JOK_0293_f1xMatsu Zakimi (with purple eyeshadow applied by her great-granddaughter) during the celebration for her 97th birthday,at a nursing home near Ogimi Village. Most of the community has turned out to honor the birthdays of three residents. (These are traditional Japanese birthdays, not the actual birth dates—88, for example is celebrated on the eighth day of the eighth month in the lunar calendar.) Musicians, dancers, and comedians perform as well wishers cheerfully gorge on sushi, fruits, and desserts washed down with beer and saki. (Supporting image from the project Hungry Planet: What the World Eats). Their fellow Okinawans, The Matsuda family of Yomitan Village, Okinawa, with one of their own centenarians, is one of the thirty families featured, with a weeks’ worth of food, in the book Hungry Planet: What the World Eats. Takeo Matsuda, 88, and his wife Keiko, 75, live together with Takeo’s mother, Kama, 100. (Please refer to Hungry Planet book p. 186-187 for a family portrait [Image number JOK03.0001.xxf1rw] including a weeks’ worth of food, and the family’s detailed food list with total cost.) See also: JOK03.0376.xf1b Hara hachi bu—”eat only until 80 percent full”—say older Okinawans. The island has been the focus in recent years of researchers trying to discover why a disproportionately large number of Okinawans are living to age 100 or more. Some scientists attribute this longevity to the island’s unique, unbeatable combination of healthy eating habits, exercise, and low stress, as well as a community commitment to ensuring the quality of its older citizens’ lives. Sadly, although the island is being studied for clues to the oldest generation of Okinawan’s great longevity, studies say that the younger population will not live as long because of their diets higher in saturated fats and calories.