Year end celebrations still a question?

First of all wishing everyone healthy and safe 2009.
2008 was a marking year in the memories of everyone and also made significant change in me that pushed me to write my first blog. And definitely the influential people around me who made me put my thoughts in writing.
Celebrations are done when we achieve some target or end of good happenings around us. 2008 has been one of the most difficult years for world economy where recession has hit everyone's life, lot of people become jobless. Thousands of people lost their loved ones in sequel bomb blasts in all the cities. All newspapers carried only number of people died in the blasts. In the end the Mumbai terrorist attack which was hard hit to our emotions. I fail to understand what are these celebrations for, failure to overcome recession or to highlight the fact that we are not safe anywhere?