It was on a spring day when apricot and peach trees were in full bloom.
Children at Mangyongdae, as usual, climbed up Mangyong Hill following young Kim Il Sung. They played merrily, seeing flowers and chasing butterflies, before sitting around a peach tree.
The President told them to answer an interesting question.
The children waited for his next words with bated breath.
“What is the most beautiful thing in the world?”
Looking at the peach blossoms overhead, a boy answered readily, “It’s a flower.”
Then the President said smilingly, “A flower is also beautiful, but isn’t there anything more beautiful than that?”
This time, the other child pointed at a flying butterfly and said, “Butterfly is more beautiful than flower.”
But the young President shook his head again, smiling.
“Butterfly is also beautiful, but there is something more beautiful than that.”
Then the children were at a loss, their eyes wide open.
‘What could be more beautiful than flower and butterfly?’ they racked their brains.
They looked here and there and each of them said, “Oriole”, “The sky”, “River” and the like.
But still the President kept shaking his head.
Now the children kept their mouths shut in bewilderment, only looking at each other.
After a while, he stood up and looked around at the hill and river at the home village, and said that though flowers and butterflies were all beautiful, their home village, Mangyongdae, was more beautiful. He went on to say:
“Beautiful flowers and sweet butterflies and birds all live in Mangyongdae and the clear and blue Taedong River meanders round Mangyongdae. That’s why it is the most beautiful.”
Only then all the children clapped their hands, exclaiming “Wow, you are right.” And they looked round at the beautiful home village with fresh eyes.
The story on Mangyong Hill is one of the anecdotes showing the fervent love for the home village and motherland young Kim Il Sung cherished deep in his heart.
