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One evening in April this year, Kim Jik Mi, a woman living in Phyongchon District, Pyongyang, took her four-year-old grandson for a walk on the bank of the Pothong River.

Taking a stroll along the riverside with willow branches drooping over the water, she watched the old people dancing cheerfully across the river. She was so attracted by the scene that she did not realize that her grandson, who had slipped away from her side, frolicked along the riverside to fall into the river.

"A child is drowning," some people shouted at a long distance. Only then could she notice her little kid was drifting slowly down the stream. However, she was too confused to let out even a cry, only stamping her feet anxiously.

At that moment, a student rushed to the site, jumped into the water in his clothes and swam back to the river bank, holding the child in his arms.

He laid the boy on the lawn at the riverside and gave him first aid together with others who rushed to the site later, thus bringing him back to life.

Jik Mi only shed tears with her grandson in her arms. After a while, she calmed herself and hurriedly looked for the young man who had rescued her grandson, but he had already gone.

From the following day she visited the nearby universities and colleges to find him or waited for him for a long time at the places she thought he might pass.

On the fifteenth day she was carefully watching passers-by on the bank of the Pothong River and there was a student passing by, poring over a book in his hand.

At the moment, she recognized that he was the saviour of her grandchild and rushed to rebuke him for having left the spot so soon, before thanking him. And then she asked his name, holding his hands in hers.

But he declined to answer her before hurrying away.

Though he got away, Jik Mi remembered the college badge on his chest and the name on the cover of the book in his hand.

He was Kim Jong Guk, a student of Pyongyang College of Electric Engineering.

Jik Mi headed for the college in no time to tell its officials and teaching staff about his deed.

When the deed was known to the teaching staff of the college, the one who was the most surprised and pleased was Jo Il Hwa, a staffer of the college and daughter of Jik Mi. The child saved by Jong Guk was just the son of Jo.

“The day after my son was rescued, I told the story to the teaching staff and students of the college and Jong Guk was among them. But he feigned ignorance. So I felt deeper gratitude for him and he left a deeper impression on me,” said Jo.

A few days later, Jik Mi and all her family members visited the college and had an emotional meeting with Jong Guk.

“During my military service, I lost my parents, but I lived free from the sorrow of having no parents, thanks to the affection and friendship of my comrades-in-arms. And after my entrance to the college, I have also led a life without any worry under the warm care of all those around me. So I have always been full of the resolve to do something good for this benevolent society and collective. In such critical situation, any other man would also have behaved like me,” said Jong Guk.