Posted a day late, but: “The largest crowd to attend a professional wrestling event ever assembles in Pyongyang, North Korea for the second New Japan Pro Wrestling event held in Pyongyang Stadium as part of the World Peace Festival. The show drew a crowd of 190,000, shattering the record of 150,000 from the previous day. The show was attended by Muhammad Ali…” A true workers paradise.
Via the Times: "The exhibition features 400 hand-painted posters dating from the peak of the Dear Leader Kim Sung Il's power in the 1950s to the present regime led by his son, Kim Jong Il." The article has only one image, but has several interesting propaganda quotes.
- #Young Korean Herrenvolk engaging in their version of Agoge, at least according to the New York Times. The two Korean schools mentioned in the article are similar to Exeter or Andover in the United States in someways (they are private academies that serve children of affluent parents). But my guess is that the studious atmosphere and intense regimen compare more to the likes of Stuyvesant (my alma mater) in NYC or T.J. in Virginia (both highly selective, but publicly-funded high schools).
- #North Korea claims that on 25 April 1932 the Korean People’s Army (KPA, 조선인민군/ Chosŏn inmin'gun) was formed. However, the more likely accurate date is 08 February 1948. It is celebrated as “Military Foundation Day” in Kimland.
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May 1st, 2007 at 1:09 am
In Ric Flair’s autobiography, he had this to say:
“Because of the ravages of Parkinson’s disease, it was difficult to understand Muhammad Ali when he spoke. But at one function, we were sitting at a big, round table with a group of North Korean luminaries when one of the guys started rambling on about the moral superiority of North Korea, and how they could take out the United States or Japan any time they wanted. Suddenly, Ali piped up, clear as a bell, ‘No wonder we hate these motherfuckers.’”
Flair, “To Be the Man”, p. 240
May 1st, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Thanks for my daily dose of medicinal laughter, Dogbert!
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:10 am
That’s spectacular, 190,000 must be close to a genuine World Record, if this is to be understood as “individuals being in attendance of a sports event” (as opposed to people gathering outside looking at wide-screens etc.). Do we know how many people show up for DPRK football (”soccer” to some of you) club matches? Or short track speedskating or other popular sports events, for that matter?
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:38 am
The 190,00 figure is probably correct. However, that’s not 190,000 ticket-purchasing fans; that 190,000 citizens directed to attend, if they wanted to or not.
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:08 am
Could you elaborate that remark a bit? Am I too naive in imagining that even in DPRK, people still have some choice of their own regarding which cinema or football (soccer) match or local patriotic theater production to go to on a Saturday night And if you were in Pyongyang on a bleak Saturday, learning from your comrades that 150,000 had seen M Ali the day before, and that 189,999 of them planned/were directed to go today, wouldn’t you have joined them? (And perhaps M Ali is the secret hope and role model of ca. 22 million dprk people?)
May 2nd, 2007 at 11:52 am
Actually, North Korean’s largely would not have a choice, and the vast majority would never have even heard of Ali or seen an American style wrestling match.
Mass mobilizations of the public for such events – especially those rare occasions when foreign press will be present – are the rule rather than the exception. More on that issue generally in this Daily NK article.
Such one-upmanship is no stretch. If North Korean officials learned that the 150,000 broke a world record, that they would actually order more participants for the second night (even bussing them in) to ensure they kept such a record. It may sound absurd, but that’s exactly why Juch’e Tower is about a meter taller than the Washington Monumnet and the largest granite monument of its type, Pyongyang’s arc’ d triumph is larger than the one in Paris and the largest one in the world, and why they have the tallest flagpole in the World.
February 27th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
This is really amazing. I attended the two performances and didn’t realize their significance until now.
I appreciate Richardson’s perceptive comments about oneupmanship.
I am also surprised at the numbers because as I recollect it we were in the Kim Il Sung Stadium, not the May Day Stadium which is where they have held the 100,000 performer Arirang shows since 2002. The May Day Stadium supposedly holds 150,000 viewers. Maybe because they had lots of us seated on chairs on the field surrounding the ring they were able to get that many into the Kim Il Sung Stadium. I would think I would have remembered if it was in the May Day Stadium since it is on an island in the Taedong River, whereas the Kim Il Sung Stadium is right by the Arch of Triumph.
I am now motivated to find my old folder on the show and see what memorabilia I have. Ebay here I come! (just joking)