North Korea
North Korea has been on my bucket list for a long time, just like South Africa under Apartheid was so many years earlier.
I had already tried to sign up for North Korea a year ago, but the trip was opened for registration at 07:00 hours in Sweden and was sold out before I even woke up, we are six hours behind Europe. This time, I complained to the organizers and they, gracefully, changed the log-in time to 13:00 in Sweden, 07:00 for me. It made me into an early entrant on the list this time.I went to Sweden to join my all-Swedish military interest group. We had to travel on Swedish passports, first to Beijing and then on to North Korea. It had taken the North Korean embassy over two months to put the visa stamp in.
First stop, Beijing, at least what we saw of it, looks and feels just like any other large western city. The traffic is horrendous and woe the pedestrian who wants to cross the street, with or against the traffic light. I narrowly avoided being run down by a driver who clearly had decided that to turn right at 50 km/h against a red light was perfectly all right. I now know that modern Chinese made cars have ABS brakes too, he left a number of short black rubber marks as he braked. The other people, walking with me, just shook their heads and walked on. Was I the only one that feared for my life then and there?
Naturally, we took in the major sights of the city. Our trip was, officially, a military-interest group. Almost all had some military experience and a few were still employed in the Swedish armed forces.
The military museum in Beijing showed a lot about China’s history of multiple invasions by Japan. The Korean war was, of course, amply visualized. It was not clear who had “won”, but a lot of talk of the cruel American soldiers that had been so mercilessly beaten by the brave and victorious Chinese troupes under General Peng Dehuai.
There was no mention of any General Kim of North Korea at all.
We continued our trip in good style on China Airways even though I, and many others, secretly wished that we could have flown in on the world’s worst airline, Koryo Air.
The brand new international airport in Pyongyang is enormous. It was also empty, not only of planes - there were only two international flights to and from China that day - but also of people.
We continued our trip in good style on China Airways even though I, and many others, secretly wished that we could have flown in on the world’s worst airline, Koryo Air.
The brand new international airport in Pyongyang is enormous. It was also empty, not only of planes - there were only two international flights to and from China that day - but also of people.
An Air Koryo customer service counter.
The trip had a military history perspective, which really only meant that we visited a number of lavish military museums. We spent eight days travelling by a comfortable Chinese-made, air-conditioned bus on some terribly uneven roads (our bus never went faster than 70 km/h) from the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) in the south to some 300 kilometres north, passing a multitude of anti-tank obstacles hidden in the highway arches and columns along the way.
These had explosives at the bottom, set such that the columns
would fall over the highway. An effective anti-tank barrier.
We were stopped every few kilometres for inspection by military guards carrying big guns. Why?
"To catch spies," we were told.
One of the stops didn't only catch spies, but our bus driver. He was taken by the elbows and led far away behind some bushes where we couldn't see. He was gone for a long time. When he came back he had a piece of paper in his hand.
The roadbed was so terrible that only the left lane was driveable.
He had been fined for driving the bus in the UNMARKED left lane on the three-lane highway. That one lane must always be left open for Kim Jong-un and his traffic. They need to go fast and there must be no obstacles.
The country has been in a perpetual state of war since 1950.
I had prepared myself well and read many books and articles beforehand just to get the hang of ”the thinking”.
Somewhat to the consternation of my fellow travellers, I often stepped outside of our group, took many photographs, and talked to all and sundry during my time in the country.
Unbeknownst to our primary guide, I actually got ”under the skin” of one of our other guides. He was ”the security” to keep us from wandering off and, heaven forbid, take any photographs that were not approved. His second job, he hinted at, was also to make sure that our official guide didn't stray outside her agenda or even, herself, get too close to any of her charges, us.
We talked quite a bit. Some, next to each other in the bus and also, later, in a quiet corner of a bar. He told me much about his life and family over a bottle of Whisky. It’s notable that I saw him in other movies taken by earlier groups. He had a different name for every group. For us his name tag said Jerry but he had been Michael on his name tag a few months earlier. Go figure.
Our primary guide, Jo, a young lady at age 26, had a few things to say in private too. She told me much about her life and family. Since all had to spend so much time in the army, four years for women and six years for men, marriages were late. Typically, at age 26 for women and 30 for men. Many marriages, but not all, are arranged by the parents. Once married, the newly-wed must live with their parents for a few years, until the state assigns them their own place to live.
