My Holiday in North Korea

by Wendy E. Simmons

  We exited the airport, and I was introduced to Driver, who had spiky hair and was standing next to our car smoking. He half grinned, revealing several gold teeth, then took my bag and loaded it into the boot.

  Older Handler directed me to sit in the backseat next to Fresh Handler and took the senior position in the front.

  My “North Korea Is Great! America Is Not!” indoctrination began immediately. The car doors had barely closed when Older Handler uttered “our Dear Great Leader” and “American Imperialist” for the first time.

  As we drove from the airport to our first tourist attraction, the Arch of Triumph, Older Handler turned to me with a smile plastered across her face and said, “Do you know what today is?”

  ME: Umm, Wednesday?

  (Which was true.)

  OLDER HANDLER: It’s June Twenty-Fifth, the day the American Imperialists invaded our country.

  (Which was not true.)

  On June 25, 1950, nearly the opposite happened. North Korea invaded South Korea.

  Unsure what etiquette dictated in such a situation, I awkwardly said nothing, hoping the conversation would end. She asked me the question again, perhaps thinking I hadn’t heard her the first time. I offered the same answer.

  Unsatisfied with my response, Older Handler responded, her smile unperturbed, “It’s the day your country invaded our country.”

  ME: Oh, that’s a coincidence then that I arrived today.

  I quickly glanced at Fresh Handler with a look that said, “Ack. How did I screw this up already?” And like the new best friend I knew she would be, she giggle-smiled back at me the equivalent of “Don’t worry!”

  I looked back at Older Handler, whose smile was now gone. Like a one-two-knockout punch, Older Handler said something to Fresh Handler and Driver, then Driver pulled the car over, and Older Handler and Fresh Handler switched seats.

  Older Handler looked at me and said, “Now I watch you more.”

  Welcome to North Korea.

  Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a mile high to leave the court.

  —Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

  Chapter 2

  Curiouser and Curiouser

  Like Alice, I’ve fallen through a rabbit hole into a world full of strange and nonsensical events, where normal is surreal, lying is widespread, and the ruler has a penchant for demanding, “Off with her head!”

  It’s a world where what you don’t know can hurt you, and ignorance is not bliss, where you must forgo all established logic to acclimate, and “Jabberwocky” makes sense.

  But it’s North Korea, not Wonderland, where I went to explore, with no Cheshire Cat to lay out the score. So I wrote this brief guide for readers and tourists, so my journey into madness won’t seem quite as curious:

  1. You are an American Imperialist, and North Koreans will call you this right to your face. They will also tell you that they “hate your country, and your leader…but not you,” and that your country is responsible for all of their problems. Don’t take it personally; they believe every word of it.

  2. Everyone in North Korea calls North Korea “Korea” or “the DPRK,” and North Koreans “Koreans.” This is because North Koreans believe North Korea and South Korea are still one country and one people, and reunification would be imminent were it not for the American Imperialists’ occupation of the South. Calling North Korea “North Korea” or North Koreans anything other than “Koreans” just reminds everyone you’re an American Imperialist, responsible for ruining all chances for the reunification of their country.

  3. Visitors quickly learn that three Kims, not one, govern NoKo:

  Kim Il-sung (dead); his son, Kim Jong-Il (also dead); and his grandson, Kim Jong-un (the new fat one). You’ll also learn you should never say leader without the qualifiers dear, great and/or supreme preceding it. Koreans seem to believe that these three terms are actually part of the word leader—like a hyphenated word—so if you just say leader, no one knows whom you are talking about.

  4. Don’t ask how old the new fat leader is or what year he was born, as it’s considered impolite:

  ME: What year was your current Dear Great Leader born?

  OLDER HANDLER: To be honest, this question is considered impolite. (Followed by tight-lipped smile that I quickly learned meant the conversation was over.)

  5. For that matter, don’t ask or talk about the new fat one at all. No one seems to acknowledge his presence or give a shit about him, and there are only so many hours in a day (even if it feels like 2,000), so focus on the two great dead ones.

