North Korea (DPRK). New Year
About stamps and plots
02.01.2020
On January 1, 2020, Korea Stamp Corporation issued a postage stamp dedicated to the New Year 2020.
The socialist realist stamp depicts riders on the winged horse Chollima. One of them is holding a flag with the slogan "Under the lofty banner of self-sufficiency!"
Chollima is a mythical winged horse capable of covering vast distances in the blink of an eye. His name "Chollima" translates as "able to overcome a thousand li a day." Originally, Chollima is a Chinese mythological character, later he is found in Korean legends and folk tales. According to Korean legends, the Chollima horse had a fierce disposition and there was no rider on Earth who could just sit on it, let alone tame this magic horse. Therefore, one day Chollima soared into the sky and melted into the azure blue.
In Korea, the winged horse Chollima is a symbol of progress, rapid development and forward movement. Chollima became one of the symbols of North Korea in the 1960s. In Pyongyang in 1961, a monumental statue of the winged horse Chollima was erected, 45 meters high. The swift winged horse has been the central theme of North Korean postage stamps many times.
There is another interesting feature of Korean stamps - the dates on the stamps are indicated in accordance with two calendars: the Gregorian and the Juche calendar. In the Juche calendar, 1912 is taken as the starting point - the year of birth of Kim Il Sung. Therefore, the year 2020 is familiar to us, it is only 109 year according to the Juche calendar.
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