Jo was lamenting the fact that, as a guide, she leaves home in April, travels all summer and doesn’t return home until the fall. She didn’t know if she’d meet a man the coming winter or not. Such a thing as sex was unheard of before marriage. Every bride had to be a virgin.
Jerry had two teenage children, a girl at 14 and a boy at 16. The boy was interested in games and spent a lot of time on the computer, at home. To make it possible, Jerry had bought a solar power system to allow a couple of extra hours on the computer after the lights went out at about 21:00.
A citizen's life, even for the privileged elite who lives on the 12th floor in a high-rise in Pyongyang, is hard. There would be power in the morning from 06:00 to 08:00 so if you wanted to go out, that was the time to use the elevators. Then they would have power around noon, again for elevator access and from about 17:00 to 21:00, time to get home from work, eat dinner and watch a bit of television. They had no refrigerator as there were too few hours of electricity to keep it cold.
The lack of so much is obvious to many. North Korea is a very poor place.
As pampered tourists, we could only observe. The lack of electricity, heat, farm implements, transportation infrastructure, road, sewage and water system maintenance was appalling.
We visited the mausoleums of both of the elder Kim's.
Here is Kim Jong-il on eternal display. We had to line up on three sides and bow before exiting this room.
The TV sets were everywhere, and the newscaster was very enthusiastic.
There is little free time for North Koreans. They live as members of a collective. Everyone, from students to older people, must give an hour a day to "the state." This involves a lot of cleaning of public places and statues.
Sunday is usually taken up by community studies or volunteer work.
Our guides told us that they, as students, had gone into the fields every spring and fall, living in tents, to work on state-run farms. Most farmers today use oxen rather than tractors. The few farm vehicles we did see were very old.
There are no large stores or shopping centres, as far as we could see, but plenty of specialized stores. The government distributes food and clothing. The stores we did visit were selling goods priced beyond the reach of local people. A lot of what we saw on the shelves was very dusty, probably just put there to impress us.
Most of North Korea's wonders were built in the last 30 years. The 3.5 million-strong city of Pyongyang is impressive, full of tall, clean-looking buildings, wide boulevards and an unbelievable number of impressive government edifices and sports palaces, including the largest arena in the world, the Rungrado 1st of May Stadium, which seats up to 150,000 people.
Private cars are forbidden. The cars you see are mostly owned by government representatives. Most people use trolleybuses, streetcars or bicycles to get around. Public transit vehicles don't turn on their lights after dark - not even headlights - to save on power.
There is an almost funny story about how the country was going to open up to the world in 1974, when it held a large industrial exhibition. Deals were struck, including one with Volvo of Sweden to supply 1,000 cars. They did, but North Korea never got around to paying for them. You can still see them here and there, as here stopped with an open hood.
Pyongyang has an extensive subway system, built 100 metres below ground to guard against "atomic bombs," we were told.
From what we could gather, no tourist has ever seen more than three stations. Do they exist?
They must, the trains were very full.
Our tour of the city included a tribute to deceased supreme leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il (current leader Kim Jong-un's grandfather and father). Their 30-metre-tall copper statues stand side by side on a tall pedestal. Some of us were given flowers to lay at their feet. Then we stepped back, lined up and were told to bow. The flowers were collected for the next batch of visitors.
We bowed often during our stay, at paintings, at indoor statues and at the enormous mausoleums where the two lie in state. They are gods. The North Korean calendar starts in 1912, when Kim Il-sung was born. Little children go to bed asking Kim Il-sung for a good night's sleep and the next morning thank him for the breakfast he has provided.
The country runs on the "juche" philosophy, which focuses primarily on patriotism and self-reliance. A 125-metre obelisk honours these principles, insisting that nothing is beyond man's abilities.
But the country has not seen the glorious results of that vision. As recently as 20 years ago, as many as a million North Koreans died from lack of food.
The country actually lives by another rule: "military first." North Korea has the fourth-largest active army in the world after China, the United States and India. Military trucks are a common sight but one that we were forbidden to photograph: "No photo." Along with "No go" and "Forbidden," these were the English words we heard most often on our visit.
