by Martin Limon
I felt like a rabbit on a live-fire range. Everyone in this restricted passenger car, with the single exception of Hero Kang, was my enemy. I sat staring grimly ahead, trying to control my breathing. As long as I held tightly to the wooden armrest, I figured my hands wouldn’t shake too much. So far, no one had approached us and I was praying that no one would.
My uniform was that of an officer of the Warsaw Pact in Eastern Europe with the rank insignia of a lieutenant colonel. Last night, Hero Kang informed me I would pose as a Romanian officer by the name of Enescu. The identity, including the papers, had already been established, but when I asked if we had backup at the Romanian Embassy, he interrupted me and warned me not to ask too many questions.
“We are a professional organization,” was all he’d say.
Apparently, they were very professional. If he could buffalo the boss of the Port of Nampo, establish safe houses amidst the city’s grain distribution network, send messages to Doc Yong, and set up contacts within a foreign embassy, the organization of resisters he belonged to was very professional indeed. But the more people participating, the sooner they’d be compromised.
When I pointed out to Hero Kang that I neither spoke nor understood Romanian, he said not to worry, no one we were likely to run into on the train did either. Military officers from other Communist countries are occasionally seen in Pyongyang, usually Russian or Chinese, but a Romanian shouldn’t raise too many eyebrows. As long as we kept moving. Like that rabbit on the firing range.
A whistle sounded and the train started its engines. Slowly, we chugged forward. Outside the window, ratty old wooden buildings rolled by, some made of brick but nothing that looked too permanent. I hadn’t expected there to be. During the war, Korean cities had been bombed mercilessly by the American Air Force, so much so that the pilots complained that all they were doing was making “rubble bounce on rubble.” Since then, the North Korean government had been in constant preparation for the resumption of war. The only structures that were designed to last were military fortifications.
I expected someone to walk down the aisle, as in South Korea, with trays full of drinks and cigarettes and snacks. But not here. The only people who marched through the train were a couple of rail-line policemen. When I turned to look back, I saw that they were checking the other passengers carefully, not only for their travel permits but also for their fare tokens. In our passenger car, the men did nothing more than nod at the various dignitaries and, without checking anyone’s permits or fare, scurried out of the car. No wonder Hero Kang had chosen to sit here.
Five minutes out of the station, we were in rolling countryside, heading north past fallow rice paddies toward the capital city of Pyongyang, the heart of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. I fought panic, taking deep breaths, reminding myself that Hero Kang would take care of me.
On some inaudible cue, people all around started to rise from their seats and make their way into the next car. Hero Kang rose and motioned for me to follow. I didn’t want to move. Impatiently, he gestured for me to get up, so I did, fighting a brief moment of vertigo. Then I pulled down my tunic, thrust back my shoulders, and followed Hero Kang.
It was a dining car.
All the cadres were taking seats at round tables, each of which could accommodate eight to ten. Hero Kang guided me to a stool in the corner. Just as we sat down, we were joined by a group of people wearing the same bland Communist uniforms everyone else was. Immediately, I went on alert. They weren’t speaking Korean. They wore high-collared jackets and the men’s hair was combed across their heads and cut in a severe straight line; the women had soft caps pulled over short hair. They were chattering to one another in the singsong dialect of Mandarin, the language of Beijing.
Hero Kang ignored them. Already, men in military uniforms were shoving trays filled with noodle soup in front of us. Each person grabbed for a bowl, offering it to the person next to him or her, until we all had steaming bowls in front of us. Then the same servers ladled white rice into smaller bowls and passed those around. Spoons and wooden chopsticks were distributed. Without further ado, all the comrades started shoveling soup and rice into their mouths. Two large bowls, each of turnip and cabbage kimchi, were placed on the table, the pieces cut in rough chunks. Hero Kang dipped his chopsticks into them with gusto. A couple of the Chinese women tried some morsels. I decided that, as a Romanian, I would steer clear of the kimchi. I even pretended to fumble with the chopsticks and then set them down and ate strictly with my spoon, which made shoveling clumps of noodles into my mouth awkward.
