italy and Spain. Ireland and Portugal were to complete the switchover after another hour. Other nations in the euro zone are Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
In Vienna, Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel and visiting European Commission President Romano Prodi planned to use their euro cash at midnight to buy flowers for their wives.
In Berlin, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder planned to celebrate the event by giving a euro coin to the first homeless person he meets.
France will say adieu to the franc by lighting the oldest bridge in Paris, the Pont Neuf, in blue and gold, the colors of the European Union, to welcome the euro.
Leading those absent from the euro club was Britain, where opposition to abandoning key elements of national sovereignty to the Brussels-headquartered European Union runs high but where Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair has vowed to push ahead with euro membership.
Blair wished the euro well shortly before the launch, saying: "With so much of our trade and so many of our jobs tied up in business with the rest of Europe, it is massively in our interests that the euro succeeds."
Also missing were Denmark and Sweden, where public opinion is beginning to turn in favor of joining the euro zone.
The French Indian Ocean island Reunion was first to reach midnight and adopt the single currency, two hours ahead of Athens and Helsinki.
French Finance Minister Laurent Fabius, speaking from Paris on a live television hook-up with the island, said he was "delighted that the European continent was upstaged by Reunion", because "the euro is not just money but a social link that fosters solidarity."
The mayor of Reunion's biggest city Saint-Denis, Rene-Paul Victoria, went to a local fruit market and bought lychees with a one-euro coin after hoisting a banner with the single currency's emblem.
In New York, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan congratulated Europeans for creating a common currency, saying: "The adoption of the euro by a dozen countries represents a bold and visionary choice for unity over division, cooperation over conflict, and a common future over a divided past."
Initially, the euro will circulate alongside national currencies, to be phased out by the end of February at the latest.
Shopkeepers have been urged to accept legacy currencies while giving change only in euros, but coin shortages and the hassles of conversion were expected to result in exceptions.
Credit and cards are also slated to take up slack until the euro is fully introduced, but cards could present problems because computer systems risked overload, an event which occurred during the Christmas shopping rush in France.
Most businesses closed on January 1 so any major problems were more likely to appear Wednesday and many retailers looked forward with concern to the post-Christmas sales.
(China Daily January 1, 2002)