He had been fined for driving the bus in the UNMARKED left lane on the three-lane highway. That one lane must always be left open for Kim Jong-un and his traffic. They need to go fast and there must be no obstacles.
No cars, but many bicycles and oxcarts
The country has been in a perpetual state of war since 1950.
I had prepared myself well and read many books and articles beforehand just to get the hang of ”the thinking”.
Somewhat to the consternation of my fellow travellers, I often stepped outside of our group, took many photographs, and talked to all and sundry during my time in the country.
Unbeknownst to our primary guide, I actually got ”under the skin” of one of our other guides. He was ”the security” to keep us from wandering off and, heaven forbid, take any photographs that were not approved. His second job, he hinted at, was also to make sure that our official guide didn't stray outside her agenda or even, herself, get too close to any of her charges, us.
We talked quite a bit. Some, next to each other in the bus and also, later, in a quiet corner of a bar. He told me much about his life and family over a bottle of Whisky. It’s notable that I saw him in other movies taken by earlier groups. He had a different name for every group. For us his name tag said Jerry but he had been Michael on his name tag a few months earlier. Go figure.
Our primary guide, Jo, a young lady at age 26, had a few things to say in private too. She told me much about her life and family. Since all had to spend so much time in the army, four years for women and six years for men, marriages were late. Typically, at age 26 for women and 30 for men. Many marriages, but not all, are arranged by the parents. Once married, the newly-wed must live with their parents for a few years, until the state assigns them their own place to live.
Jo was lamenting the fact that, as a guide, she leaves home in April, travels all summer and doesn’t return home until the fall. She didn’t know if she’d meet a man the coming winter or not. Such a thing as sex was unheard of before marriage. Every bride had to be a virgin.
Jerry had two teenage children, a girl at 14 and a boy at 16. The boy was interested in games and spent a lot of time on the computer, at home. To make it possible, Jerry had bought a solar power system to allow a couple of extra hours on the computer after the lights went out at about 21:00.
A citizen's life, even for the privileged elite who lives on the 12th floor in a high-rise in Pyongyang, is hard. There would be power in the morning from 06:00 to 08:00 so if you wanted to go out, that was the time to use the elevators. Then they would have power around noon, again for elevator access and from about 17:00 to 21:00, time to get home from work, eat dinner and watch a bit of television. They had no refrigerator as there were too few hours of electricity to keep it cold.
Often without electricity or working elevators
The lack of so much is obvious to many. North Korea is a very poor place.
A very common view away from Pyongyang
As pampered tourists, we could only observe. The lack of electricity, heat, farm implements, transportation infrastructure, road, sewage and water system maintenance was appalling.
A typical toilet.
- When no water runs, scoop your flush from the bucket
- When water runs, use red hose to fill the bucket.
These people were all doing their laundry by the side of the river, confirmed by our guide who also said, in the same sentence. "No Picture, forbidden."
The glories to the leaders were everywhere. There may be 30,000 statues of the two elder Kims around the country, we could certainly count many.
This one is in a subway station
Note the urns with flowers in the foreground. They had just been placed by a military group. The urns were soon moved back and made ready for the next group.
We visited the mausoleums of both of the elder Kim's.
Here is Kim Jong-il on eternal display. We had to line up on three sides and bow before exiting this room.
The TV sets were everywhere, and the newscaster was very enthusiastic.
Entertainment TV program with Kim Jong-un
A few minutes later, the cannon were booming.
There is little free time for North Koreans. They live as members of a collective. Everyone, from students to older people, must give an hour a day to "the state." This involves a lot of cleaning of public places and statues.
One hour in the morning. Cutting the grass with SCISSORS...!
Sunday is usually taken up by community studies or volunteer work.
It was harvest time, September, when we visited. These huts
were ubiquitous and used by many farmworkers for overnight stays.
Our guides told us that they, as students, had gone into the fields every spring and fall, living in tents, to work on state-run farms. Most farmers today use oxen rather than tractors. The few farm vehicles we did see were very old.
There are no large stores or shopping centres, as far as we could see, but plenty of specialized stores. The government distributes food and clothing. The stores we did visit were selling goods priced beyond the reach of local people. A lot of what we saw on the shelves was very dusty, probably just put there to impress us.
