Galery

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Georgios Kouvaris is 103 years old and is a citizen of Ikaria Island. Not long ago scientists, CNN and National Geographic declared the island as one of the four places on earth with the most centenarians. And since we do not live in Ikaria, the least we can do is as one centenarian about the secret and whether we can steal few years and add them to our destined ones… 

Here is what Georgios Kouvaris says for the Greek newspaper Vima: “I have been working all my life – trading, I raised my children and I built my house alone – here in the Karovostamo village in Ikaria. I even built it twice, because at one point the wind and the sea took it from me. I built a house for each of my children, so they can come to the island and not forget their birth place. 

Work gives a person bread and life. A man who does not work will never reach old age. He will just die out of boredom. 

I fought in the Second World War, I went to the Middle East and passed through dozens of hardships. But those hardships made my generation resilient. The easy things never help us. 

What is the secret of living a hundred years? Good food, good wine and dancing. To laugh, to dance and not to complain and worry. Whatever is supposed to happen, will happen. A person needs to do his job and think positively. 

I have eaten many vegetables, wheat foods, fruits – everything was freshly produced here, on my island. I drunk milk and ate meat and fish only once a week. I don’t know whether this has helped me reach 103 years old but this is what we had and this is what I ate. We did not have anything else. 

A man needs sex too. But you do not need to waste your energy every day – once a week or even once every two weeks it is OK. 

Love is necessary – you need to love a woman but not too much. “Lovers kill” – we need to have only one loved woman in our lives. 

My life was good, I cannot complain. If I hadn’t lost my wife, everything was going to be better. But what should you do with those 103 years if you cannot eat and drink whatever you want and if you cannot dance?”