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| Misao Okawa, the world's oldest person, turned 116 last Wednesday. Photo: Getty |
In the year in which Misao Okawa was born in Osaka, Queen Victoria was still on the British throne, the Spanish American War was raging and Horatio Kitchener triumphed in the Battle of Omdurman.
The daughter of a kimono-maker from Japan’s second city, Okawa assumed the title of the oldest person in the world after the death of 116-year-old Jireomon Kimura in June 2013.
Experts say it is no coincidence that both record-holders are from Japan, which was home to 54,397 centenarians on the last Respect for the Aged national holiday in September - including 282 super-centenarians, who have achieved the ripe old age of 110.
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| Misao Okawa pictured with her older sister, circa 1900. |
"Mrs Okawa eats three large meals a day and makes sure that she sleeps eight hours a night," said Tomohito Okada, the head of the Kurenai retirement home where she has lived for the last 18 years.
"She insists that her favourite meal is sushi, particularly mackerel on vinegar-steamed rice, and she has it at least once every month," he said.
Asked about the happiest moments of a life that has now spanned three centuries, Okawa unhesitatingly recalls her marriage in 1919 to Yukio Okawa and the birth of their three children. Her surviving son and daughter have clearly inherited her genes and are now aged 94 and 92.
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By Julian Ryall
www.smh.com.au
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