Dressed in powder blue—her favourite— a “Birthday Girl” sash and a silver tiara, Hilda Bastian celebrated her 100th birthday in style on Wednesday in Regina.
Bastian was born in Lumsden and moved to a nearby farm when she was two.
“Dad went on the farm because the war was coming, so we got scared,” said Bastian. “There was nothing on the farm, no barn, nothing. Dad had to start from scratch.”
“It was hard, we had to peel potatoes and hoe the rest of the garden and then we got water from the slough in a barrel to water the cucumbers.”
When asked what her earliest memory was, she sighed and said “Oh, you put me on the spot!”
“I met my husband first, I knew him when he was 20-years-old. He came from Germany and I got to know him because we went to the same church,” Bastian said.
“He liked me,” she said while others at the nursing home giggled and smiled at her.
“Who’s laughing?” she asked, cracking a smile of her own.
According to her family, this isn’t out of the ordinary for Hilda, who is still sharp at 100. So what’s her secret?
“I’ve been healthy all my life, I did hard work, I helped my husband with everything and I never was sick,” Bastian said.
Bastian credits life on the farm with her husband, and the hard work that came with it, with her longevity.
“We had 200 head of chicken. That was our favourite,” Bastian recalled.
“But my husband didn’t want to help me with the chickens, he would never butcher a chicken, he wouldn’t kill anything!” she said. The room lit up again at the memory.
Although Bastian spent some time after her retirement in Victoria, she ended up back in Regina. Bastian says it’s “her city.” “It was always my city.”
Only a few of her family members could make it to her important birthday. She said “I’m very happy about you guys doing this.”
“And I’m sweating!” Bastian added, much to the entire room’s delight.