Our remote island celebrates New Year on January 13

The remote Shetland Islands are celebrating their traditional New Year’s Day two weeks later than the rest of the world.

Foula – which is home to fewer than 40 people – never fully adopted the modern Gregorian calendar, preferring instead to follow some traditions of the Julian calendar.

Therefore the islanders celebrate Christmas on January 6 instead of December 25 and New Year on January 13.

“We’ve always done it that way,” one islander told BBC Scotland News.

More than four centuries ago, Pope Gregory XIII designed the calendar used today to replace the Julian calendar, which had miscalculated the number of days it took for the Earth to revolve around the Sun.

Faula residents do not follow the Julian calendar as a strict daily rule due to the practicalities of island life, as they have to fit it in with things like plane and ferry timetables.

However Christmas Day and New Year’s Day are different.

Foula is about 16 miles from the Shetland mainland Claims to be Britain’s most remote inhabited island,

It is less than five miles long, and is powered by wind turbines, water power and solar panels, with generators for backup.

It is served by a ferry that runs between the island and Shetland, and there are also regular flights to the island from Tingwall Airport, just outside Lerwick.

The island was one of the last places in Shetland where the Old Norn language, a relic of the Norse period, was spoken.

The latest population count was 36.

Like many of those Islanders, 27-year-old Robert Smith wears many hats.

These include crewing a boat, working in a water treatment plant, taking tours and delivering mail when needed.

“We do anything and everything,” he said. “You have to stay busy. Everyone contributes to this.”

He spent part of his life in mainland Shetland during his education, and has experienced “the best of both worlds” by celebrating two Christmas Days and two New Year’s Eves in the same 12-month period.

On Faula’s calendar differences, he said: “I think growing up it felt unique.

“But our New Year has similarities with first-footing. You go to houses with drinks, stay a while and meet up. Then maybe home for dinner and then off to a party somewhere for a few hours.

“In Foula it’s family-oriented, it’s more intimate, and we’re always playing music together. It’s something the island is known for. It’s a good bonding thing.

“We’ve always done it that way.”

He started playing guitar, then moved on to mandolin, and is now trying to learn the mandolin, all “just for fun”.

He added, “Christmas is similar, with most people staying home in the morning to look for gifts and spend time together.

“There were probably different traditions in the past that have been lost – people would go and kill birds for cooking.”

Population levels can fluctuate but Mr Smith described things as being in a healthy state at the moment.

“Most small islands may have older people but we are doing well,” he said.

“We have a lot of children and young people.

“I think Foula feels very relaxed and free, with no one breathing down your neck.”

For New Year’s Day he said he would follow the traditions he learned from his mother and grandmother – doing something you want to do well for the rest of the year.

This might possibly have included crofting work, or gardening, or fishing.

“It’s a symbolic effort to bring good luck,” he said.

“I’ve got a croft house I’m trying to build, so I can do some plastering.”

Another islander, who declined to be named, said, “Yule Day on the 6th works the same as the 25th for most people.

“The unique thing is that we try to go to every house and have a big party with music and singing.

“It seems to be less commercialized and more rooted in traditions. It’s important to maintain these old traditions.”

Islanders were lucky enough to have “kind of” a white Christmas amid the cold this year, he said, with the hills still getting some snowfall.

“And New Year’s is not Hogmanay like the rest of the country, with the 13th being the same day as the first,” he explained.

“It’s just like Yule Day, with a big party at the end of the evening.”

Crofter echoed: “We try to do a little bit of everything for the coming year, a little bit of each thing that involves you.

“And I’ll go and collect some driftwood from the shore, which is a tradition for good luck.”