Mick Hartley

If you have tears, prepare to shed them now. From an item entitled Reason Why He Left Stick in Car, at the Korean Central News Agency:

President Kim Il Sung in his eighties made round of fields on a Sunday in the middle of June, Juche 83 (1994), the last days of his life.

He visited a cooperative farm that day when a strong wind came from the West Sea, raising dust on the field path.

After saluting the President, an official courteously said that he should refrain from walking along the rugged path across fields in the windy weather.

The President said that it didn't matter and he could walk any rugged path for the wellbeing of the people.

Stepping towards fields, he acquainted himself with the estimated maize production per hectare and expressed satisfaction over the fact that the farm raised good crops. He stated that other farms, too, should do farming like this and should produce large amounts of humus to raise good crops for the year. And then he acquainted himself with dry field irrigation.

Time glided along and the sun began to sink in the west. The wind became still stronger.
The officials accompanying him told the President repeatedly that he should turn back as the wind blew hard. But he continued to walk along the field path, noting that only by being exposed to such wind longer could they bring about a rich harvest.

Going round the fields for a long time, he left the farm, leaving the words that he would re-visit it.

But nobody knew that it was the field path along which he walked in the last moments of his life.

After his demise, the people came to know that that day he walked along the field path with his stick left in the car lest the people should worry themselves about him.

Being told about the story, people wailed, walking again and again the field path marked by the footsteps of the President in the last moments of his great life.