I’d been in Korean restaurants before, plenty of them, and usually in addition to the standard cabbage and turnip kimchi, various types of pickled vegetables, up to a dozen, are served on elegant plates. Also, rice is never served with noodles. But this was plain peasant fare, filling, in no way trying to be elegant. Nothing to drink was served, not even barley tea, and the staff had disappeared into another section of the dining car. If you were expecting a dessert menu, you could forget it.
None of the Chinese looked up while they ate. Neither did Hero Kang. I was grateful for the lack of attention. In South Korea, as the only Westerner, I would’ve been the center of attention. People would’ve been showing me how to use chopsticks and explaining the various dishes on the table—and, more importantly, practicing their English.
When he finished eating, one of the Chinese apparatchiks pulled out a pack of cigarettes with a drawing of Chairman Mao on the front. He offered it first to Hero Kang, who took two, and then to me. Without saying anything, I shook my head, pointing to my lungs. The Chinese nodded sympathetically and continued to pass out cigarettes to the men at the table, ignoring the women. All the other tables were lighting up now and soon the bare-walled dining car was filled with acrid smoke. The serving staff reappeared and cleared the tables, not bothering to ask whether we were finished or not.
Now was the time to leave. I was afraid someone would speak to me, but Hero Kang continued smoking, apparently unconcerned. One of the Chinese spoke to him in broken Korean.
“You are famous, comrade. How fortunate you are to have met personally with the Great Leader.”
Kang nodded dreamily, his eyelids half closed, allowing smoke to drift out of his nostrils.
There was no nameplate on the Chinese man’s tunic, only his pin of Chairman Mao. Nor did he wear a rank insignia. Therefore, he was political and possibly of very high rank indeed. He grinned and continued to speak to Hero Kang.
“And your friend, a comrade from Eastern Europe, I see.”
Kang nodded again. The Chinese man turned to me and said something in Russian.
Hero Kang sat up as if electrocuted. “He’s a Romanian, not a Russki.”
“Ah,” the Chinese man said. “But he’s an officer. Certainly he’s been educated in Russian.”
“The hell he has.” Hero Kang was raising his voice now. “He’s like me, promoted because of his ability to fight. In the Czech uprising he killed ten counterrevolutionaries, with his bare hands.”
Hero Kang reached out his big, bear-like paws as if to demonstrate. The Chinese man leaned back. I stared ahead sternly, showing as little reaction to what was going on around me as possible.
“Don’t provoke him,” Kang said, waggling his finger, “or he’ll think he’s back on the field of combat and then you’ll have to watch out.”
Kang barked a laugh, stubbed his cigarette out directly onto the wooden table, stood up and strode out of the dining car. I glanced at the wide-eyed Chinese without nodding, stood up, and followed Kang. Behind me, I heard them chattering. I wished I could understand.
We were the first to return to the passenger car. Hero Kang flopped down in his seat. He looked worried. I was too. I doubted that Kang’s little charade about me being a combat veteran who didn’t speak Russian fooled anyone. I felt certain we’d been exposed. In a low voice, I asked Hero Kang what we should do. He waved me off.
“When the time
comes to fight,” he said, “we will fight.”
I glanced back at the dining car. No one had emerged yet, but they would soon. If I was going to do anything, now was the time.
Hurriedly, I stepped past Hero Kang until I reached the spot where the Chinese had been sitting. In the overhead rack, they had sequestered a few traveling bags. I reached in my pocket and pulled out one of the packs of British cigarettes I had purchased in Hong Kong, the half-empty one, and slid it into a side pocket of one of the bags, quickly rebuckling the clasp.
When I returned to my seat, I quietly told Hero Kang what I had done. He said nothing but nodded, pleased. He kept his eyes open for a few moments as other passengers filtered back into the car. Then he let his eyes droop and, after a few minutes, softly began to snore.
