Earlier this month Emma Morano received news informing her that an American woman a few months older than her had died, making her – at 116 years old – the world’s oldest known person.
Ms Morano, an Italian who lives along in a one-bedroom apartment in a small lakeside town near the Swiss border, was born in the northern Italian region of Piedmont on November 29, 1899.
When she heard the news, The Telegraph reported that she said to her caregiver Rosi Santoni, “my word, I’m as old as the hills”.
Considered in good health for her age, Ms Morano credits her years to eating a raw egg daily (which she was told to do by a doctor who diagnosed her as anemic when she was a teenager), going to bed early, and being single.
And perhaps they are the secrets – she’s the only person still alive to have been alive across three very different centuries.
As for her long term status as a single woman, Ms Morano said leaving an unhappy marriage in 1938 was a good decision.
“I didn’t want to be dominated by anyone,” she said.
As for working, she had a role at a factory, and then as a cook, retiring at 75, 41 years ago. That’s a lifetime to reflect on a lifetime!
Image via the Washington Post.
Good Mediterranean diet!