For nearly twenty years, the inhabitants of a city in North Korea have been greeted by an unusual wake-up call that resonates through its streets.
Located in East Asia, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is a nation under a totalitarian regime.
Amnesty International has described the country’s human rights situation as among the worst globally, a sentiment echoed by the United Nations and Freedom House.
The ruling Kim family, known as the Mount Paektu Bloodline, has held power since 1948 as the country’s ‘supreme leaders’.
In 2008, three years before the passing of Kim Jong II, North Korea’s second supreme leader, a loud sound started to reverberate throughout the capital, Pyongyang.
At 6am every day, a haunting melody fills the air over the vast city constructed from concrete, bronze, and marble.
Watch the daily occurrence below:
This enigmatic sound was highlighted in the Channel 5 program Michael Palin In North Korea.
Referred to by Monty Python member Michael Palin as ‘the most peculiar wake-up call’, the sound has gained renewed attention on social media.
“I thought it was just incidental post-production music,” commented one YouTube user after listening to the sound.
“But when you learn that it’s being played through a sound-system throughout the city it becomes creepy. It takes on a bizarre life of its own. There’s also something weirdly hypnotic about it to”
Another remarked: “Eerie. Sounds like a perfect soundtrack for a strange dystopian land, played throughout the city like that creates a fitting vibe.”
“It seems like a song that would play if you walk around in a foggy forest under the watchful eye of a mystical predator creature,” another person wrote.
A TikTok user also stated: “This is the same exact vibe I get in my dreams.”
“That’s quite creepy imagine having sleep paralysis and this is playing,” another individual added.
If this is the first time you’ve heard about this strange wake-up call, here’s what you need to know.
The tune that echoes through Pyongyang every morning is titled ‘Where Are You, Dear General?’
It is believed that the six-minute and 30-second composition might have been created by Kim Jong II in 1971, as a piece for the A True Daughter of the Party opera.
In the opera, an army nurse named Kang Yeon-ok uses the song to express her aspiration of meeting Kim II Sung, the father of Kim Jong II and the ‘founder’ of North Korea.
Since around 2008, a version of the song performed by the Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble is heard throughout Pyongyang at 6am daily.
‘Where Are You, Dear General?’ thus acts as an alarm, with some suggesting it is ‘heavily distorted and barely recognizable’ from its original form.
The electric ballad is also occasionally aired on North Korean television, according to NK News.
You really need to hear it to believe it.