SAINT AMBROSE, Marisol Islands (CNM) -- Parliament in this coral-ringed archipelago voted 11-2 on Monday to nudge the international date line another 40 miles to the east, a move officials said would guarantee the islands see the first sunrise of the year 2000.

The international date line, as currently understood by the Marisol Islands

It is the second such adjustment in seven months. In May, the Marisols leapfrogged the neighboring Kingdom of Tavai, which promptly announced its own shift. "We simply moved it back," said Tourism Minister Ezekiel Pomare, holding up a map with several lines crossed out in pencil.

The stakes are not merely symbolic. Hotels on the main island report every room booked through New Year's Day, many by tour groups that paid a premium to be "first into the future." One resort is selling sunrise-viewing spots on its jetty by the square foot.

Cartographers abroad have expressed weary amusement. "We have printed three atlases since spring, and all of them are wrong," said a spokeswoman for a European map publisher, who asked that the company not be named because it was "still deciding which ocean to put them in."