North Korea

I've just come back from North Korea (or Korea as the locals refer to it; there is South Korea, and True Korea as far as they are concerned).

I started flying from Beijing with Koryo Airlines - voted World's Worst Airline four years in a row. True, they have hideous food (the NK version of a burger, has to be tasted to be believed) and play military music bands at you constantly, with brief sojourns into the gospel according to Kim Il Sung periodically, but the service really wasn't any worse than Qantas and the music less offensive to my ears than Mariah Carey, so wasn't a bad start. I did note that any uneaten burgers were carefully placed back on the tray, I suspect they make a reappearance on the return crossing.

You cannot travel independently in North Korea; you have two government goons from the state-sanctioned KITC with you at all times. They picked me up from the airport after clearing customs (which wasn't as arduous as you are lead to believe; you have to declare books and electronics, but they only give them a cursory inspection) and drove into Pyongyang. My lead goon, Mrs Pak, gave me a brief introduction to the major monuments and constructions, each one apparently a credit to the vision of various Kims. At the hotel she went through the approved itinerary with me; I was told we could go and see other things, but only if they were already on the itinerary. OK then.

I won't list everything we saw over the week; a significant amount was displays of the greatness of Kim 1 and Kim 2. Highlights include:

The Korean War Museum. How unbiased would the North Korean version of the Korean War be? Not very, turns out. It's a marble monstrosity with a huge display of downed American machinery and the spy ship Pueblo (and the only place I saw a statue of Kim 3, I get the impression they are kind of ashamed of him). There's an introductory video which basically states "Macarthur and his mates got together and decided they wanted a rumble, so they took it out on us poor, innocent Koreans." The whole place is dedicated to how great and brave their soldiers are, and how cowardly and rubbish the American were.

The International Friendship Exhibition. I was expecting something along the lines of Disneyland's Small World for some reason. Turns out to be Kim Il Sung's Big House of Crap: a 17,000 square metre pagoda-cum-bunkhouse that houses all the stuff given to the various Kims by such luminaries as Billy Graham, Dennis Rodman and the Juche Study Group of Tanzania. I had a guide who gave me illuminating commentary like "Vase, from Ghana". At the end of the tour she asked me if I thought that the items were valuable and beautiful. "I wouldn't want any of that crap in my house" was not the answer she was after.

Revolutionary Martyrs' Cemetery. Koreans refer to two wars; the Revolutionary War (against Japanese occupation, lasted from around 1925 to 1945) and the Korean War (1950-1953). This is the cemetery of people who carried out various attacks on the Japanese in the 1920s and 1930s, often at the cost of immense torture and murder of their families. A lot of monuments are overblown and feature quite aggressive anti-US or Japanese slogans, but this place is incredibly well done, restrained, and some of the stories on the gravestones are heartbreaking. It's also the burial place of Kim Il Sung's mother who dies in her 30s.

The Mausoleum. If you want to see taxidermied dictators, this is the place to go. You are ferried around by travelator, taken off in groups of four and bow before the mortal remains of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jung Il (who actually wanted to be cremated). It's a very surreal experience as the locals really do feel heartbreak at their deaths and are wailing all around you.

The people are incredibly welcoming; I was pulled into a dance event by a bunch of old people and made to dance with them for about two hours. Man, their 80 year olds are fit and strong as oxen. It was like being a cute kid at a grandmothers' convention with all the kisses I got off randoms. Complete strangers would cross the roads (which is a feat in itself), just to say "welcome" and then go away. It was without doubt, the safest I have ever felt while travelling, ever.

We in the west don't get to see what goes on over there, apart from Kim 3 periodically blowing stuff up, and you know what? Neither do they. I've heard that there was another nuclear test while I was over there, but didn't have a clue about it as it's simply not broadcast. The majority of the people are farmers and really couldn't give a rat's ass about the politicking of the international community. Outside Pyongyang there is little infrastructure, and getting outside Pyongyang means travelling on some very bad roads; one major road is called the Young Heroes Motorway and was constructed by the Youth Corp by hand as they didn't have oil for machinery, now, how good do you think that a road made by a bunch of teenagers would be? It wasn't usual to have to swerve to avoid a drive shaft lying in the middle of the road.

