Couples worldwide will engage in Birth Race 2000, the Egyptians will cap a pyramid and now the young people of Ireland will be given an opportunity to mark the millennium in a special way.
The Irish project is to create "a new national treasure". There were suggestions yesterday that the finished work could be valued by the nation in years to come in much the same way as the Book of Kells, the Ardagh Chalice and the Cross of Cong.
The "Write Here! Write Now!" project, which involves compiling a book of life stories by young Irish people at the end of the millennium, was launched yesterday at The Ark, the children's cultural centre, in Temple Bar, Dublin.
National Millennium Book Day is to be May 12th, when students will be offered parchment on which to script their thoughts and experiences. The finished manuscripts will then be sent to the Department of Education and Science, where they will be selected at random.
The project, devised by the novelist Deirdre Purcell and funded by the National Millennium Committee, invites fifth-class and transition-year students in 4,000 Irish schools to "examine who they are, where they are, and how they are in 1999" and write their perceptions.
"It is not homework, it is for the students themselves. If there is a blot or a misspelling it stays like that because that is the way it was written," said Ms Purcell.
The Minister of State, Mr Seamus Brennan, said: "There is material about me which I hope won't last to the next millennium, but this project will offer future generations a tantalising glimpse into how our young people felt at this moment in time."
Niamh Skelly, a transition-year student at St MacDara's School in Templeogue, Co Dublin, said: "It's a great idea, something unusual and different to do. I mean, we'd like to find out what it was like 1,000 years ago. But you'd be afraid to write down some things that happen in every teenager's life because older people wouldn't understand."
Damien McCaul, presenter of RTE's Den 2 children's programme, is helping to promote the project and is featured on a promotional video which will be sent to schools. "I think it's a great opportunity for students to express themselves and they're not limited in what they say," he said.
"It's up to teachers once we get the information to the schools. We will have 120,000 pages if we get a 100 per cent take-up," said Ms Purcell.
The completed Millennium Book will be presented to the President, Mrs McAleese, by students from all over the country on December 15th.