“Eat good food and take good rest!” is the key to lov­ing a long and healthy life says new cen­te­nar­i­an Sybil Wil­son who cel­e­brat­ed her 100th birth­day on Valen­tine’s Day.

Wil­son was recog­nised as part of the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices Na­tion­al Salu­ta­tions to Cen­te­nar­i­ans Pro­gramme.

The Na­tion­al Cen­te­nar­i­an Pro­gramme seeks to pro­mote a sense of so­cial in­clu­sion and es­teem among cen­te­nar­i­ans giv­en their con­tri­bu­tions to the de­vel­op­ment and over­all suc­cess of our na­tion.

Speak­ing to rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the min­istry, Wil­son said the fes­tiv­i­ties be­gan on Sun­day when she at­tend­ed the Church of the Na­tiv­i­ty Ro­man Catholic Church, Crys­tal Stream, Diego Mar­tin, where she re­ceived flow­ers and com­men­da­tions from the at­ten­dees at her church.

Re­count­ing fond mem­o­ries, Wil­son said she met her hus­band Rudolph Wil­son in 1952 when he took her out to dance and danc­ing still re­mains her pas­sion as she still dances to some of her favourite ca­lyp­soes by Spar­row and Lord Kitch­en­er.

Wil­son, who was born in Scar­bor­ough, To­ba­go, said she would vis­it her un­cle in Laven­tille and even­tu­al­ly moved to Trinidad for a change in scenery.

She al­so said that de­spite the events of World War II, “grow­ing up was love­ly days.”

Giv­ing ad­vice to the younger gen­er­a­tion, Wil­son said that the younger gen­er­a­tion should fo­cus on their ed­u­ca­tion.

“Get a schol­ar­ship, learn a trade and look for some­thing you like and make your fu­ture come alive,” she said.

Al­so mark­ing the mile­stone was her 90-year-old sis­ter, Beat­rice Alexan­der and son, Earl Wil­son.

Mr Wil­son com­mend­ed the min­istry for ho­n­our­ing his moth­er while she was alive, not­ing that his un­cle re­ceived a sim­i­lar award by the then-Pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed States George W Bush when he turned 104.

He al­so al­so not­ed that keep­ing fit great­ly con­tributed to his moth­er’s good health and longevi­ty as his moth­er still ex­er­cis­es and his fa­ther ran twice around the Sa­van­nah for 45 years be­fore he passed away at age 99.

As part of the Na­tion­al Cen­te­nar­i­an Pro­gramme, Mrs Wil­son re­ceived a Cer­tifi­cate of Achieve­ment and Ho­n­our, a ham­per, a care pack­age and oth­er items.

She al­so re­ceived a per­son­alised birth­day cake spon­sored by the Kiss Bak­ing Com­pa­ny.

Per­sons wish­ing to reg­is­ter for the pro­gramme can vis­it the min­istry’s web­site at www.so­cial.gov.tt and com­plete the on­line form or print a down­load­able form for com­ple­tion. Com­plet­ed forms may be dropped off at the near­est So­cial Wel­fare Of­fice or emailed to the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing at opic@so­cial.gov.tt.

For more in­for­ma­tion, per­sons may con­tact the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing at 623–2608; Ext 2002 to 2009 or 800- OPIC (6742).

Join­ing in the cel­e­bra­tions were Man­ag­er of Cor­po­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions and Ed­u­ca­tion Unit and Reena Dass-Ramkissoon, In­spec­tor II of the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing un­der the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices.