Before reading this article, we sincerely invite you to click the "Follow" button, so that you can continue to push such articles for you in the future, and it is also convenient for you to discuss and share, your support is the driving force for us to insist on creating~
Text|皑皑
Editor|Ah Rong
North Korea's current first lady, Ri Seol-ju, has sparked countless speculations since she "came to power."
How can this post-85 girl, who has no strong background and was once a singer, become the first lady of North Korea?
You know, North Korea's atmosphere is very traditional, and as soon as the news of Li Xuezhu being selected as the first lady came out, many people questioned it.
However, Li Xuezhu's position has not been shaken, but has become more and more stable, and now, she has also gained a lot of support in North Korea.
How did she do it?
First lady by singer
In December 2012, Kim Jong-un's wife, Ri Seol-joo, appeared for the first time at a commemoration of the one-year anniversary of the death of former leader Kim Jong-il.
At that time, Li Xuezhu was about twenty-seven or eight years old, elegant in temperament, wearing traditional Korean clothing, and some people felt very familiar when they saw this first lady.
Anything that happened in the world left traces, and it was soon discovered that in 2005, at the 16th Asian Championships held in Incheon, South Korea, North Korea sent athletes to participate, and at the same time sent cheerleaders to Incheon, South Korea, to cheer on the North Korean team.
At that time, the cheerleading girls, dressed in white Korean costumes, holding microphones in one hand and flowers in the other, cheered for North Korean athletes at the scene, which left a deep impression on people.
Someone turned over the live broadcast of that year and found that Li Xuezhu was a member of the cheerleading team in North Korea.
The girl in the video is about 20 years old, pure in appearance, temperament and literature, no one would have thought that she would become the first lady of North Korea in the future.
Born in 1985, Lee Seol-ju is rumored to have been born into an intellectual family, and after graduating from high school, he joined the North Korean Galaxy Orchestra, became a singer, and was sent to China to study vocal music.
And Kim Jong-il loves movies and appreciates art, he does not like the original wife, and divorced after a few years of marriage.
He had a crush on North Korean film actor Sung Hye-rim and lived with him and gave birth to his eldest son, Kim Jong-nam.
His mother's identity as an actor prevented Kim Jong-nam from appearing in front of everyone, especially from meeting his grandfather Kim Il Sung, in order to prevent being discovered by his grandfather, Kim Jong-nam was sent abroad by his father to study.
After Kim Jong-il became the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-nam's status was recognized, he could conduct public activities, and he was given office.
But when Kim Jong-nam grew up, he did not become his father's ideal successor.
Perhaps influenced by his childhood life in hiding and his relatively happy study abroad experience, Kim Jong-nam prefers a free life in Western countries, his life style is more Westernized and loose, and Kim Jong-il gradually abandoned his cultivation in the later period.
Kim Jong-il turned to raising his third son, Kim Jong-un.
In order to let his son succeed smoothly, he painstakingly chose a daughter-in-law for his son, but his criterion for choosing a daughter-in-law was to have an artistic temperament.
It was at this time that Lee Seol-ju entered his field of vision, and Kim Jong-il felt that the girl looked very long and his mother, Kim Jong-suk.
In the end, between Lee Seol-ju and another film actor, Yu Young-hyang, the next First Lady of North Korea was chosen by voting.
After that, Ri Seol-ju disappeared for a while, then married Kim Jong-un in 2009, and in 2011, after Kim Jong-il's death, Kim Jong-un officially became the leader of North Korea, and Ri Seol-jo also became the first lady.
Ri Seol-ju became the first lady of North Korea as a singer, which caused a lot of controversy.
However, Li Xuelord, who appeared in the public eye, acted and spoke in a good manner, very much like a first lady.
After Kim Jong-un came to power, he deliberately imitated his father and grandfather from his dress, while Li Xuezhu dressed relatively fashionably, and their combination reminded the North Korean people of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-suk, and the symbolism was too strong.
The outside world is curious, what is the life of this first lady from a civilian and singer after being voted to "join" the Kim family?
"Harem" life rumors
On February 17, 2023, North Korea issued a set of stamps containing scenes from Kim Jong-un and his daughter Kim Ju-ae appearing in the test launch of North Korea's "Mars Cannon-17" in 2022.
That test shot was the first public appearance of Kim Ju-ai, and since then, she has appeared on important political occasions such as military parades and receptions.
The girl appeared on important occasions in North Korea and always stood in the C position, sparking interest in Kim Jong-un's family life.
