Islands in the Sun
Created | Updated Jul 11, 2003
The Nights Are Drawing In
Yesterday I forced my parents to run me in to yet another rehearsal for the Christmas Pantomime this year. The car has been overworked recently, having had to trawl back and forth to and from town seven days a week, for as well as school, I have got myself involved in so many public events. Well, it adds up to this much - I've been struggling to find time to write an article this week, and I thought, "Hey! Just why are so many things on now?"
Orkney is a farming community. But not only that, it's also an incredibly social area - people tend to stick together, and so groups form. As a result of this, over the next few weeks, a resident of Orkney could attend the Young Farmers speechmaking competetion,
Deerness Drama Club's "Arthur Dearness and the Mermaid Bride", Kirkwall Amateur Operatic Society's "Cabaret", the Palace Player's "Sleeping Beauty"...
The list, could, literally, go on forever.
So just why are so many events happening now?
Well, Orkney is a farming community - intensive farming, and so the year is packed with tasks to perform. - sheep-dipping, field-ploughing, crop-harvesting... However, as any farmer will know, these activities are concentrated over the first two-thirds of the year. Therefore, in Orkney, as in any farming community, our main holiday is not the labour-intensive summer, but instead Winter, when the nights draw in and the festivites begin.
Although the days are shortening and the nights lengthening, the hours are now empty, and the festivites can begin.
The American Christmas has invaded Orkney, just like anywhere else, and so our shops are filled with "Outstanding Christmas Offers!" and the like, but it's still far more dumbed down more so than what we like to call "down south" - anywhere South of Orkney. This happens despite Orkney's intense religious nature - in fact, possibly beacause of it. There is no form of worshp available in Orkney other than Christian, unless it is in your own home, allthough denominations are as varied as anywhere. To taker an example, the island of Westray, with a population of around 700, has a huge 6 churches.
In this way the commercial Christmas is warded off, and that form tends to be celebrated more by the agnostics and aetheists in Orkney.
However, New Year's Day bears no such religious pressure, and so then the residents can really let go. New Years Parties, pub crawls, dances, the lot. Alcohol, of course, is consumed in enormous quantites, the brandy on the Christmas pudding not being enough.
But, to take us back to the beginning of my article, to stave off the wit for New Year, the shows commence in earnest.
So excuse me while I desert my keyboard and head off to learn my lines for "Cabaret".
