Slideshow: Celebrations as 2013 dawns (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/50328745/displaymode/1247/?wbSlideShowId=50328745&wbSection=travel)(http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Slideshows/_production/ss-121231-newyear/ss-121231-newyear-tease01.photoblog600.jpg) (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/50328745/displaymode/1247/?wbSlideShowId=50328745&wbSection=travel)Brendon Thorne / Getty ImagesFrom Sydney to Siberia, revelers prepare to celebrate the dawn of a new year.Launch slideshowBy NBC News staff and wire reportsUpdated at 6:20 a.m. ET: Happy new year! At least to those on Christmas Island. The Australian territory rang in 2013 at 5 a.m. ET on Monday. So did Kiribati and Samoa. They were the first populated places to do so.
More populous areas, including New Zealand, started a new calendar just an hour later, joined by Fiji and Tonga.
Meanwhile, Scotland was already a day into the party. International datelines hadn't been surreptitiously changed. Scotland was celebrating the annual festival known as Hogmanay, which kicked off Sunday night with thousands of torchbearers marching in Edinburgh to bid farewell to 2012 in a celebration drawing inspiration from pagan traditions. The Scotsman newspaper estimated that 7,000 people (http://www.scotsman.com/news/arts/hogmanay-celebrations-7000-join-torchlit-procession-1-2712683) participated in the "river of fire" through the city center.(http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/121231-hogmanay-1230a.380;380;7;70;0.jpg)David Moir / ReutersUp Helly Aa vikings from the Shetland Islands march in the torchlight procession to mark the start of Hogmanay (New Year) celebrations in Edinburgh on Dec. 30.
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