Over 4 000 years old, the famous Epic of Gilgamesh is considered the earliest surviving great work of literature. It is an epic poem recorded in ancient Sumerian cuneiform on several precious clay tablets from Mesopotamia, detailing the exploits of the King of Uruk – an old city east of the Euphrates River in present day Iraq.
Distressed over the death of his beloved friend Enkidu, Gilgamesh the Great undertakes a long and dangerous journey seeking the secret to immortality. In the second half of the narrative, he finally learns that the eternal “Life which you look for, you will never find. For when the Gods created man, they let death be his share, and life withheld in their own hands.”
Gilgamesh is seen by scholars as a historical figure who may very well have existed, a ruler so outstanding he became viewed as divine. A legendary builder who erected massive walls to defend his people, he travelled extensively and listened to the Great Flood accounts of his ancestor, Utnapishtim.
In a seminal story that was much later mirrored by the more famous Biblical Noah’s Ark, Utnapishtim is ordered by the Gods, recorded in the year 2100 BC, to construct a giant ship “The Preserver of Life” to save his family, craftsmen, baby animals and grains from the upcoming killer deluge. For his troubles, he gains perpetuity and a permanent place in the heavens.
Today, the quest to live forever remains very much on the minds of not only the extremely religious but also scientists, nutritionists, geneticists and gerontologists, who seek out the secrets to longevity by studying those among us blessed with far more than the said three score and ten years.
In the Caribbean, one such incredible woman is Jamaican, Violet Mosse Brown, 116 years young and verified as being born on March 10, 1900. The world’s second oldest surviving human, she belongs to that select group of super-centenarians, proved to have passed the mythical 110-year-old mark.
Cheerful, eloquent, “Aunt V” dwells, in quiet Duanvale, Trelawny where she was delivered a century ago, with her eldest, a son, Harold Fairweather, aged a mere 95, said to be the oldest living child with a parent alive. This year, in an extraordinary interview with the Caribbean news app, Loop, she spoke strongly and lucidly, declaring “the best time is now” following the “very hard” era “like slavery” during colonialism.
“Mi glad for long life,” Violet chuckled loudly and with great amusement added that she is so enjoying it, she would love to last another two years. “Anytime God ready for me, let me…” the matriarch mused. “There is a time for everything, but my time wouldn’t come yet” pointing out “mi nah pray for dead,” because “if God gives mi more life meh tek it. Mi can tek meh stick an walk ah go in ah meh bed, an me wan sleep inna meh room.”
A canefarmer like her late beloved, “nice” husband, Augustus Gaynor, Aunt V recalled the arduous, lengthy walks “to mek living” and in other interviews attributed her rare achievement to “hard work and good food” especially the savoured coconut milk-based “run down” a condensed island version of Guyanese metemgee, filled with fish, hearty ground provisions like sweet potato, yam and dasheen, breadfruit and garden seasonings. The green banana often comes from the successor to a tough hundred year-old parent sucker grown in her yard. With a prodigious memory and sharp eyes, the former church organist, Aunt V can still read without glasses, listens to music, and favours Lord Byron’s poem “Belshazzar’s Feast” often reciting the entire ode from memory.
The Gerontology Research Group (GRG), based in California is a global group of researchers that tracks the world’s longest lived people and follows up and validates such claims. On its online list the first 20 names are all women, several Japanese, and featuring the oldest individual alive, Italian, Emma Morano who will turn 117 on November 29 next, her remarkable life having touched three centuries.
Emma maintains, “I don’t want to be dominated by anyone,” explaining to reporters that she chose to remain single and at peace, after losing an infant son, then leaving an unhappy marriage and a violent husband in 1938. Attributing her longevity to the fact that she never remarried, the Verbania (a lakeside town) resident also feels that the eternal elixir is really the two to three raw eggs she has been guzzling daily since she was a teen. Not only has there been no sign of salmonella, but cholesterol has never bothered the charming Ms. Morano who would have eaten around 100,000 eggs in her lifetime.
Judging from the 81 or so centenarians in the 700-strong population of another amazing Italian coastal village, Acciaroli, genetics obviously play a key role in the ability to hang around. Chomping on plenty of anti-inflammatory, aromatic rosemary daily, this set also ingests fresh, healthy fare they produce or farm, are normally physically active, traversing the steep, hilly roads, existing simply and leisurely, and avoiding stress.
Mountainous, beautiful Nature-isle Dominica in the Caribbean, unsurprisingly records a disproportionately high number of the special ones, including the memorable Elizabeth “Ma Pampo” Israel who charted an astounding 128 years, but was sadly not recognised by GRG because of the absence of an indisputable birth certificate. In a set of interviews with “Ma Pampo” and some of the country’s oldest centenarians in 2002, my husband Tony recorded their proud passion for labour and diligence, natural organic homegrown meals and absolute avoidance of anything processed. Their wholesome diets ranged from bountiful basic bush teas, crisp vegetables and juicy fruits, sumptuous river and sea food, to plump dumplings, hearty callaloo soup, fat tubers and fresh water. Added to this was a strong sense of friendship, community and family, and an unbreakable belief in God.
In Grenada, patchy paperwork is also a bit of problem for the Carriacou Queen, the magnificent Masima or Leonora Noel, 114 years old, born in Venezuela, now settled in L’Esterre, who largely looks after herself, minds chickens, is so smooth-skinned, sweet and kind; climbs stairs, sings softly, manages modestly in a small wooden house near the sea, cracks jokes and of course relishes her natural nourishment.
Guyana can count among its senior superheroes, Calcutta’s Alice Alberta Crawford and the Palms’ Mortimer Lamazon, Sonny Henriques of Moco Moco who died in 2011 at 111 years of age, and Barbadian-born Guyanese Grand Dame, Ismay Winifred Spooner who passed away just after her 112th birthday. She was another indefatigable backdam and domestic worker – and pious, porridge and provisions practitioner. Each is an “eggcellent” example of enigmatic endurance.
ID hopes she has a few of her 103 year-old Indian-born strict vegetarian, great grandmother’s longevity genes, but doubts it – being the oldest surviving member of her immediate family. So she plans to eat extra eggs with rosemary, greens, ground provisions and porridge, and promptly move to Dominica.
