(The lovely panda enjoying delicious birthday cake in her cozy cave on her 25th birthday. Photo: Xinhua)
An elderly female panda gnawed a huge birthday cake while waving a bunch of flowers to the audience watching the special celebration Sunday at a panda park in this capital city of east China's Fujian Province.
The giant panda named Basi was celebrating her 25th birthday, which is equal to the age of 100 of human being. Basi has far outlived the normal panda life expectancy of about 12 years.
The famous superstar with regular appearances on Chinese television is a nimble weight lifter, basketball player and cyclist.
Adopted as the panda mascot "Pan Pan" for the 11th Asian Games hosted by Beijing in 1990, it has charmed large audiences at the opening ceremony of the grand activity.
It toured the United States for six months in the late 1980s to promote wildlife conservation and was a great hit in its western coastal areas.
But the aging panda has suffered from high blood pressure, cataract and neural disease. The cataract was removed from her right eye in a medical operation in 2002 by Chinese doctors, the first of its kind on the endangered species.
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Producer:
Xie Qiao 
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