  6. Koreans love both of their Dear dead Great Leaders…a lot. They love their dead Great Leaders as much as I loved my cutest, most adorable, best doggies in the whole wide world (coincidentally also dead, and running North Korea). Vibrantly painted murals (read: flat, desaturated, Technicolor-looking pastels) of the Dear Leaders commanding troops, running movie studios, and beauty-pageant waving while standing on the edge of active volcanoes punctuate NoKo’s otherwise overwhelmingly drab, gray, washed-out world. Larger-than-life statues of one or both Great Leaders riding horses, dressed as farmers, or simply being big tower over cities and towns and are there to greet you everywhere you go. It is the cult of Kim, and fierce, absolute, unalloyed love and loyalty are demanded (and shown), or stiff penalties must be paid. Whether you encounter larger-than-life Kim(s) in the library or in a forest, before doing anything else you must first reverently and respectfully bow before the statue (hands to your sides, sunglasses off, no photos or talking until bowing complete) until your guide cues you that the time for idol worship is over.

  7. As mentioned, Koreans believe their first Dear dead Great Leader is still running the country—literally calling the shots—from his glass-encased mausoleum inside the Kumsusan Memorial. In fact the North Korean people refer to Kim Il-sung as their Eternal Leader—and in addition to him being an all-around amazing human being and one awesome guy, Koreans will proudly tell you he is also their sun (as in shine) and their father (as in dada…ism). Do not laugh. It’s one hundred percent true. They swear to Sung.

  8. As if they’re not busy enough running the country while dead, and being gods and the sun, etc., the Great Leaders are also expert geniuses at literally everything. Whenever mortal man is in a bind, a Dear Great Leader (living or dead) needs simply to show up, stand, and point—officially referred to as providing “on-the-spot guidance”—and presto chango, all is great. Just like that of their fictional superhero counterparts, the preternatural genius of the Great Leaders knows no bounds. They effortlessly dispense expert advice on everything from hydroelectricity and satellite technology to proper desk height and SPFs. Every place you visit during your trip—from the hospital to the dam (which the Koreans call the Barrage)—has the Dear Great Leader’s on-the-spot guidance written all over it, usually in the form of a commemorative plaque (red writing on paper in a frame) or some kind of monument (red writing etched in concrete walls, red writing etched in rocks), which you will stand staring at while your handlers or local guide retell His Supreme Genius’s genius advice, given at that very spot. Try not to think too hard about why such a supreme genius can’t sort out the country’s chronic lack of toilet paper, water, electricity, and food. This too is considered impolite to ask about.

  9. Be it the statues, murals, monuments, or commemorative plaques, or the billboards, signs, posters, paintings, or photos that dot every spot—from street corners to schools, parks to stamps—propaganda is everywhere. Taught in school, enforced at home, played on the radio, blasted from loudspeakers day and night. Only government-approved books, art, film, music, and fun exist. No freedom of the press, no internet, no outside news, no outside anything. Unless it’s Great Leader love (specifically, how great and smart the Great Leaders are, how great and smart the Great Leaders are at being great and smart, and how great and smart the Great Leaders are at giving genius on-the-spot guidance) or how strong and powerful their military is (particularly when
crushing the American Imperialists), or how disgusting and despicable the U.S. and South Korea are (just in general), or how pleasing and fantastic their lives are in North Korea—basically anything other than propaganda simply does not exist, and it will be force-fed to you from the moment you arrive until the second you leave.

  10. Koreans have adopted a calendar system predicated on Kim Il-sung’s birthday instead of Jesus Christ’s. Year one is 1912, the year the Dear Great Leader was born, making 2014 year 103, 2015 year 104, and so on. They correlate his birthday and other important dates in his life to all kinds of things: the length of a road, the number of floors in a building, the number of lines in a poem, and how many people can fit in an elevator. Your local guides and handlers will often say things like, “The poem on this rock is written in three lines of forty-eight characters each because our father, who is our sun, was born on this day.” They will also tell you in what years and how many times a Great Leader has visited every place you go. If you add the Great Leader’s birthday to the number of places he’s visited and multiply by the years, you can probably calculate pi.

