Octogenarian granny shows how graceful aging could be (2)

Photo of Hasen in 1956. (Photo/Chinanews.com)

With her carefully applied makeup, outstanding outfit choices, and positive attitude towards aging, an 82-year-old granny in north China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region has inspired many people to enjoy the process of growing old gracefully.

Over the past years, Hasen, an art enthusiast, has acted as an artistic advisor to the middle-aged and senior model committee in Hohhot, capital of Inner Mongolia, and the deputy director of a cheongsam association in the region. She has also been a jury member for some fashion show competitions.

“Women should live it up in style at any age. While getting older, you also need to spruce yourself up and shouldn’t spend all your time taking care of grandchildren,” Hasen said, adding that elderly women should spend their old age gracefully.

As a young woman, she was a music teacher and was skilled at playing musical instruments and dancing.

When she worked for the region's nationalities affairs committee in 1986, Hasen was a co-author of the region's first book about traditional Mongolian costumes, which was published about two years later.

This early experience gave her a fondness for making Mongolian robes. Instead of learning the skill from others, she decided to undertake the entire process herself, from designing to tailoring and sewing.

To reach the goal, Hasen went to Beijing and copied textbooks on costume design from a university's library and then applied the knowledge she acquired from those books.

In recent years, the elderly woman has designed various kinds of Mongolian costumes, including evening dresses, ordinary clothes, and even shepherd-themed clothes.

She has also made intricate accessories to match the Mongolian costumes, including headwear and earrings. In addition, she has made cheongsams, a traditional Chinese dress, and accessories by herself.

Hasen suffers severe hearing loss in her old age, but that has not stopped her from pursuing a colorful life in her twilight years.

She set up a model team consisting of middle-aged and elderly women and taught them how to walk the runway. At the age of 79, Hasen began to learn traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy. “You're never too old to improve your artistic ability," she said.

The octogenarian now still directs the model team’s rehearsals and teaches traditional costume-making techniques, and sometimes offers guidance online.