Most of North Korea's wonders were built in the last 30 years. The 3.5 million-strong city of Pyongyang is impressive, full of tall, clean-looking buildings, wide boulevards and an unbelievable number of impressive government edifices and sports palaces, including the largest arena in the world, the Rungrado 1st of May Stadium, which seats up to 150,000 people.
Private cars are forbidden. The cars you see are mostly owned by government representatives. Most people use trolleybuses, streetcars or bicycles to get around. Public transit vehicles don't turn on their lights after dark - not even headlights - to save on power.
There is an almost funny story about how the country was going to open up to the world in 1974, when it held a large industrial exhibition. Deals were struck, including one with Volvo of Sweden to supply 1,000 cars. They did, but North Korea never got around to paying for them. You can still see them here and there, as here stopped with an open hood.
35-year old Volvo, broken down by the highway
Pyongyang has an extensive subway system, built 100 metres below ground to guard against "atomic bombs," we were told.
From what we could gather, no tourist has ever seen more than three stations. Do they exist?
They must, the trains were very full.
Our tour of the city included a tribute to deceased supreme leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il (current leader Kim Jong-un's grandfather and father). Their 30-metre-tall copper statues stand side by side on a tall pedestal. Some of us were given flowers to lay at their feet. Then we stepped back, lined up and were told to bow. The flowers were collected for the next batch of visitors.
We bowed often during our stay, at paintings, at indoor statues and at the enormous mausoleums where the two lie in state. They are gods. The North Korean calendar starts in 1912, when Kim Il-sung was born. Little children go to bed asking Kim Il-sung for a good night's sleep and the next morning thank him for the breakfast he has provided.
The country runs on the "juche" philosophy, which focuses primarily on patriotism and self-reliance. A 125-metre obelisk honours these principles, insisting that nothing is beyond man's abilities.
But the country has not seen the glorious results of that vision. As recently as 20 years ago, as many as a million North Koreans died from lack of food.
The country actually lives by another rule: "military first." North Korea has the fourth-largest active army in the world after China, the United States and India. Military trucks are a common sight but one that we were forbidden to photograph: "No photo." Along with "No go" and "Forbidden," these were the English words we heard most often on our visit.
A common sight (forbidden to photograph)
Soldiers in uniform guarding geese, sheep, and pigs
Soldiers in uniform guarding geese, sheep, and pigs
Oh, the stories we were told. The best was that Kim Jong-il was born on Mount Paektu in February 1942, when there was a double rainbow, a star over the mountain and the cranes flew in circles. In reality, he was born in Siberia when his father was there commanding a Russian company, as was pointed out by one of my fellow travellers. Strange, those words were totally ignored by our guides who, usually, were quite quick to correct our misunderstandings of world history.
Also, Kim Jong-il is a great maker of "internationally acclaimed" films. We saw glimpses of many on TV during our stay. There was a lot of black-and-white movies about war showing men and women singing in front of a background of shooting cannons, flying warplanes or running soldiers. The government sends out inspectors to make sure you're not picking up any South Korean or Chinese channels.
But the weirdest moment of all came when we had to empty our pockets and were given a once-over with a vacuum cleaner before entering a huge complex devoted to 243,000 gifts received from adoring world leaders.
I wonder which world leader donated the doctorate degree to Kim il-Jong from Kensington University, California, in 1973? That is a diploma mill, the more you pay, the bigger is the diploma print-out.
This is similar to what I saw in this museum
"No pictures allowed", of course.
This school was cited in the 1995 government sting operation on diploma mills and forced to close in both California and Hawaii so its credibility is not widely established in terms of using a degree from here for employment. Degrees from here have been banned for use in several states of the USA and in many countries around the world.
It took five minutes to enter the country ("Any movies in your iPad?" "No.") and two hours of scrutinizing our luggage and inspecting all cameras and smartphones before we could leave. "Illegal, erase."
The bulk of my photos were on picture cards hidden in my socks on departure.
Guards, guards and more guards along the railroad track.
All with guns.
All with guns.
We left North Korea on a train that never went faster than 40 km/h according to the GPS that one of my colleagues had hidden.
The roadbed was terrible with long stretches where up to 40 % of the spikes were missing.
Our train had seats for all, but not so on any of the other trains
we saw. Note the persons going between the tracks, UNDER the train.
