The Hermit Kingdom

Just got back from a strange, weird, bizarre, peculiar, trip to North Korea. No, I'm not directionally challenged...THAT North Korea and yes, Americans can travel there. If your reaction is "Why?" I can probably never make you understand my obsession with going there after reading this blog: Wait But Why. If you have time, please check it out. Lots of curse words, but he is a much better writer than I am and sums it up perfectly with good photos. I hope that if you are at all curious, you will read my take on visiting North Korea, or as the people of the country call it simply, Korea. It was definitely worth going and I have to say I did hours and hours and hours of research and contacted travel agencies, talked to people who have gone, and weighed the safety, political and social responsibility of a trip like this. While there, I never once felt unsafe, but assumed that would be the case from the research. I still haven't processed it all and can't really figure out the right words to express how I feel about the country and people. Make no mistake, I think the leaders are crazy, sadistic, narcissistic, nut jobs and feel more strongly about that after visiting. It is a cult like no other I've ever experienced. The part of the trip I struggle to describe is the people. Our guides asked us how we felt about their country after visiting and it was so hard to answer. It wasn't that we were scared to give an honest answer, rather, we still weren't sure. Was it pity, was it sadness, was it shock at how brainwashed and insulated they are, was it anger when they continually insulted America? But how can you be angry when that is ALL they are taught? And they were very kind and gracious otherwise. When we flipped the question around and asked our guide what he thought of life in America he simply answered in a robotic voice, "Americans are indoctrinated." It was definitely what they were coached to say and as we had three guides/minders we think they were all supposed to be watching each other.

I have to admit that Americans are given a somewhat skewed impression of parts of North Korea. It is not all doom and gloom. I read and watched a lot of documentaries leading up to the trip. They are all so dramatic and give the impression the people are living in a gray world, completely unhappy and repressed in all aspects of life. I think it's a very hard life compared to ours and I can't imagine being so sheltered and controlled, but it's all they know. Also, in the news you hear about visitors being detained. Every one of those visitors was doing something we were explicitly told not to do. Laura Ling snuck across the border, as a journalist, without a visa. The Korean American was giving out Bibles in the main square. The 24-year-old who was recently in the news, crossed immigration, tore up his visa and said he wanted asylum. I was at the US Embassy here in Beijing today and a man who worked there said the 24-year-old had "mental issues." Ya think? Not saying what North Korea handled the reported events diplomatically and reasonably, but it is North Korea. If you abide by their rules, there have been zero incidents with tourists in 25+ years of tourism according to the big agencies handling the majority of tourists going to North Korea.

We flew to the capital of Pyongyang, which is the only way Americans are allowed to enter and exit. Our guides met us at the airport and we were literally in their sights at all times. They even slept at the hotels we stayed at. It was kind of overwhelming and hard because I didn't feel I could speak freely except at night in the hotel rooms and by then I was too exhausted. It was hard not being able to catch Kenny's eye and say, "Are you freaking kidding me?" when they gave their version of history. From the airport we drove into the city and were given a list of the rules. Basically don't take pictures of any military soldiers, or installations, and when photographing the "great leaders" you can not cut off any part of their portrait. We had a couple of photos deleted for this. It's a clean city, but looks like it is stuck in 1950....Russia in the 50's. However the people were like people anywhere, albeit as I said more brainwashed than people I've ever met anywhere else. They were going about life and appeared happy. We saw kids on rollerblades, visited two schools, drove past working farms. Many people were fascinated by our boys because they were western and I think tourists rarely bring kids. They were much more discreet and shy about staring at them than the Chinese are, however. On the tours North Korea allows you are only allowed to see what they want you to see and you are kept on a specific path, so our observations are obviously only of the leaders putting their best out there for the world to admire. Definitely a dog and pony show.

Touring around Pyongyang mostly consisted of seeing monuments dedicated to their "Great Leaders" and the buildings and museums said leaders built. The most fascinating was their library. They were so proud of their book delivery system and computers. The delivery system was basically a conveyer belt and the computers really gave insight into how far behind and sheltered they are. They asked me to search for a book and after 3-4 tries with no results (Harry Potter, Star Wars, should have thought to try Fifty Shades of Grey), I just put in "trees." SUCCESS! But there were about 400 books and the newest was from 1980. I tried "cars" with the same result. About 300 books and none newer than 1983. Google would completely blow their mind! A Google search of "cars" gave me 576,000,000 results in .28 seconds. I was in a time warp and they seemed to think they were showing me something from the future. In the music room they were so proud to play some Madonna for us on a boom box like I had in high school. And the funny part is that there were tons of people in this place. I can't really figure out what they were doing. It was a school and work day, but it was like they had nowhere else to go and no real reason for being there except boredom. We also visited the war museum to bask in all of their exploits over the US and the atrocities committed by the US during the war. In one room there was literally, I am not kidding you, a section dedicated to how we used mosquitos and flies to introduce illness and kill Koreans during the war. Luc was incredulous and named it bugological warfare. Normally I am full of questions for our guides, but by this point I gave up. I can't even say they were lying to us because they fully believe the load of crap they would give us as answers.

From Pyongyang we drove to a hotel about an hour outside the city where the next day we'd visit the modern marvel of a dam designed by their "great leader" who happened to not have any engineering education. And they fully believe he designed it. We even asked what his degree was in and they said political science. After the dam we went to a cooperative farm, which are like communes and were dreamed up by.....you guessed it, the "great leader," whom I gather was also an expert in farming. I keep putting the title "great leader" in quotes because I generally knew they were assholes, but I really, really, REALLY hate the guys after this trip. There's nothing great about them other than their egos. Also, I'm really only talking about Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il because that's all our guides talked about. They never mentioned the current nutter's name once until we asked about him. From the cooperative farm we went to a kindergarten which was a highlight. The kids were adorable and fascinated by seeing our western boys. We visited two schools and in both there is one room dedicated to teaching the history of their great nation and how the Imperialist Americans are holding them down. Then we had the biggest slap in the face and welcome to North Korea when we noticed the walls were decorated with machine guns, pistols, rockets and they were depicted as being used on the USA.

Then things went from weird....

to shocking, this was a mural in a stairwell

These poor kids are raised to hate us. It's not in their genes, they are taught by command of their country's higher ups that we are the enemy. From day one of their education; probably from birth from their family because that is what has been passed down. This is where I feel that visiting and coming into as much contact as possible with the people of this country is beneficial. And tourism and technology will hopefully someday be their leaders' downfall. Technology is slowly and illegally creeping in. And when they see what the outside world is really like, and see that we aren't as evil as they were taught, a few of them at least will start to question what has been drummed into them. Maybe if we're not the horrible monsters they've been told, just maybe some of the other things they've been taught aren't true either. It's already happening from what I've seen on more recent documentaries. As a side note on the documentaries, it is so interesting to compare some of the older ones to newer. In one with Lisa Ling, she states there are no cell phones in the country. In a newer one cell phones have been introduced and ownership/usage has exploded. I also watched a 2006 documentary called Crossing the Line about the 4 US soldiers who defected to North Korea in the 60's. One still resides there and has three western looking sons he has raised there who claim Korea as their nationality. It is really weird to watch them speak English with a Korean accent.

In the afternoon we drove from the north of Pyongyang to way south and the DMZ area. It was so interesting because a lot of the drive was at night and it was completely dark. I've seen this picture of the black hole that is North Korea from space, but now I've also experienced it.

Rarely a light on the whole drive and then as we got closer to the border our guide pointed out a glow over the mountains and told us that was Seoul. I should explain that there were only two themes on this trip, the "great leaders" and all their greatness, and reunification, specifically how the US is holding South Korea back from reunifying with the North. How, in a rational mind, can anyone believe that the city glowing over the hills is just clamoring to join this country that is stuck in the past with intermittent electricity, water and food? I took this opportunity to get a little dig in and told our guide we had just been to Seoul and it is a world class city with the fastest internet on the planet. Kenny told him how they now are considered some of the best at manufacturing and technology. He had to stew on that for a bit.

The next morning we went to the graves of some old emperor. Normally this is not that exciting to me, but I was so happy to not be hearing about the two crazy leaders and seeing their grotesque statues, that I was loving a little spice in the itinerary. From there we went to the DMZ. I have to say that was a little tense. Not for anyone else, but we were told we were sensitive because we were Americans. We were to ask before taking any pictures and initially were told "no" when everyone else was snapping away. It was very strange and disconcerting. We went to two different rooms where talks and signings had taken place and they saved seats for us on the American side of the table. We were definitely used as props and I would love to know what was said about us. The military dude in charge of our group gave talks in the different rooms and he didn't even blink when talking about how awful America was and all blame for the Korean War and its aftermath is squarely on our shoulders. It was a li-ttle uncomfortable to say the least. Our guide kept asking if we were offended. I so wanted to ask if I could turn the tables and tell him what the world thought of North Korea's leaders and see if he'd be offended. Offended wasn't the word for how I felt though, because I know the truth and have the freedom to research the generally accepted truth. He can say whatever he wants when I have that fact on my side.

So that was pretty much our itinerary and experience. The food was good, lots of kimchi, fish, pork, cabbage, bean sprouts, and eggs. Nothing phenomenal, but we didn't go hungry. The hotels were 2-3* and very stark. The big hotel in the capital has a pool, bowling alley, ping pong, billiards and a casino because you are not allowed to leave. They have to give you something to occupy your time. The streets are wide and smooth in the city, but AWFUL outside the city. The "great leaders" needed to put their street engineering smarts to work. Kenny noticed that there was zero advertising anywhere. Lots of propaganda, but not one advertisement. I suppose there's no need. It's not like anyone needs to convince you of the benefit of buying Coke over Pepsi.

I'm so glad we went and normally I end a trip by saying that I learned a lot. I don't think I really learned anything other than to see life in North Korea with my own eyes. I hope our guides and the locals we came in contact with learned a little from us. Most of what I learned came from my own research and I guess one thing it taught me is that I'm so grateful to have access to that research and the freedom to travel and have my own thoughts about the world.

We were literally the only people checking in for our flight on a holiday weekend. Hmm.....

I read somewhere that there are an estimated 34,000 statues of these dudes in this small country. Here a group of North Koreas pays their respects with flowers and a bow.

Their subway - totally looks like the one we rode in Russia and is the deepest in the world to double as a bomb shelter

People get their "news" by reading these newspapers put up daily in the subway stations

From the war museum - we weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but could on the USS Pueblo which was captured by North Korea in 1968

This military soldier was all smiles after our tour when she was done telling us how awful American policy was and all the atrocities we perpetrated against them

 Loved the traffic light girls. We weren't supposed to photograph them for some reason, but snuck a few. Not sure why they are needed. They don't have much traffic and as of recently, they now have traffic lights.

Where the two previous "Great Leaders" are buried. Experts put the cost of this building between $100-900 million

The DMZ - that building is on the US/South Korean side

Inside the blue huts

 Another wedding, another opportunity for us to crash a wedding in a new country

Typical dress for a lot of men

 The bowling alley in our hotel in Pyongyang

And one of my favorite illicit pictures. Good thing this one wasn't caught by our guides. We may still be in a labor camp, but since we're back here in the land of the free  (ha!) - eff you "great leaders!"