Missing you....

Mother's days is just around the corner. You can hear over the radio there are contests on who can come out with the best wishes, on-the air-greetings by children to their wonderful moms, appreciation speech etc.

Yesterday, whilst I was driving home, I heard this lady was talking about her mother and how wonderful her mom was. It was such a beautiful dedication that it touches my heart and I started to get all teary-eyed. As I keep on listening to her speech, I began to feel that she was actually describing my mom!

You see, my mom was brought up in rural area. Her father did odd jobs to support the family. She has 9 siblings and a crippled mother who suffered from stroke. When she reaches her adolescence, she defy the traditional norm and began working in a rubber estate just to help support the family. My mother had always been known for her strong character and her firmness. Despite her tough exterior, she has one of the very soft heart in the world. She was genuinely caring and always willing to go extra mile to help those in needs. I can see all her characteristics embodies into my eldest sister (though she vehemently denied this!).

My mother loves cooking. I may be seen as tooting my own horn, but to me she is the best cook in the world especially when it come to traditional dishes. Whenever there was big wedding do in our neighbourhood, she will always be called to cook the dishes. I must say, my mom was not only a good cook, she also possessed very strong managerial qualities as well. She always like to maintain high standards in her work and can get violently impatient towards shoddy workmanship. She also had very low tolerance level towards people who delay and slow at doing things. When I was young, I couldn't understand why she has to behave very violently whenever I make mistakes, but now when I look back, all the things that she did had conditioned me to be who I am now.

Though my mom was not a very physical person, you can feel the warmth and her compassion towards you with the things that she was willing to go through just to make sure her kids get everything they deserved. She will braved government agencies to ensure her kids will get a scholarship, she was always there whenever there were ceremonies to celebrate our achievements, in short she always put our priority first. It is pity that sometimes us kids were unappreciative to the things that she did for us.

Even with her grandchildren, she was always very generous with them. My kids adored her so much and will always eager to go to her place. In fact, they like her 'bedak sejuk' session so much that until to day, they still use the same 'bedak sejuk' after taking their bath. (My mom will always put the bedak sejuk - a kind of traditional facial powder to her kids and grandchildren every time after bath time. I used to hate this when I was young as it makes you look ugly - but somehow luke and nique loved it so much!)

As I was typing this entry, I didn't realise that tears began flowing down my cheek for I can never get to greet my mom 'Happy Mother's Day" anymore.

Al-fatihah...... to my late mom and thank you for all the wonderful things that you have done for me. I really, really miss you!