An 86-year-old man in Turkey's Bursa province has been carrying a rose in house mouth for the past 59 years, a habit he developed after giving up smoking when he was 27, Ihlas News Agency reported Saturday.

Ali Rıza Karan, who lives in Keramet village in Bursa's Orhangazi district decided to quit smoking at the age of 27, when he realized that his smoking habit started to have negative implications for his health.

Smoking around two packages of cigarettes a day, Karan initially struggled to give up the habit, but then decided to carry a rose in his mouth to help him in the process of quitting.

"It was quite difficult for me to quit smoking in the beginning and I tried to look for means to help me quit" Karan said, adding that he started carrying a rose in his mouth, with the hope that it would make him forget about smoking.

"Itarget="_blank"'>