The Chinese train to Beijing, the next day, sometimes traveled at 275 km/h.
Chinese high-speed train
I came home with lots of thoughts swirling in my head. That little insight into a world that is completely different than what any of us know, North Korea, was sobering.
They live in a communistic, totally dictatorial, state with zero, absolutely no ability to control your own life. All are told what to do, and even worse, taught what to think. I don’t say that because of what we saw, but based on the several books that I read before, and even more books that I read after my return.
It is a society without monetary rewards, there is nothing to buy outside of the farmers’ markets. There are some flea markets selling Chinese products, but most of them are smuggled into the country.
So much was put up for show, and displayed for us. What was for real? We all tried to look behind the Potemkin facades but couldn’t agree on what we had seen. Our guides kept us busy every minute of the day, from breakfast to the last night-cap.
As so many who have visited North Korea, have said, there was no time to walk or see anything on your own. Or, more to the truth, we were not allowed to step away from our guides, not even for a few seconds. I stepped into a store while we were walking as a group. One of the guides saw me come out again but got distracted by one of the group taking a picture of a military truck. He jumped at that man, made him open the camera and erase the offending picture.
When that was done, I was far away.
I took a great number of photographs from inside my semi-closed hand, not in an obvious manner. With a wide-angle lens, you can cut out what you care to see when at home. My micro photo memory cards were only 11 x 15 mm, easy to hide anywhere in my luggage.
So much was put up for show, and displayed for us. What was for real? We all tried to look behind the Potemkin facades but couldn’t agree on what we had seen. Our guides kept us busy every minute of the day, from breakfast to the last night-cap.
As so many who have visited North Korea, have said, there was no time to walk or see anything on your own. Or, more to the truth, we were not allowed to step away from our guides, not even for a few seconds. I stepped into a store while we were walking as a group. One of the guides saw me come out again but got distracted by one of the group taking a picture of a military truck. He jumped at that man, made him open the camera and erase the offending picture.
When that was done, I was far away.
I took a great number of photographs from inside my semi-closed hand, not in an obvious manner. With a wide-angle lens, you can cut out what you care to see when at home. My micro photo memory cards were only 11 x 15 mm, easy to hide anywhere in my luggage.
I am glad to say that my camera and my memory cards evaded inspection on our way out of the country. There were two inspectors for each of our six-person cabins. They spent at least an hour, or more, systematically going through, first the cellphones, and then our regular cameras, then asking for any extra photo-cards, erasing all “forbidden” pictures. They ran out of time before they came to me, I sat closest to the window, farthest away from the door.
I had some hope of being able to keep in touch with my so open guide. He had expressed a great interest in how to leave North Korea, which route to take, and what happens to a North Korean, once in South Korea. I told him about the routes, the difficulty of getting to a North Korean consulate, and how they are interrogated before they receive a USD 20,000 bonus for coming. He was keenly interested. Perhaps he registered what I said to tell the border guards, but I don’t think so, there are dozens of books, both in Korean and English, describing how North Koreans have escaped their country-sized prison.
As a final gesture, we had stepped aside, I handed him my business card. He took it, read it carefully, put in his pocket and said, very slowly and with great deliberation, in a sorrowful tone.
“What good is this, the law forbids me to send or receive a letter for as long as I live."
Just imagine…
See more photographs here.
https://goo.gl/photos/mvGzj7oXTYZcNdiU9
I had some hope of being able to keep in touch with my so open guide. He had expressed a great interest in how to leave North Korea, which route to take, and what happens to a North Korean, once in South Korea. I told him about the routes, the difficulty of getting to a North Korean consulate, and how they are interrogated before they receive a USD 20,000 bonus for coming. He was keenly interested. Perhaps he registered what I said to tell the border guards, but I don’t think so, there are dozens of books, both in Korean and English, describing how North Koreans have escaped their country-sized prison.
As a final gesture, we had stepped aside, I handed him my business card. He took it, read it carefully, put in his pocket and said, very slowly and with great deliberation, in a sorrowful tone.
“What good is this, the law forbids me to send or receive a letter for as long as I live."
Just imagine…
See more photographs here.
https://goo.gl/photos/mvGzj7oXTYZcNdiU9
