Kim Il Sung's Embalmed Body

Paying respects to Kim Il Sung’s embalmed body was by far one of the most weird and memorable experiences of my life.

15 April is a major national holiday in North Korea. It is the birthday of the Great Leader and Eternal President Kim Il Sung. This holiday is the North Korean equivalent of Christmas. It is a highly revered and civically holy day, a day of great respect and ultimate devotion to Kim Il Sung specifically and the North Korean nation generally.

I was lucky to be able to experience such an important day for North Koreans. This day was an incredible opportunity to witness and join in on the celebrations for this auspicious day. The entire day was full of memorable events, but by far the most shocking and creepy was the visit to Kim Il Sung’s body.

Kim Il Sung’s embalmed body is on display in the Kumsusan Memorial Palace on the outskirts of Pyongyang. The word Palace does not do justice to the grandness and awesome presence of this building-monument. It is truly a palace of epic proportions. It is an intimidating building, designed in a megalomaniac Communist-fascist fashion. In other words, it is needlessly big, with grand arched hallways stretching forever, massive rooms with glorious murals and chandeliers, and grand marble staircases. Outside of the palace are carefully manicured gardens, rivers, and a large Communist-type square in front of the Palace with a floor-size portrait of Kim Il Sung. It was truly an impressive sight and place to visit.

But it was the carefully choreographed process of going to see and pay respects to Kim Il Sung’s body that left the real lasting impression on us all. It was made into such an affair that one would think they were being presented to the Pope or Queen of England. Ironically, there is probably nowhere near the amount of hoopla to be presented to those dignitaries as there is to this dead body.

The whole process took half of the day. It’s good we did it early in the morning. We all had to walk in one straight line, like a funeral procession, throughout the entire Palace. Some corridors were so long that there were special moving-runways like you see in airport terminals to speed up the walks. We had to pass through strict security, where we went through x-ray screens and military guards swiped us down. We also had to pass through a special tunnel where there was a moving rubber-floor with rollers underneath that would clean the bottom or our footwear! Then there was an actual wind tunnel with fans built in the walls, floor, and ceiling, where all the dust and dirt would be blown off of us. Our hair was windswept afterwards, I felt bad for the North Korean women who had their hair specially styled for this occasion.

We finally approached yet another grand hallway, but this hallway was different. This hallway had a giant doorway with thick wooden doors swung open. The ceiling and the wall-length doors must have been at least 30 feet high. There was a red-tinged light emanating from the doorway and sad Socialist Realism music loudly playing, bellowing through the hallway. We were instructed to form lines of four people in four columns. Each line was then marched through the doorway where a massive gold statue of Kim Il Sung greeted us, all lit up with high-voltage bulbs and different coloured lighting. We had to march respectfully to the centre of the room and bow in unison in front of the statue. Once we finished our bow, we then turned to our right to face another grand entranceway, this one leading to Kim Il Sung himself.



Kim Il Sung’s room was by far the largest room in a Palace in which each room and hallway outdid each other in size and grandeur. This room was huge. The ceilings, you almost couldn’t see them, they must have been upwards of 60 feet high. There were grand columns in the room. There was soft mournful Socialist Realism music playing. The room was in virtual darkness except for the lights shining on the glass enclosure displaying the body.

Kim Il Sung’s body was displayed in the glass enclosure, which was elevated by a red-draped platform and protected by purple velvet rope. The room had military guards in all four corners, beside each column, and at the four ends of the display. We were marched into the room and order again to go in lines of four. Then each line of four would move as a uniform unit towards Kim Il Sung’s left side. We would bow gracefully and respectfully for a few long seconds. Then we would march to his feet, and bow again. Then we would march to Kim Il Sung’s right side, and bow again. Next, we would walk past the head of the body and out of the dark room into another arched corridor. The experience was surreal.

We were sent down another arched hallway to a trophy room displaying all of Kim Il Sung’s awards and accolades he received in North Korea and abroad. There were special medals, gifts, and diplomas from across Africa, Asia, and Europe. There were conspicuously no awards from North America. There were also framed pictures of Kim Il Sung and international leaders decorating the walls of the trophy room. The pictures featured the Great Leader with controversial leaders and former Communist stalwarts, including Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, Palestine’s Yasser Arafat, and many others. We were led through a number of similar trophy rooms and display rooms of Kim Il Sung’s greatness. Then we were led back through the Palace to the entrance. It took forever to get back, but not as long as getting to the body since we didn’t have to do any of the pomp or circumstance exiting the building.

The North Koreans truly revere and love Kim Il Sung. Kim Il Sung is like their very own god. It is unsettling how much they adore and worship this dead man. I can only imagine the respect they conferred upon him while still alive.

I asked the guides how they felt about the Kims. The impression I got was that they respected Kim Jong Il, but could take him or leave him. But I could tell how they unconditionally worship Kim Il Sung. Kim Il Sung is their true and only leader, they still believe he runs the country and will eternally watch over them.

I was at a loss for words when they sincerely stated that they were shocked when he died. They could not believe he passed away. They thought he would never die, that he would live forever. You could see the hurt in their eyes as they freely admitted this. These are smart, educated people, and yet they honestly believed that this man had eternal life. They claimed that, to this day, they still can’t believe that Kim Il Sung is gone. I remember watching some of the footage of Kim Il Sung’s funeral way back in 1994 when it was covered by the international press (the first time the international press was allowed into DPRK). The scenes were of uncontrollable mass hysteria. It was scary. After talking to North Koreans and questioning their belief in Kim Il Sung, I now know that those images weren’t choreographed by the government for propaganda purposes.