Most everyone slept throughout the rest of the slow trip to Pyongyang. Often we traveled at speeds of twenty miles per hour or less. I believed this was to preserve coal, but it might have been because of the poor condition of the tracks. The iron wheels screeched and occasionally lurched from side to side, making for some interesting moments along the banks of the Taedong River. Even at our reduced speed, the trip to Pyongyang should’ve taken only an hour, but we stopped at every country village, stretching the trip out to almost three hours.
Behind us in the regular passenger cars, during the loading and unloading, there was much argument and discussion centering around travel permits and fare tokens. If I hadn’t known that I was traveling in the “people’s paradise,” I would’ve guessed that the conductors and the rail guards lengthened the stops in order to eke out the maximum number of bribes from harried peasants, many of whom were traveling with bags of grain balanced atop their heads or clutching wicker baskets filled with dead fish or live fowl—presumably to barter with, which was strictly illegal. The old woman who had been knocked out back at the Nampo Station had been either unable or unwilling to pay a bribe.
At least the North Koreans were eating well, I thought. And so far, I hadn’t seen any beggars. No filthy men, or even children, sleeping on sidewalks and sitting listlessly near commuter stations, holding out hats or tin cups for loose change. Life was grim here in North Korea. But from the point of view of a people who had suffered through colonization, occupation, war, starvation, and disease in the last fifty years alone, maybe things weren’t so bad.
The train whistle shrilled and, with iron brakes grinding, we screeched into the Pyongyang Train Station. A large clock tower sat atop a sturdy stone building lined with plate-glass windows. Behind each one of them stood a uniformed guard, some of them peering at us through binoculars. When we came to a halt, the other passengers, particularly the small cadre of Chinese, were up and heading for the door. Hero Kang took his time, staying in character as a tough hombre who didn’t much care what anyone thought of him. I don’t think he was acting.
We followed the crowd to the departure gate. The uniformed woman checking documents there merely bowed to Hero Kang and waved the two of us through. It was in the foyer of the huge domed building that I spotted them. I pulled on Hero Kang’s sleeve.
The Chinese man we’d spoken to in the dining car was conversing urgently with two men with red security armbands. They were having trouble communicating; the Chinese man had an exasperated expression on his face and kept gesticulating wildly, receiving blank looks from the security guards.
Hero Kang sized up the situation quickly.
“Come on,” he said.
We headed for a side exit. About halfway down the hallway, a sign said: PEOPLE’S SECURITY, PYONGYANG TRAIN STATION. Hero Kang stepped inside. A smartly dressed young man stood up from behind a counter, tugged on his tunic, and half bowed to Hero Kang.
“I have a case of smuggling to report,” Kang said. A supervisor was brought out and Hero Kang quickly explained the situation. Within seconds, a detail of security guards was dispatched to detain the Chinese apparatchiks who were so brazenly smuggling counterrevolutionary tobacco into the Democratic People’s Republic.
In the main lobby of the train station, the Chinese man must have finally made his point, because a policeman’s whistle blew. But the whistle sputtered out as a larger contingent of security guards surrounded the Chinese and placed them under arrest.
Hero Kang and I exited the train station from a side door.
There are no taxi stands in front of the Pyongyang Train Station, mainly because there are no taxis in North Korea. Automobiles, all automobiles, are gifts from the Great Leader, given selectively to those who contribute most to the revolution. Which means mainly Communist Party bosses and the military. Even the police are usually left on foot. And the fire department can forget about it; there are just not enough internal combustion engines to go around.
Hero Kang and I caught a ride on the back of a garlic truck. The driver was a farmer from a cooperative outside of town, and the young man with him was his nephew. They were in awe of Hero Kang and repeatedly thanked him for saving their country from the American imperialist aggressors in the Great Patriotic War. They seemed afraid of me and mostly tried to pretend I wasn’t there. The old truck was Russian-made and coughed and wheezed through the wide Pyongyang streets. There weren’t the teeming masses I was used to in Seoul, only small groups of uniformed students or organized workers marching to and fro, sometimes belting out songs in praise of the Great Leader.
