Sister Act

Siblings Mary Barritt and Lena Lenderink live together at Hamersley and as the pair are just as inseparable now as they were in childhood, it’s the ideal way for them to spend their latter years together.

It’s one of the many great things about moving into a Hall & Prior aged care home - the fact that if you want, you can choose to continue living together if you’re a couple or siblings. For sisters Mary Barritt and Lena Lenderink, residents of Hamersley Aged Care Home in Subiaco, WA, it’s meant that they can stay as close as ever, living side by side as they grow old together. Lena, 91, was born in Subiaco, and married Jack in 1980. She would go on to own a small business in Halls Head, Mandurah but remained close to her sister Mary, 86, over the years. Her daughter Rita visits the pair regularly and keeps in touch with her mother and aunt.

“As children, we used to like sleeping near each other,” says Lena. “It made us feel safe.” There’s some dispute between the pair about who was the dominant one as they grew up. Lena says Mary was bossy but Mary says that Lena was the sister who was in charge.

Mary was born five years later in 1936, and by now the family had moved from Subiaco to Kalgoorlie, a country town famous for having an enormous mine site called the Super Pit. Visible from space, this huge scar on the landscape is one of the largest open-cut mines on earth and the biggest gold mine in Australia. About 900,000 ounces of gold are harvested here each year, making a total of 50 million ounces since it started operating in 1989. The hole is approximately 3.7 kilometres long, 1.5 kilometres wide and around 480 metres deep - big enough to bury Uluru.

TOGETHER FOREVER Mary Barritt and Lena Lenderink, sisters who live together at Hamersley Aged Care Home in Subiaco, WA. Inset, The Super Pit in Kalgoorlie, near where the pair grew up.

DID YOU KNOW?

Two Japanese sisters were confirmed as the world’s oldest living identical twins and the oldest ever identical twins at the age of 107, according to a 2020 news report. Born on November 5, 1913, Umeno Sumiyama and Koume Kodama were 107 years, said the Guinness World Records in 2020. They were born on Shodo Island, Kagawa prefecture, into a family of 13. The pair now live in separate care homes. Guinness World Records sent the twins their certificates and care home staff said Sumiyama burst into tears when she saw it. “Koume, whose memory is not what it once was, sadly couldn’t fully comprehend the significance of receiving the certificate,” continues the statement:

Meanwhile, the oldest male identical twins ever verified by Guinness World Records were Dale and Glen Moyer, from the US, who both reached the age of 105. Born in 1895, they became the oldest living twins on January 23, 2000. Japan is known for its supercentenarians - a person who is 110 years old or older - and many records have been achieved in the country, said Guinness World Records. Among their number is the oldest person living, Kane Tanaka, who is 118. Tanaka has twice survived cancer, lived through two global pandemics. He’s said to love fizzy drinks. It’s a dry, dusty kind of a place and perhaps because of this, both sisters still love sitting outside together in the sunshine. “We are very close and worry if we can’t see each other or sit together,” says Mary. Mary married Alan and has a son Gian, who lives in Melbourne. She worked as a bookkeeper until the 1990s and now is a firm fan of watermelon, party pies, jelly, soup and bread. Lena, meanwhile, loves curry, egg sandwiches, pizzas and satay wraps. As they enjoy their golden years together back in Subiaco, the pair remain touchingly affectionate and close, just as they have for their whole lives.

“When we walk together, we hold hands and sleep on the chairs together,” says Lena. “We will always look after each other.”

To find out more about shared accommodation options, visit hallprior.com.au