JEDDAH — Every year, Mother's Day is celebrated worldwide including Arab countries to honor motherhood, to strengthen the mother-child bond, demonstrate children's appreciation for their mothers, and shed light on mothers' role in raising children and their influence in their societies. Mother's Day falls on a different day in different countries. For example, it is the first day of spring in the Arab world, which is March 21; in Norway it is February 2, in Argentina it is October 3, and in South Africa it is May 1. The festival takes place every year on the second Sunday in May in the United States and Germany, and on December 22 in Indonesia. But who owns the concept and where did it come from? The credit of starting the Mother's Day celebrations in Arab countries goes to Egyptian journalist Ali Amin, publisher of the Akhbar el-Yom newspaper, who conceived the idea of Mother's Day in 1955, according to the book "Ali Amin: the Journalist and the Human". The late journalist received a letter in the readers' mail, in which a mother complained about her children's mistreatment of her and their denial of the hard work and time she invested in raising them. When their father died, she refused to marry again for her children's sake. She remained with her children until all of them grew up, graduated from university and married. However, when each of them had their own life, they no longer visited her except when it was convenient for them. This is how the idea of marking Mother's Day as a national holiday originated in the East. On this day, the children give their mothers gifts and write sincere comments thanking them for their hard work and the sacrifices they made in their lives to bring them up. Ali Amin proposed celebrating Mother's Day in an article he wrote, saying, "Why don't we agree on a day in the year that we'll call Mother's Day, and make it a national holiday in our country and the countries of the East, on which sons and daughters give their mothers small gifts and write them letters in which they express their gratitude and pray for their protection? Why don't we encourage children to treat their mothers like queens on Mother's Day, prohibiting them from working and taking on all of their household responsibilities in her place? But when do we call it Mother's Day?" Many people praised the article, and many of them responded to the invitation. As a result, March 21, the first day of spring, was chosen as Mother's Day, and it has since become a symbol of beauty, flower blooming, giving, and life. In 1956, Mother's Day was first celebrated in Egypt, and it swiftly expanded throughout the Arab world. However, according to tourist expert Ahmed Diab, the idea originated in ancient Egypt during the pharaonic period. Their temples in Dendera and Samanoud attest to how they honored women and mothers, presenting them to the world as saints, and considering them to be the secret and source of life. Isis, one of the most important Egyptian deities, was a symbol of motherhood and an emblem for the ancient Egyptian mother's celebration. The ancient Egyptians, like the Greeks and Romans, held a flower procession across Egyptian cities in honor of mothers on this day. Isis eventually appeared as a sacred religious figure on certain temples in Rome, the ancient Roman Empire's capital. Diab said people regarded her as a wise lady and a magnificent mother, as their temples showed. The concept was carried down via centuries from the ancient Egyptian civilization to various cultures, and it was passed down until it took on its current form. When it comes to the origins of Mother's Day in different cultures, the first Mother's Day event in the United States took place in 1908, when Anna Jarvis conducted a memorial for her mother, after which she began a campaign to have Mother's Day recognized in the country. Anna Jarvis is an American activist born in 1864, whose mother always said: "Sometimes, somewhere, someone will call out the idea of Mother's Day." She believed that families would reunite and cease bickering if they cared more about their mothers and expressed their affection for them. And when Anna's mother died; she swore to herself that she would be the one who would make her mother's wish come true. Despite her success in 1914, when American President Woodrow Wilson accepted the idea, Anna Jarvis was disappointed because she was later accused of doing it for the sake of business. However, Jarvis' campaign ended up being adopted by different cities and is now held all over the world.
