Stamps, sticks and stories: looking for traces of baseball in North Korea

A 2009 North Korea stamp set. Baseball is still remembered in a country that has proclaimed itself America’s ‘biggest enemy’. Photograph: Sherab/Alamy

How do you find evidence that people are still playing – or still remember – a once-loved sport?

Earlier this year, when a baseball team called the Challengers, made up of young North Korean defectors, toured the US, American and Korean media reported that baseball was “unheard of” in the North.