  11. If you want to push your handler’s buttons, ask about the giant elephant in the room, the Ryugyong Hotel. This towering pyramid, which defines the Pyongyang skyline, has been under construction since the 1980s and still isn’t finished. This is particularly curious because, according to your handlers, every other structure erected in North Korea, regardless of size or complexity, took no time at all to build.

  DAY ONE

  Cut to: immediately upon arrival anywhere in North Korea, when Wendy was still being polite.

  OLDER HANDLER: To be honest, this building is 600,000 square meters and took three weeks to build.

  ME: Wow. That’s very impressive.

  DAY SIX

  Cut to: immediately upon arrival anywhere in North Korea. Wendy, no longer so polite.

  OLDER HANDLER: This building is 800,000 square meters and took one month to build.

  ME, to myself: Huh, that seems pretty unlikely. There’s absolutely no way you were able to build this gigantic thirty-story building in only thirty days since you have no power tools or electricity or running water. On the other hand you are a country of slaves, so I guess it’s possible your Dear Great Leader could have just said, “Hey, you 300,000 normal people are going to do nothing for the next thirty days but build this building, and I don’t really care how many of you die doing it.” (He probably whispered that last bit.)

  So, it’s equally likely that it’s true, or not true, which is the fundamental conundrum with everything everyone says to you in North Korea, and it will slowly make you crazy.

  ME, aloud: Uh huh. That’s pretty fast.

  OLDER HANDLER: Yes.

  ME: So then let me ask you this…what’s the deal with that pyramid hotel? I mean it’s been under construction for what, like 30 years? Why can’t they get it done? What’s the holdup? I bet it’s still completely empty inside! Have you been inside? But you’re a guide…surely as a guide they’d want you to see inside. When will it be finished? Why wouldn’t they tell the guides? I just don’t understand. I mean if they can build an entire movie studio in a week, why can’t they get one hotel finished?

  OLDER HANDLER, while making a sweeping, grandiose arm gesture: Who can know the future?

  ME: Well, I thought your Dear Great dead Leader could?

  OLDER HANDLER, VERY tight smile.

  12. Unless you’re inside your hotel, where you’re free to roam alone, you will never be without your handlers and usually your driver. And every place you go, you and your handlers and driver will be met by local guides, sometimes one, sometimes a few, sometimes many. So at each of eight to ten activities scheduled for every single day (I was on a solo private tour, so this could be different for people on group or preplanned tours), you are suffocated in bombast by entirely new groups of people. As a single person who lives alone because I like it, I found this, above all else, to be one of the hardest parts of my trip. I could not wait to get back to my room at night so I could decompress from ALL THE TALKING AT ME.

  13. You can take photos of almost anything you want in Pyongyang. This is because Pyongyang is the Workers’ Party of Korea’s gleaming showcase city. Even so, the Party and your handlers do their best to keep your movements restricted to the official tourist routes, and almost everything is staged, and the following photographic subjects are strictly forbidden:

  anyone in the military

  traffic ladies

  stores

  empty shelves in stores

  people waiting in lines of any kind

  errant litter

  normal people outside your regular propaganda tour (unless you ask permission)

  anything that isn’t staged (i.e., anything unscripted or unplanned that accidentally happens during your propaganda tour)

  anything your handler thinks you think will make a great photo

  me eating dinner in the banquet hall of the Koryo Hotel.

  Conversely, you are not allowed to take photos of anything outside of Pyongyang without prior authorization from your handlers or local guides because the rest of the country is a primitive, third-world shithole. You will entertain yourself devising ways to thwart this.

