In my country, we mark this day with flowers – here it’s about empowerment and equality
IAM Hungarian but when I was 18, I moved to Scotland to study journalism at university. Before then, every year on Women’s Day, I received flowers from my dad, other men in my family, classmates and friends.
I grew up looking forward to this day, which felt like a celebration of womanhood and femininity. In Hungary, it was a compulsory holiday during the Soviet era and was celebrated first in 1913.
Although its ties to socialism have died down, flowers are still a customary gift given to girls and women throughout the country.
Today, International Women’s Day is observed worldwide, including in Scotland – but not the way I remember it from my childhood.
Now, at 26 and living in Glasgow, I think about womanhood very differently. I haven’t received any Women’s Day flowers in a long time. Instead, as an honorary Scot, I focus on empowerment and equality.
Admittedly, it took me a few years to get used to the way the day is observed here – as firstly, not everyone is aware of it, and secondly, it’s primarily women marking it by organising talks, marches and gatherings.
Social media fills up with pictures posted by women uplifting each other, and maybe companies will put up some signs.
I think this is powerful and important but I can’t help and ask myself: Where are the men?
The comforting aspect of receiving flowers used to be that the recognition came from an external source, whereas here, it seems we have to make things happen for ourselves.
This makes me respect the women of this country, who demand this day to discuss issues that we all face in our everyday lives, sometimes so often that we don’t even mention them any more. When I was 19 and working in a cafe, the owner told me I should quit studying and become a waitress full-time because “serving people suited me”.
On the same day, I heard him tell a colleague – a man – he should go back to university because he was wasting his life making tea for people. The weight of this remark has never left me.