I went to see the state circus (excellent) and the state opera, which was having a song and dance spectacular based on the building of a hydroelectric dam - having spent the last two years involved with building a dam I couldn't see much to sing about but nonetheless, it was enjoyable. They also have a really good natural history museum, though I was kind of skeptical when Mrs Pak said all the fossil exhibits were found in NK; it's not overly famous for the occurrence of Triceratops and T rex.

Overall, I had a very enjoyable time. While the constant harping about how great the Kims are gets on your nerves (mainly Kim 1 and Kim 2; Kim 3 doesn't really get a look-in, I asked Mrs Pak about why there weren't any images of him anywhere and she didn't answer), and you are asked to bow before any full length statues of them, you also get an insight into a country that isn't on the world stage for anything other than bad news. While the infrastructure might be a bit ropey by our standards, it has been built entirely by Korean hands with virtually no assistance from outside, as has the entire country. I was impressed by what they have achieved with the resources they have, though might suggest selling some of the gifts from the House of Crap on ebay and using the money for road improvement; how many tea sets do you need, after all.

I adored the people. They are humorous, welcoming, curious, warm and wonderful. Yes, they are indoctrinated into the Juche idea and can quote Kim 1's writings off by heart, but benath that they are hugely proud of who they are and where they've come from.

It's not the place to go if you value your own freedom to wander. You go where they say you go, you take pictures when they say you can, and you show respect to the leaders, regardless of what you think personally. It was a bit of an eye-opener to me and I can see the context that Kim 3 is having to showboat so much within; partially the Juche idea of military independence, partially because everywhere you go there's images of his old man and grandpa reminding him of what he has to live up to.

Overall, the country was surreal, amazing, restrictive, eye-opening, oddly Stalinistic while completely modern. I loved it.

Thank you for sharing it sounds a wonderful place. I didn't realise you were not free to walk around their country without a guide, is that suppose to be for your or their protection. Maybe they thought you may take one of the tea sets lol.

Great write up enjoyed reading it. I guess the PRK is not too unlike the Warsaw Pact nations were like in their hey day. Interesting note on the friendliness of the people. I would imagine language translation was provided by the state sponsored ' officials' always on hand.

A bit of a time warp, but how interesting such a country exists in this over globalised world of 2016.

Did you organise the trip (and guides) yourself or was it through a travel agent? I presume you were travelling alone? Really enjoyed reading it, thanks for posting you tale of the Road Less Travelled :notworthy:

There are a number of travel agencies that deal with the DPRK, you have to have an official agreement with KITC to go there so they are the only choice. I was supposed to be on a group tour but for various reasons everyone else transferred to other tours or dropped out, so I got my goons to myself and a solo tour. In some respects it was great as I got personalised service, in other respects, it also meant I could go missing while the goons were distracted, and got a lot more lectures about the greatness of Kim. Flag, I spoke to some other westerners and one German made the observation that it was indeed, very much like the architecture of the former Soviet States, not something that immediately struck me as I'd already travelled to those states but apparently Americans really notice the difference.

Were you followed everywhere you went ?

I thought in the line of the control displayed in Soviet era. From hotel to special shopping facilities to feelings of being observed in engagements with locals. The young at the time keen on blue jeans of superior western quality. No doubt records and other capitalist trimmings as well.

My parents travelled in Soviet era USSR back in the 60s, and it seemed to be about the same in terms of being told what to see, how to see it and what to do. Parley, I had my two KITC officials, but not any people in dark suits or anything following me around. Truthfully I was surprised at the number of western tourists who were there. By the end of the trip I got on well enough with my lead goon that we could have lively debates about the future of the state without feeling any danger of being sent to the gulags. She was a really lovely woman and I actually miss her.