DPRK: Famous for Volleyball

In March last, various sporting events of juvenile sports school teams were held for qualifiers for the national juvenile sports schools games. The women’s volleyball team of the Sosong District Juvenile Sports School attracted the attention of experts and spectators. Their matches were spectacular: Pak Nam Hyang, the captain, spiked from low passes changing her position in the attack area; Kang Ok Yong, made passes for attackers to spike correctly, sometimes making feints and thrusting the ball into the loose place; Ri Kyong Hui made wonderful serves. The spectators praised them with thumbs up. Of course, the team took first place by defeating all opponents in Pyongyang. On average, they are 15-16 years old. Then who is their instructor?

The school is famous for volleyball all over the country and it is largely attributable to the efforts of An Nam Hui, the volleyball instructor. She played in the April 25 Sports Team; she was one of the players who defeated the US team 3-0 in the women’s volleyball at the First World Military Games held in Italy in 1995. The Merited Athlete was Player No. 2 as attacker during her years in the team, who helped win victory with her merit of back spike.

In August 2005 after a dozen years as active player, Nam Hui was appointed instructor of the Sosong District Juvenile Sports School. At that time the school was not good at volleyball. First of all, Nam Hui tried hard to arouse greater interest in volleyball among the school administrators and the schoolchildren’s parents. And much of her attention was directed to selection of children for volleyball. She talked to parents of students so as to encourage them to be enthusiastic about selection of reserves. Meanwhile, she drew up a proper annual plan for training reserves and strengthened the basic instruction of selected students. She studied hard sports science and applied it actively to teaching. Due to her exact demand and high ability the children gradually took interest in volleyball and a lot of them in the district entered the sports school to learn volleyball.

In 2009 the 46th National Juvenile Sports Schools Games were held. It was the first time for Nam Hui’s team to participate in. On the basis of accurate analysis of all opponents she adopted right tactics and led her players to fight stoutly and persistently. Thus her team won the victory, defeating all opponents—and declaring their existence to the whole country for the first time. Since then the team has never failed to win the annual games. Many of her old students are now seed players of different sports teams. An Nam Hui says, “Today more and more students are enthusiastic about learning sports, especially volleyball. We teachers are obliged to give proper instruction and encouragement to our students.”