Posted on 06/15/2004 12:04:42 PM PDT by freepatriot32
SHAITIYA, Lebanon (June 15) - A Lebanese woman who has documents saying she was born in 1877 -- making her at least 126 years old -- could be the oldest person in the world.
Hamida Musulmani, frail and wrinkled but still working on her family's farm in south Lebanon, showed Reuters this week a document from Lebanon's 1932 census which lists her birth year as 1877.
She feels well, she said, but complained of failing sight.
Local officials said her papers were authentic, although they date from a year when she would already have turned 55.
If the census papers are accurate, Musulmani would now be four years older than the oldest person officially documented -- a Frenchwoman who died seven years ago at the age of 122.
Musulmani comes from a Shi'ite Muslim farming family. Documents show her husband Ali was born in 1890, which would have made him 13 years younger than his wife. He died in 1960.
Musulmani said she had stopped eating meat many years ago. Though her family grows and dries tobacco, she does not smoke.
"I only eat what I grow," she said. "I am fine, it is only my eyes that cannot see properly."
She says she has about 100 descendants, the youngest of whom is 10 months old.
The world's longest-lived person with reliable documentation was Jeanne-Louise Calment of France, who died in 1997 aged 122 years and 164 days, according to the Guinness Book of World Records
The deal with this lady was probably a scam forty years back to qualify for some benefits that Lebanon offered when it was still a country.
At least all of those womyn now have a long life to look forward to!
My great-grandma is 105. She has now lived in three different centuries.
mmmm...I like mature women.
I'm just hoping to reach 59 on the 29th of this month.
There's a "flying carpet" joke there someplace...
Why?
Why?
You'll have to change your user name. I suggest staying 58 forever.
Agreed....I bet she was born in 1897....and somehow they recorded the documents as 1877.
I don't know. Isn't that White House reporter older than this lady? She sure looks like she is.
Muslim women don't live that long, their men don't let them.
Even if they're dead?
LOL!!!
As a way to reflect we went through all of the amazing things she would have went through in life. McKinley was President when she was born. WWI and WWII, Korean War, Vietnam, Gulf Storm, Pearl Harbor, 9/11 etc. It is simply amazing.
I always see chinese, japanese, european and american women who are in the running for the worlds oldest.
I've never seen or heard of a muslim and since a part of the philosophy of their cult is to lie to infidels I believe this is just a scam.
Hey, a few shots of BOTOX and she'll look as good as Tay-Ree-Zah Heinz/Kerry!
All she needs is Botox treatments and teeth to join Kerry on his ticket.
OK
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