The Time Ric Flair Traveled To North Korea For The Biggest Wrestling Show Of All Time
"Nature Boy" Ric Flair is one of the most electrifying wrestlers ever to enter the ring, and between his fearless high flying moves and mega-macho smack talk between bouts Ric was born to be a wrestling superstar.
Back in 1995 Ric got to represent as America's greatest wrestler in an epic match versus Antonio Inoki, the most popular wrestler in Japan's history, but there was one catch- the match was in North Korea.
The show, which took place on April 28 and 29, 1995, was dubbed the International Sports and Cultural Festival for Peace by the North Korean government. For a country that is usually intent on keeping outsiders away, inviting 300,000-plus people to cram into Pyongyang's massive May Day Stadium over the course of the two-day event seemed to be an about-face for the notoriously secretive regime.
"American tourists are almost never granted visas," wrote The New York Times's Sheila Melvin in 1996. "Yet less than a year after [Kim Il-sung's] death, North Korea was allowing outsiders to attend an International Sports and Cultural Festival for Peace. Perhaps it was an effort to showcase a North Korea ruled by Kim Jong Il."
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