A Cuban woman is celebrating her 125th birthday today, making her the oldest woman in the world according to the Cuban press agency AIN. 

Juana Bautista Rodríguez is not in the Guinness World Book of Records, which claims that US citizen Gertrude Baines - who died last year at the age of 115 - was the oldest woman ever recorded.

Mrs Rodriguez was born in 1885 in Granma province in the east of Cuba and lives there still. She was the second child in a family of 13 siblings. One of her three children is still alive. She also has six grandchildren, 15 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren. Her own mother reached the grand old age of 100 years.

Her long life she attributes to the pure air of the Cuban countryside, a diet of root vegetables and meat, as well as her love for her fellow man.

Cuban country air: recipe for old age - photo from Flickr.com