One of the oldest people on the planet, 121-year-old Appaz Iliyev from the Russian republic of Ingushetia, has got his sight back thanks to a successful surgery. Born in 1896, the man still works daily in his garden in the North Caucasus mountains.

The surgery on one of the oldest people alive was performed by doctors at a regional hospital in Ingushetia, Russian media reported Saturday citing local authorities. Iliyev, who had been suffering from cataracts, spent only one day at the hospital before returning to his village high in the mountains. At this stage, one of his eyes was treated, with specialists predicting a full sight recovery for their special patient, TASS reported.

“After the surgery, he had no complaints. The old man claimed he could see much better,” the agency cited doctors as saying. Before the surgery, the man was apparently distressed he couldn’t read the Koran. “Now that's in the past,” according to local authorities.

Born in March 1896, Appaz has been married twice and raised eight children. He now has 35 grandchildren, Rossiyskaya Gazeta reports. The old man says his raison d’etre is his family and also hard work. Every day he works in his garden, rarely leaving his home village.

“He only left his native mountains to fight during the [1917] revolution and World War II,” the man's nephew said. A teetotaller who has never smoked, Appaz leads a healthy lifestyle, only eating produce from his farm and drinking spring water.

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According to Russia’s Book of Records, the oldest person living in the country is Nanu Shaova from Kabardino-Balkaria, also in the North Caucasus. Born in 1890, the woman is said to be 127 years old. This makes her ten years older than Japanese woman Nabi Tajima, 117, who tops the list of the world’s officially verified oldest living people.