Happy Mother's Day

My beautiful mother and I; she is wearing a Palestinian dress (Thobe) she designed, and I am wearing a traditional Iraqi dress (Hashmi).

Mother’s Day is celebrated on this day in the Arab world, the 21^st of March. People are expected to honor, protect and take care of their mothers, as is the tradition and the culture, until their old age. However, they wanted to set aside one day in the year to be devoted to the Mothers something they learned from other countries who had been celebrating it. For example, in Norway and Argentina, Mother’s Day is celebrated on the second Sunday of February and October respectively. In South Africa it is on the first Sunday in May and in France on the last.

The idea behind celebrating Mother’s Day in the Arab World grew in Egypt. It first started as an idea in Mustafa and Ali Ameen’s newspaper Akhbaar Al Yawm (which translates to today’s news). The two brothers asked the people for their input on whether there should be a day that commemorated the mothers and remember their virtue, hard work and sacrifices. They mentioned the ‘west’ and how other countries were doing it already and that since it is an Arab person’s obligation to honor the mother then why not adopt the idea. The paper received many positives votes, some suggesting that it should be for a whole week since every day of the year should be for one’s mother and not just a single day. But the majority of the votes suggested a one day celebration. They all voted and chose March the 21^st as it was the first day of spring and it is symbolic of open-heartedness, purity, beauty and love. Egyptians started celebrating their Mother’s Day on March 21^st 1956 and from then on it spread to the rest of the Arab World.

March 21^st does not only commemorate Mother’s Day but also the Coptic New Year and the Kurdish Nawroz festival which is another way to celebrate the Kurdish cause.

So on this special day, I wish every single mother a Happy Mother’s Day! And say that you are a beautiful person inside and out. Thank you for all the love, care and warmth that you showered us with. Thank you for the sleepless nights you spent next to us when we were sick. Thank you for kissing our hurt and listening to our problems and worries. Thank you for teaching the necessary skills to survive in this world. Thank you for your constant unwavering support despite the heartache that we might have given you. Thank you for being protective. Thank you for simply everything… for giving us life! We love you! No one can fill the void a mother leaves after she passes on. No one can take over a mother’s job, a mother’s place.

To My Mother

By Edgar Allan Poe
Because I feel that in the heavens above
The angels, whispering one to another,
Can find among their burning terms of love,
None so devotional as that of "Mother,"
Therefore by that dear name I have long called you,
You who are more than mother unto me,
And filled my heart of hearts, where death installed you,
In setting my Virginia's spirit free.
My mother -- my own mother, who died early,
Was but the mother of myself; but you
Are the mother to the one I loved so dearly,
And thus are dearer than the mother I knew
But that infinity with which my wife
Was dearer to my soul that its soul-life.

Happy Mother’s Day Mom!