After the Sinterklaas craze with all the rhyme writing and gift hiding, and a relatively quiet Christmas dinner with the family, New Year's Eve in Holland is another staggering feast, with many neighborhoods becoming like a Baghdad air raid due to fireworks.

Compared to the relaxed attitude it has towards prostitution and soft drugs, the Dutch government imposes a very strict policy on fireworks, in that individual citizens are only allowed to set them off once a year on New Year's Eve.

Apart from the small fireworks for decorating cakes, fireworks can only be bought here from three days prior to New Year's Eve, and can only be used between 10 a.m. Dec. 31 and 2 a.m. Jan. 1.

Driven by the excitement this rare opportunity provides, children and young people around this time seem to only talk about how many of these explosive products they are going to buy, with neighborhood stores like bicycle shops becoming ad-hoc fireworks stalls to meet their needs. At the same time, large amounts of illegal and dangerous fireworks are smuggled in from China, with greater sound, light and explosive power.

The result is scorched earth on New Year's Day.

New Year's 2008 saw one death, 1,100 injuries, 22 schools and 400 cars set on fire, with fire engines in the city of The Hague alone called out 800 times. [New Year's 2009 has so far seen two people's eyes be gouged out by explosives — see Page 20.]

Damage on that one night is estimated to have been €47 million (¥6 billion).

There was also a considerable amount of damage in the quiet suburban area where I live. But while I am fully aware of the seriousness of damage fireworks can cause, I wonder if I'm the only one who ponders: "If they were legal here all year round, would there be so much excitement that seems to lead to so much damage?"

A few years back, when I wrote an investigative article about prostitution in Holland, one argument I heard was that prostitution was a necessary evil that was impossible to eradicate. And given that premise, the Dutch government took the pragmatic approach to legalize it and have better control over the industry — with the added bonus of being able to tax it. The theory also goes that by having prostitution (and also soft drugs) legal and readily available, Dutch citizens were treated as mature adults who can make their own decisions. But when something is readily available, it's not so attractive anymore — which helps decrease the abuse of such controversial items.

You can buy fireworks all year round in Japan, and I have never seen a situation there like New Year's Eve in Holland. I was also curious why the Dutch government had such a seemingly disproportionate policy on fireworks compared to prostitution and soft drugs.

I raised the issue with Stichting Comite Staakt het vuren, an organization that aims to ban the use of fireworks by individuals.

According to Paul Steverink, its chairman, the Dutch political parties avoid discussing fireworks as if they are taboo because so many people look forward to the yearly indulgence and they are afraid to lose votes.

While Steverink said his group wants to ban private fireworks as "they gave gone far out of proportion," he believes that it is important to trigger discussions because there have been too few thus far.

"We want people to discuss and decide for themselves whether fireworks should be legalized like prostitution or soft drugs. We also want to encourage young people to think of a creative and inventive way to pass New Year's Eve, in a way that does not harm the environment or people," Steverink said.

Yumi Wijers-Hasegawa is a former reporter for "The Japan Times" who lives in the Netherlands.