Happy Mother's Day To All The Mothers In The World & Specially To My Mother
It was a recent phenomena to my knowledge, Mother's Day is celebrated quite grandly and with huge publicity. An aura of business laced celebration in the air, I would recon, with slight apology! I hadn't heard, in my childhood anything like that! I just embrace and feel comfortable of the notion and physical presence of my dear mother almost all the time except when I'm in school or joining out any outdoor activities. There wasn't any special Happy Mother's day celebration but just experienced my mum being `happy mother all day, every day'' with her children!
She never misses her duty to ensure we (siblings) are taken care and fed lavishly though on a moderate choices - simple but wonderful food. There's no maid of grandma' to babysit all day long. A mere 100% protection veil were imposed on us. This also maketh the modern mums unable to match on amount of quality time spent with children. Mums of yesteryear's makes and takes her days 100% and set their eyes on their kids.
Kids welfare comes first and at all cost. She may have not taken her meal, missed her lunch, was grabbed of dinner food pieces from her mouth by her kids (asking for more), lack food altogether or suffering from fatigue, sick and other ailments; still she cares for her Born's first and foremost! We rarely heard mothers abandoning their offspring's or neglect if their child is ``abnormal'' nor be such abusive/cruel beyond description as how we read in papers in present day. They are however, firm and hard in exercising punishment and reprimanding. The famous quote after getting smacking is, ``It's for your own good and it pains me more than you do''. These usually never last long. Inflicting pains or scars never were or meant to be after all. Just a `strong impression' that will remind us not to repeat in the future.
That's tells many a reason why kids brought up in those days rarely becomes a liability to families or society but a high calibre/productive citizens. She knew, we are naughty kids but just that, nothing else. As we roam to adjacent kampongs, secondary jungles or stroll up in a laid back town, she could know where we will be! We slowly would creep back into house when all ``activity in the house'' are at standstill, an indication she is sleeping or lay down for a nap. That would be the best time to sneak quietly that our steps were so slow and no noise could be heard! We then, would pretend to sleep along , shirts drenched with sweats .
Mum would just make a ``blaring noise'' soon when she woke up. We will just keep pretending to sleep!! Just wait and when the right moment comes, when she finishes preparing evening tea and when the splendid aroma of `karipap goreng'', or ``lepat pisang'', or ``steamed pulut'' or any of the traditional kuih's in the size you could not imagine in this days passes our nostrils. Like zombies walking in sleep, we then tread courageously to the kitchen, see if we could lay our hands and ``wallop'' heart fully! The moment we lay our hand in the basket, she would would just ``tap'' on our hand and chides our ``antiques'' and smiles herself seeing us ``stuffing'' our stomach, as though that we had been starved for so many days!
Of course there were so many incidents and moments of despair, painful, life and death situation conditions she went trough in ensuring we are on right track and be good citizen of the country and be proud of our success or join in the sadness during ``trial periods'' in our lives. We definitely owed her so much and can't be paid in full in our many ``life times''. I know there are millions of mothers out there who are going through many trials, tribulations and challenges in raising their kids for a better future and to be proud as well. There are also fathers who acts as mothers, raising kids single handed. We have to solute them as well. Motherliness too has it's root in man!
To all the mothers out there, wishing all of you `Happy Mother's Day' and Special Happy Mother's Day to my mum in Segamat!
