culture

In the past 45 years since the opening of the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital, a great number of babies were born at the hospital, including over 790 sets of triplets and quadruplets.

Among them are the 168th set of triplets who were born over 30 years ago.

At that time, their birth was not only a happy event of the family of an ordinary worker living in Myonggan County, North Hamgyong Province, but also that of the whole county and country.

The triplets received gifts of love, including silver-decorated knives, and different kinds of nutritious foods and materials for clothes and grew up happily under the warm care of the state.

Thanks to the state’s meticulous care and benefits, they could live without any slightest worry even in the period when the country was undergoing difficulties.

They always took the lead in studying and doing good things for the country and, after graduating from middle school, also took the lead in joining the Korean People’s Army with the desire to glorify their youth in defending the socialist fatherland.

After their demob, all of them entered Kim Il Sung University. 

When their mother Kim Chun Mae was told that her sons must have been good at studying as all of them passed the entrance examination, she said: “Endless is the love and benevolence of the motherly Party shown to my triplet sons and this became the nourishment and foundation that helped them grow up as reliable pillars of the future.”

At present, there is a special room with a nameplate saying “Triplets” in the dormitory of the university. Though they study in different departments, the university provided them with the room so that they could live together.

There are some photographs hanging on a wall of the room, which are the source of the greatest pride of the triplets and their family.

At the time when the triplets had served in the army for a little over one year, they happened to meet Chairman Kim Jong Il and the respected General Secretary Kim Jong Un who visited their unit. That day, they were honoured to have a photo taken with the great leaders by their sides.

In 2022, one year after their entrance to the university, the respected fatherly Marshal Kim Jong Un called young students who contributed to the successful military parade in celebration of the 90th founding anniversary of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army and had a photograph taken with them.

In addition, their mother took part in the Fifth National Conference of Mothers held two years ago and had a photo taken with the respected General Secretary.

The seven photos taken with the great leaders are the great honour and blessing more than one family deserves. Always bearing those photos in their mind, the triplet brothers are devoting their untiring enthusiasm to studying at Kim Il Sung University, the highest institution of Juche-oriented education.