In fact, North Korea has not released the name of Kim Ju-ae, and people speculate that she is called Kim Ju-ae because Rodman told the outside world that he was born in the summer of 2013, after spending time with Kim Jong-un in North Korea.
The child is about the same age as North Korea's "first daughter" who appears in people's eyes.
Some people speculate that Lord Lee gave Kim Jong-un three children, the first child was a boy, Kim Ju-ai was the second, and the third may also be a girl.
Lee Joong-ae gave birth to three children for Kim Jong-un, and it seems that Ri Seol-jo's life as the first lady of North Korea is very happy, and her love with Kim Jong-un is also rumored to be that the prince falls in love with the princess.
However, some people say that Li Xuezhu, who was born as a civilian, disappeared for 6 months after being "voted" to become the first lady, and was undergoing special training.
The so-called special training is to have someone to teach her how to be a first lady, especially how to cooperate with Kim Jong-un in public. How to sit, how to stand, so that every expression and gesture must have the style of Kim Jong-suk.
After the training was completed, Lee Seol-ju had the appearance of Kim Jong-sook before he was arranged to attend a public event with Kim Jong-un.
After marriage, she was asked to imitate Kim Jong-sook in every word and deed, and had no private space of her own.
On April 27, 2018, when Lee Seol-ju accompanied Kim Jong-un to meet Moon Jae-in and his wife, her first reaction to her husband's inquiry was nervousness and unease.
This has already exposed that Li Xuezhu's words and deeds must meet the standards in Kim Jong-un's eyes.
"Literature and art fan" influenced North Korea
Although she had various unavoidable reasons due to her identity, Li Xuezhu also realized many personal ambitions with the support of her husband during her time as the first lady.
In 2012, Kim Jong-un reformed his father's Putianbao Electronic Orchestra into the Peony Peak Orchestra, with Lee Seol-ju in charge of the orchestra's work.
There was speculation that Kim Jong-un's reorganization of the orchestra might change North Korean music, and some people found that in the early days of the Peony Peak Orchestra, the members of the orchestra wore Westernization and also introduced Western instruments, which seemed to change the previous style.
In 2015, Kim Jong-un formed another "Qingfeng Orchestra", also presided over by Lee Seol-chan.
In addition, as a young first lady, Ri Seol-ju is influencing North Korean women in her personal dress and style.
In February 2015, a news report said that in North Korea during the Kim Jong-un era, the aesthetics of young women were quietly changing, evolving from simple hairstyles in the 80s to fashionable hairstyles in 2015, and North Korean women began to use South Korean cosmetics.
South Korean media said that because North Korean women have long been allowed to wear only white tops and black skirts, their desire to pursue their own image and aesthetics has been restricted and suppressed.
But since Ri Seol-ju, young North Korean women have also used mascara and begun to pursue their own aesthetic value.
Unlike North Korean women in the Kim Jong-il era, who had long hair, under the influence of Li Xuezhu, women also began to erect short hair, and street women began to appear hairstyles such as "youth head", "wavy curls", and "peony medicine head", and some people wore "dresses" and "suits" and other personal style clothing.
Women's cosmetics produced in South Korea are popular with North Korean women.
Unlike the stereotypical aesthetics of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il's era, Kim Jong-un, who studied in Europe, adopted a tolerant attitude towards North Korean women's consciousness of pursuing beauty, and Li Seol-ju could easily hit it off with her husband.
Under the influence of Li Xuezhu, the aesthetic consciousness of the new generation of North Korean women is awakening like never before.
In 2019, the beauties of the Peony Peak Orchestra of North Korea sang "Mobilization Song" in quintet.
The female singer wears a short white military uniform, fashionable hairstyle, bright rhythm, compact melody, and has the characteristics of popular pop songs, this song shows the image of female singers influenced by Yi Seol-ju in the Kim Jong-un era from the outside to the inside.
They sang the main melody song out of the atmosphere of the times, allowing the outside world to see the quietly changing North Korea.
It should be said that Li Xuezhu changed the image of North Korean women with the influence of his first lady and fashionable aesthetics, and with his artistic accomplishment, led the North Korean orchestra, especially the singing troupe, to make the style more modern, overcoming the dogma, stereotype and conservative of North Korean women in the past.
Her changes to Korean literature and art were very popular with young Korean women, which also made her position as first lady more and more secure.
To this day, North Korean literature and art, movies, songs, music, and paintings still have single and rigid problems in nature, but these problems are obviously not something that Li Xuezhu can solve.
However, Lord Li has done her part, which also proves that her ascension may be an inevitability of the Korean people's pursuit of beauty and freedom.