Reason for leaving the stick in the car

Generally, people know that walking sticks serve for people to walk and they are also used for other purposes.

The blind are difficult to walk without walking sticks and those who have inconvenience in their legs are relying on them to walk and others carry them for show.

Although walking sticks are usually used for various purposes but they are commonly used for people with uncomfortable bodies.

Our people burst into tears when they came to know the story about the walking stick of President Kim Il Sung after his demise as that walking stick failed to fulfil its mission in his whole lifetime.

Chairman Kim Jong Il said:

"He trained our people into excellent people, established our advantageous socialist system and worked energetically to the last moment of his life to provide our people with still greater happiness."

The President continued his on-the-spot guidance to cooperative farms amid the scorching heat even in his 80-year-old age warmly saying that he would stay in the rice field forever with the peasants till he realized his earnest wish to let the people eat to their hearts' content.

In retrospect, most of the field guidance given by the President was carried out on the rice fields.

Reminiscent traces of the field guidance left by the President on rice fields of the whole country are beyond enumeration.

They include Mirim Plain where he transplanted rice seedlings for the first time in the liberated country, Wonhwa Plain where he planted the seeds with peasants in the flames of the war, Junghwa Plain where he spent his first birthday with the peasants after the victory of the war, Chongsan-ri, Rihyon-ri, Yonbaek Plain and Kumdang Plain.

Although he was the elder statesman and a president of a country recognized by the world, there was always a thermometer in his pockets and a straw hat in his car by which he gave on-the-spot guidance throughout the country.

Our people were well aware of the fact that the President had travelled the ridges between rice fields till the last moments of his life, saying that the anxiety of his whole life was relieved by the fragrance of grain spilled over the fields, but they did not know how much physical burden he had to overcome during those days.

Dufu, a Chinese poet, once said, "70 is rare in life". It means that there were few 70-year-old men in the past while it is considered to be difficult to maintain their health at this age. But the President continued his on-the-spot guidance to the rural areas in his over 80s.

One Sunday in mid-September, Juche82(1993), when he gave on-the-spot guidance to the Combined Fruit Farm of Kwail County in South Hwanghae Province, saying that the people felt pain in their heart to see him lean on a walking stick, he left it in the car.

President in his 80s would be rather comfortable with a walking stick, to look round the spot for a long time, but he thought that the people would be worried and refused to walk with it.

President visited cooperative farms throughout the country for the people's livelihood without any time to recover his physical fatigue and cure himself till the last periods of his life.

One Sunday, June 19th, Juche 83(1994), when President Kim Il Sung visited the Kumdang Cooperative Farm in Onchon County, the officials said he should not take a rough road in the stormy weather and he said that he could walk any rough road as much as possible for people's welfare.

The officials said that he should go back as the wind blew strongly and it was getting dark.

However, the President continued to walk along the lane through fields and gave valuable instructions to the problems arising in the farming saying that they could only see the rich harvest in such bad weather.

But it was after his demise when our people came to know the fact that the road to the field which he had carried on until the last moment of his great life was a difficult step to walk on his walking stick, and that he continued his on-the-spot guidance with his walking stick left in his car for fear of the people's heartbreak.

President Kim Il Sung was also a man who was in need of rest.

That was why on April 16th, Juche 83(1994), the day after celebrating the 82nd birthday of the President as a significant holiday, officials earnestly entreated the President to have a rest even on his birthday.

At that time, he said that he really wanted to relax with grandchildren like the other people as he was over 80 when the work was difficult, but at those times, he was worried that the living standard of our people.

President Kim Il Sung was our fatherly leader who loved the people regarding them as his God.

So he concealed his physical pains for fear that the people would be hurt while devoting his all to improve the living standard of our people.

From olden times there is a saying that "Children are filial if they are half parental love".

The Korean people could neither see nor feel the physical burden and the pain of the President because they grew up with happiness under his care, calling him our father of the great family.

That's why the image of the President presented to the people is a portrait of smiling throughout the world.

However, the Korean people did not know that amid the bright smile of the sun, was the severe physical pain associated with the arduous struggle of the President dedicated to the people.

Indeed, President Kim Il Sung is the benevolent father of our people who made an energetic field journey until the last moment of his life.