PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — Former NBA star Dennis Rodman brought his basketball skills and flamboyant style — tattoos, nose studs and all — on Tuesday to a country with possibly the world's strictest dress code: North Korea.
Arriving in Pyongyang, the American athlete and showman known as "The Worm" became an unlikely ambassador for sports diplomacy at a time of heightened tensions between the United States and North Korea. Or maybe not so unlikely: Young leader Kim Jong Un is said to have been a fan of the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s, when Rodman won three championships with the club.
Rodman is joining three members of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team and a VICE correspondent for a news show on North Korea that will air on HBO later this year, VICE producers told the Associated Press in an exclusive interview Tuesday before they landed.
Arriving in Pyongyang, the American athlete and showman known as "The Worm" became an unlikely ambassador for sports diplomacy at a time of heightened tensions between the United States and North Korea. Or maybe not so unlikely: Young leader Kim Jong Un is said to have been a fan of the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s, when Rodman won three championships with the club.
Rodman is joining three members of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team and a VICE correspondent for a news show on North Korea that will air on HBO later this year, VICE producers told the Associated Press in an exclusive interview Tuesday before they landed.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/basketball/2013/02/26/dennis-rodman-worms-his-way-into-north-korea/1947909/
When he first landed in Pyongyang airport, the first sentence he said to North Korean officials greeting him was "I come in peace".
He may be very first celebrity to befriend Kim Jong Un in the history record.
Plus KJU is a big fan of basketball.