It's Mother's Day again, with its rush to book tables in restaurants and order bouquets of flowers. In spite of its modern commercialisation, traditional celebrations of motherhood have existed throughout the world for thousands of years, going back in Europe to Greco-Roman festivals, and early Christian traditions.

Different countries have different dates to honour their mothers. Here in Singapore, we celebrate this day in May in tandem with the United States, which has a more modern relationship to the holiday, celebrating it first only in 1907.