  14. Everyone in North Korea lies to you about everything, all the time. Doesn’t matter what, who, or why, or whether it’s small stuff or big stuff. And when they aren’t outright lying to you, they’re either purposely unclear, or evasive—or if they really object to what you’re asking or saying, they’ll just pretend you aren’t talking or they can’t hear you.

  Cut to: Older Handler, Fresh Handler, and Wendy standing in the driveway of the Koryo Hotel, waiting for Driver to pull the car up. It’s raining.

  ME: Sad. It’s raining.

  OLDER HANDLER: Very lucky. Nice sunny day.

  ME: It’s raining.

  OLDER HANDLER: No.

  ME: Yes, it’s raining. See?

  OLDER HANDLER, tight smile.

  15. Everything in NoKo is the same everywhere. Everyone wears the same 1950s-era clothing or uniforms. All the local guides have the same hairstyles and speak in the same urgent whisper. All the buildings have the same basic decor. It’s all the same marble, the same wall coverings, the same chairs, the same tablecloths, the same bicycles, the same uniforms, the same smiling portraits of the dead Great Leaders, the same bowls and the same beer.

  16. Bring only small-denomination bills as spending money—euros, RMB, or U.S. dollars will do—because there is no change in North Korea. By small, I mean small. By no change, I mean no change. Even so, more than once I was given bottled water as change for small-denomination bills.

  17. Whether you’re on an independent tour, as I was, or a scheduled group tour like most everyone else, everything you do in North Korea is nearly flawlessly scheduled in advance by the Korean International Travel Company (KITC). The company meticulously plans for and prepares every detail of your hour-by-hour itinerary with military precision, making sure everything is in place and everyone is on script, so you will leave North Korea believing it’s the best place on Earth. They are the ultimate event planners. Whether it’s a tour of the Fatherland Liberation War Museum or a visit to an orphanage, the KITC has it covered. But, as you actually are on Earth, interruptions will occur, and when they do, DISCUSSIONS will be had. The length and severity of said DISCUSSIONS are wholly dependent on the nature of the anomaly. Arrive someplace and the local guide is sitting down instead of standing up: a threatening grunt or two will do, as the guide jumps to his or her feet like the chair has suddenly caught fire. Wendy deciding at breakfast she doesn’t want to go to the town of Sinchon to visit the Sinchon Museum of American War Atrocities: CODE RED! DIS-CUSS-IONS! And since there are no cars on the roads, or lines to contend with anywhere, the KITC can control time, too, choosing to schedule start times on less commonly used increments like 7:55 a.m., 1:35 p.m., or 6:55 p.m.

  18. There is no need to account f
or lines or crowds, because no place is crowded, because no one is there. Okay, sometimes people are there, but it’s never one or two people or a small group of friends just casually hanging out talking or taking in the sights. It’s a flash mob, NoKo style. Say you arrive at a Funfair (one of NoKo’s extraordinarily depressing amusement parks), and there’s no one there. Within minutes of arriving, a huge swarm of people—usually hundreds—will suddenly arrive, always walking in lockstep, five or six people across and as many deep. And of course they’re dressed and look nearly the same, sporting the same decades-old clothing and hairstyles, many, sometimes most, wearing military or other uniforms. Your handlers may deny this is happening, even when you point to it while it’s happening. In such cases, deny their denial and continue asking a lot of questions.

  People in North Korea walk in lines like this

  And like this

  19. Your handlers will take excellent and overbearing care of you. It’s their job. They are tasked with ensuring you have a perfect experience and that you leave loving the Great Leader and North Korea. Basically they are (not) paid to brainwash you. This makes your interactions with them complicated and difficult. As a fellow sentient being, you will experience profound feelings of sympathy and empathy, while simultaneously feeling annoyed and disgusted by their blatant attempts to ingratiate themselves. Your options are to not think too hard about their feelings, motivation, lives, future, and mental states and enjoy your time, or drive yourself insane and rack yourself with guilt. I went with the latter. I recommend the former.