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MOTHER'S DAY IN REFLECTION

When I was a little girl, Mother's Day was a big deal for me. I simply couldn't wait to give my mum a greeting card and a present, which were mostly hand made, and therefore had to be planned weeks in advance. It made me very happy to give my mum a token of my love and gratitude, which often times doubled as gestures of unspoken apologies and regrets for being so stubborn and difficult. I'm 32 this year and have become a mother myself. If anything, Mother's Day has become an even bigger deal for me.

I never knew when I was growing up that not everyone celebrated Mother's Day at the same time. In Malaysia, we celebrate the event on the second Sunday of May, as do people in countries like: Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Italy, Turkey and the United States. In Thailand, Mother's Day is celebrated on 12th August, the birthday of Queen Sirikit Kitiyakara. In all, there are as many as 30 separate dates for Mother's Day celebrations throughout the world. There are also various theories to the origins of Mother's Day and they date back to ancient times. The Greeks and Romans are credited for beginning the tradition by honouring their mother goddesses Rhea and Cybele at the arrival of spring.

In the United Kingdom and Ireland, Mother's Day, originally known as Mothering Sunday', is observed on the fourth Sunday of Lent (exactly three weeks before Easter Sunday). This tradition may have begun in the 16th century, when Christians visited their mother church annually, ensuring that most mothers were reunited with their children on this day, as they came home from far and wide. In the United States, the concept of Mother's Day is thought to have been inspired by the British tradition and came into being during the Progressive Era of the 1900s, when the roles of women and mothers were rapidly changing as they stepped out of the constraints of the Victorian era. The concept was also adopted by social activist Julia Ward Howe after the American Civil War, as a call to unite women against war. The Mother's Day Proclamation', which she wrote in 1870, called for peace and disarmament. Her attempts, however, failed to receive the formal recognition of a Mother's Day for Peace.

Later, a woman by the name of Anna Marie Jarvis (1864 1948) would be recognised as the founder of Mother's Day in the US. In 1907, she held a memorial to her mother and persuaded her mother's church in Grafton, West Virginia to celebrate Mother's Day on what was to be the second

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