How do you live past 100? The late doctor Li Shu-pui might well have advised you to stay faithful to your spouse.
The secret to his healthy 102-year life, the former Hong Kong Sanatorium and Hospital superintendent once joked to his son, Walton, was that he did not have the stress of juggling a mistress with his wife.
Shu-pui died in 2005, three months after his wife, Dr Ellen Li, who was 98. Walton, HKSH's current superintendent, says: 'I never saw [my parents] arguing.'
Shu-pui and Ellen were even-tempered. He, a private sector pioneer of Western medicine in Hong Kong, never raised his voice; she, an advocate of gender equality and social justice, was never one to hold a grudge.
Even as Shu-pui approached his 100th birthday, he still put in a full day's work. He chaired daily hospital meetings, took 15-20 minute post-lunch naps, and saw patients in the afternoon. At home, he studied medical journals and the latest medical technology.
Ellen was the first woman Justice of the Peace (1948) and legislative councillor (1966), defeated cancer in her 50s, dedicated the next 20 years to public and community service through the Ellen Li Charitable Foundation, and spent her retirement playing mahjong.
'Longevity is in the genes,' Walton says. 'We try to prevent external factors from affecting that potential.'