My briefers in Seoul had told me that only the most loyal Communist subjects were allowed to live in Pyongyang, handpicked for their socialist credentials. The buildings were mostly huge apartment-like complexes made of cement. What was odd was the lack of signs or advertisements of any kind, and there were no stores where one could purchase food or cigarettes or soju. If you couldn’t buy what you wanted when you wanted it, that meant you were dependent on the generosity of the Great Leader. Which, I suppose, was the plan. After meandering through the city for a couple of miles, we hopped off in an area of town that sat beyond the central monuments and parade grounds, beyond the rows of shoebox-like cement apartment buildings. It was an area of town that looked almost as if it were fit for human habitation.
“The bosses don’t let foreigners come down here,” Kang told me. We stepped down muddy alleys surrounded by wood- and brick-walled buildings, nothing much more than two stories and all of it jumbled in a maze that led up the side of the hill. From there, the neighborhood spread off to the left toward the Taedong River. A few women with bundles of laundry balanced atop their heads passed us. One of them stared at me goggle-eyed. The others averted their gaze, cringing as they did so, as if I were some predator escaped from a zoo.
“The children are at school,” Kang said, “their mothers and fathers at work. Only the grandmothers remain.”
“Won’t those women report me to the police?”
“No. You’re wearing a uniform, for one thing, and even if you weren’t, they dare not talk to the police. They or their family might be accused of sedition.”
“Sedition? For what?”
Kang shrugged. “Just talking to a foreigner is a form of disloyalty.”
“How about you?”
Kang laughed and flicked the photograph of himself shaking hands with the Great Leader. “I’m a hero of the people.”
Like the rest of the city, this jumble of buildings lacked storefronts. Even the poorest neighborhood in South Korea would have a few shops selling dried cuttlefish or puffed rice or ginseng gum, but there was nothing like that here. Not even any noodle stands or chop houses.
Another thing I didn’t see were cops. Hero Kang seemed to read my mind.
“The police mainly patrol the government offices and the homes of the cadres.”
“But if we see one?”
Kang’s face set grimly. “I’ll take care of it. Come on.”
We slid into a narrow alley lined with brick-and-stone walls. The pathway ran straight for a while and then began to wind sinuously in various directions until I was completely disoriented. I would’ve na
vigated by the sun, but it was hidden behind banks of gray clouds. Finally, the walkway started to rise uphill. I felt hidden back here, and safe.
“Commander Koh,” I said, “in the Port of Nampo, he will alert the authorities about me. And the Chinese aboard the train, eventually the train station security office will corroborate their story and confirm that a Romanian officer who couldn’t speak Russian is wandering around Pyongyang.”
Kang shook his head. “No. Neither one of them will report it. Neither Commander Koh nor the security people at the train station.”
The road became steeper and finally, leaning forward, Hero Kang explained.
“Things are different here. No one dares to report failure.” I thought of the headquarters of the Eighth United States Army in Seoul. There wasn’t much failure reported there either. Kang continued, “The price of failure is too high. Commander Koh would never report that he allowed a foreign sailor to escape from the Port of Nampo, nor would the security office at the Pyongyang Train Station report that a man posing as a Romanian officer slipped through their grasp. They will remain silent and hope that your escape is not traced back to them.”
“And if it is traced back to them?”
“They will cut a deal with someone to keep it quiet.”
“They will be blackmailed,” I said.
Hero Kang nodded. “Precisely. But that is unlikely.”
“Why?”
“Because they will take other action.”
“Other action? You just said they won’t report me.”
“No, they won’t. Not officially. But they have other options.”
“Other options? Like what?”
“Like reporting you to one of the fixers.”