Picture this: Friends forever

Eight women, who were primary school classmates in Pingyang county of Zhejiang province, have taken a group photo every year since 1977 (above). Photos Courtesy of Qianjiang Evening News

Eight women from a small town in Zhejiang province's Wenzhou city have set a world record with their strong friendship and a simple vow. Bian Yi reports.

For 50-year-old Jin Jinli and seven of her closest friends, group photos are more than just for an aid for their memories. They're a decades-long tradition. And they've become the way by which the women have set a world record.

For every one of the last 35 years, Jin and her seven friends have met to take a group photo at the same studio. No matter how far they have to travel or how busy their lives are, they always meet for their annual photo.

The eight women - Cai Guili, Huang Xiaohe, Huang Xiaoping, Chen Xiaoling, Li Aiyue, Jiang Xiaofei, Huang Lili and Jin Jinli - all from Kunyang town, Pingyang county in Zhejiang province's Wenzhou city, were classmates in the first grade of primary school.

"We were very close friends in school. We went to classes together, went home together, did homework together and went to the cinema together," Jin says.

"We even had similar exam results."

Jin says the eight girls were like sisters growing up.

"We never quarreled or got angry with each other," she says.

By 1977, some of them had to quit school and get jobs to help their families. Several went to work in other cities without graduating from junior middle school.

"The happy days we spent together were so precious," Cai says.

"No one wanted to be apart. But we realized separation was an inevitable part of growing up, so we decided to take a group photo so that we could remember one another."

On July 17, 1977, the teenage girls dressed in their most beautiful clothes, wore the same braided hairstyles and took a photo in Beimen Photo Studio in Pingyang. The girls smile sweetly in the faded black-and-white photo, a trace of shyness glittering in their young faces.

Cai remembers that someone in the group then suggested that they take a photo every year. That tradition has endured over the past four decades.

Every year, the girls take turns to organize the group photo.

"In the beginning, we were single and didn't live far from one another, so it was easy to get together," Jin says.

However, as they grew older, got married, had children and even moved, it became more difficult to arrange.

"But no one has ever missed the annual gathering."

Jin quit school and went to work in Beijing for a year.

The letters from her friends were the greatest source of comfort when she was lonely in the big city, she says.

Telephones were rare in those days, so the girls wrote "combined" letters.

"Each of the girls wrote one sentence, describing the trivial things in their daily lives that were so familiar to me," Jin says.

"I often held the letter in one hand and the photo in the other, trying to making out which handwriting belonged to which girl."

Over the years, the black-and-white photos took on color, and the small-sized shots became bigger.

Even now, when they all own digital cameras, they prefer to go to the same photo studio. As the album became thicker year after year, some friends joked that they may have set a record.

When Huang Lili, one of the eight girls, told her husband about the speculation, he began to apply for "world record" status from various organizations.

On Nov 3, the eight friends were awarded a certificate for "the world's longest continuous time span for a group photo taken each year" issued by the China World Record Association (WRA), a Hong Kong-based organization that registers non-sports records.

The eight women have now sat for a group photo annually for 35 consecutive years - between 1977 and 2011, to be precise.

In the latest photo taken in November, the eight friends gathered before the camera, holding their world-record certificate.

Lin Jinglu, the owner of Beimen Photo Studio in Pingyang, has been a prime witness of the decades-long friendship.

In 1977, he was 22 and the only photographer at his new studio.

"The first time they came to my studio, I was not impressed. But then I was surprised to find that they came every year."

Lin has enjoyed watching the women grow and change.

"I saw them change from teenagers to adults, from wives to mothers, and some of them are even grandmothers now," he says.