We Are the Happiest in the World written by the collective and composed by Kim Hyok is a song that has been popular for over 60 years in the DPRK.

The song sings of the great happiness of the Korean people who held President Kim Il Sung in high esteem as their leader and formed a grand, harmonious family in the embrace of the Workers’ Party of Korea, and highlights the fact that nothing can undermine the strength of the DPRK which has been thriving by dint of such a great unity.

From its publication to date, it has never been outdated in the people’s life both in peaceful and grim days and in bad and good times, and it has been further etched in their mind with the passage of time.

Blue is the sky and gay is my heart

The sound of an accordion rings out far and wide

What a wonderful homeland we have

A land filled with harmony and hope

Our father is Marshal Kim Il Sung

Our home is the Party’s bosom

We are all blood brothers and sisters

We are the happiest in the world.

… …

The song was premiered as a chorus of students from then Haeju School for Bereaved Children when the national performance of schools for bereaved children and primary schools for orphans was staged to mark the Fourth Congress of the Workers’ Party of Korea in September Juche 50 (1961). Since then, the Korean people have received it as the theme song of their life, a hymn to the WPK. It was at that time when they started to call Premier Kim Il Sung “fatherly Marshal”.

When speaking at the Fourth Congress of the WPK, Kim Il Sung proudly reviewed the fact that an advanced socialist system, which was free from exploitation and oppression, had been established, saying that it was a long-cherished desire of the Korean people and many revolutionaries fought for it at the cost of their lives. With the socialist system put in place, people began to lead a new life. At this stirring time the new-born socialist Korea was faced with difficulties and lacked many things. However, the people were unanimous in saying they were the happiest in the world!

It was an expression of their profound gratitude for President Kim Il Sung , who won back the country from the Japanese imperialists and put it on the map as heroic Korea, and for the WPK which took good care of the destiny and future of all the people.

As there are a father who will be revered as “our father” and the embrace of the Party or “our home” to which people will entrust their destiny and future, there is no more enviable happiness in the world—this sentiment was shared by all the people.

Kim Il Sung had devoted his heart and soul all his life to making the people the well-off in the world. While living and working with him held in high esteem as their father, the people keenly experienced what the most enviable happiness in the world was like.

On the morning of New Year’s Day in Juche 106 (2017) the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un said in his New Year Address that he would work hard to ensure that the past era when all the people used to sing the song We Are the Happiest in the World with optimism about their future does not remain a moment in past history but is recreated in the present era.

Once he said: It is our Party’s determination and will to ensure that our people live an abundant life without any cause for envying others and a mere thought of the slogan “We Are the Happiest in the World” encourages me to do even a difficult work cheerfully.

With this in mind, he is on an endless journey of devotion for the people.

Therefore, the Korean people are full of absolute confidence that they cannot live apart from his embrace and when they believe in and follow him, their country’s sky will always remain blue, there is a mass of blossom on this land forever and nothing will conquer them.

As the song truthfully depicts such a unanimous feeling shared by the people through their life with deep lyrical emotion and great optimism, it is still being sung as one of the most popular songs, the eternal theme song of socialism.

Yang Ryon Hui