I meet my travel agent, Chris, in Beijing. Chris is an amiable Irishman who tells me a lot of tourists get drunk in Pyongyang and it’s fine. I thank him for the suggestion.
I do not intend to get drunk in Pyongyang.
Chris hands me handwritten flight tickets and I'm good to go. Flying from Beijing to Pyongyang requires the most thorough security check I've ever received. Every nook and cranny in my trousers is inspected. I am patted down by a stern woman.
When I land, we disembark from the plane and head onto a bus that takes us to immigration. I am struck by the quiet. There is little to suggest we are in the twenty-first century. The airport has one room; it looks like a disused warehouse. The “diplomatic” queue is longer than the “tourists” queue.
Someone walks up to me and greets me by my middle name. He sees my surprise and follows this up by stating my birthday. When I confirm that’s me, he introduces himself as Mr. Lee, a representative from KITC, Korea Independent Travel Company. I don’t know if it is North Korean practice to greet foreigners with their middle name and DOB.
I tell Mr. Lee that he can call me by my first name. Later he returns the favour and asks me to drop the Mr. and call him Lee.
Lee takes me to the car and introduces me to Miss Yu, the other tour guide, and Mr. Jang, the driver, who speaks basically no English. Miss Yu and Lee tell me I can call him Mr. Driver. Yu studied literature and has been working for KITC, the tourist company, for four years. Her English is impressively good for someone who has never left Korea: she understands almost all my questions – and I ask tough questions. Lee has worked for KITC for two years, and prior to that he was in the army, where he did guard duty in a cemetery.
They are happy that I know not to call their country North Korea (they prefer to be known as the DPRK, for Democratic People’s Republic of Korea). Lee’s English isn’t great. His vocabulary is fine, but his pronunciation is very stilted and he struggles with verb tenses. I ask questions in the present tense with a date modifier (e.g. “when you meet me at the airport at 5pm yesterday, you say my birthday. Why do you do that?”) and this improves our communication (incidentally, his explanation is “I know your birthday from KITC”)
The roads are quiet– apparently rush hour is 7am and 7pm. One car is driving backwards at a slow pace. I ask if this is normal and am told that it is not.
I see one van with an open top – more like an old-fashioned wagon – displaying a hundred dead pigs with no protection. Literally, someone appears to have thrown skinned pig bodies onto the back of his wagon and then started driving. On top of the pig carcasses is a soldier in full military dress holding a gun. I don’t ask if this is normal.
Our first stop is a memorial to Juche, the political philosophy founded by Kim Il Sung. Juche has three aspects: Political independence, economic self-sustenance, and self-defence. The elevator takes 90 seconds to reach the eighth floor, 150 metres up. I ask what is on floors 2-7 and am told construction and maintenance. The view from the eighth floor is amazing, though the area is built up and not significantly different from other developing Asian capital cities.
The most unusual thing is the quiet around us. Everyone is apparently at work, so daytime is very quiet. Yu and Lee walk with me at all times. When I need to go to the bathroom, Lee comes with me.
Some stops have a tour guide who doesn’t speak English, in which case Lee or Yu will translate. Yu and Lee both repeatedly ask me to recite information they've given me. Yu asks me her name, and Lee asks me once for the date of the Juche building’s construction, then asks later for its height (he asks this one twice). On all occasions I remember the answer and give it. For this feat, I am congratulated on my intelligence. I don’t know whether all foreigners go through this ritual. My guess is they are checking I can understand their accented English. But that’s only a guess.
After this, I ask to use a bathroom, prompting our first stop that’s not on the official route. This is where things begin to get interesting. I am shown to a nearby shop, which has no lighting. The front room is lit by daylight to some extent. The back rooms are not. Lee shows me to a grimy room with no windows, no electricity, and no running water. It has a urinal in one corner. Lee kindly keeps the door open so that I have enough light to use the urinal. Another corner has what looks like a bathtub four feet above the ground. It is full of cold, grimy water. To wash my hands, I am told it is normal to take a scoop from the bathtub, wash my hands in it, and pour it back. I do this.
It's unclear if this leaves my hands cleaner.
On the way out, I ask Lee why the building has no electricity. His face makes an expression I later come to recognise and mentally label the Doublethink. He explains that there is a very temporary electricity cut. I ask if this is common and he says it is not. He continues to make the Doublethink.
Lee had earlier dropped into conversation that he liked to smoke and Yu now mentions that Lee likes to smoke. I had known before coming that it is traditional to bring gifts for the tour guides, and I had bought gin, chocolate and cigarettes. All of these goods, including the cigarettes, are stored in my bags and I wonder whether my bags have been searched in my absence. I later offer him a large packet of cigarettes.
In hindsight, I think my bags were not searched, but a downside of a police state is that you have to mistrust everybody, no matter how friendly they seem.
Next we visit an art gallery. Most paintings are Korean scenery. Two are President and General (the leaders Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Il, and Kim Jong Un are known respectively as President, General, and Marshal). My favourite painting shows Korean children playing in the snow next to a snowman. I really like the painting because the scene is so similar to how children anywhere else in the world would play in the snow. I ask if I can take a photo of it and am told I cannot. While I am there, the electricity flickers. I ask Yu if this is common. She makes a Doublethink face and says it is not.
We head to a restaurant for dinner. When we walk in, I am happy to see some locals, until Yu corrects me: they are Chinese tourists.
Jang, Yu, Lee and I eat together, and enjoy a very good hotpot and chat (Jang leaves early, as the conversation is in English). Yu tells me a funny story: she had an interest in learning French, so some of KITC’s French-speaking tour guides taught her a French phrase meaning “I would like some dumpling soup”. She practiced it until she had a Frenchman to show around, when she trotted it out proudly. The Frenchman was slightly surprised. It turns out that the phrase actually means “I would like to have sex with you tonight”. People are the same all around the world. Later on I teach her another French phrase, which has a very similar meaning (I use a different verb and remove the “tonight”). It is the Right Thing To Do.
I compliment Lee’s watch: it is gold and very sleek-looking. He tells me that on getting married, his wife gave him a watch rather than a ring, and this is a fairly common custom in Korea.
Yu tells me that Koreans have a form of online dating. I am surprised by this, given they have no access to the internet. Yu explains they can use a North Korea-wide intranet, and tells me that North Koreans sometimes pretend to be a different gender when speaking to people online.
Every Buzzfeed list of “things I have learned from my years of travel” has an entry to the effect that “people all around the world are the same”. When I am asked in the future how true that is, I think I will respond by saying that North Korean dudes talk to strangers online and pretend to be women for the lols.
I try to phrase all my awkward questions as “Some people in the West say that… about North Korea. Is it true?” and I do not sense unhappiness from either Yu or Lee. In fact, they seem genuinely happy to hear stories of North Korea from the outside. I wish I had read recent news articles so I had more recent information – Yu knows all of the stories I proffer because she has heard them from other tourists. She has heard about things like the “Kim Jong Il got four holes in one in his first round of golf” stories through previous tourists, and not through the Korean media. Later I meet a Swiss man, Ricardo, who found a lapel pin with the flags of Korea and Switzerland. Ricardo explained to his tour guide, Lin, that Kim Jong Un studied in Switzerland and Lin was stunned to hear this. I later ask Yu if she knows this, and she confirms that she has heard it from tourists, but explains it as “he only studied for a year. He is still Korean”.
Incidentally, Lee does not have the same haircut as Kim Jong Un, and I am told that the haircut is not mandatory, just "recommended". I am told that Koreans have access to specific western media. Bend it Like Beckham is apparently popular. Yu’s favourite film is Titanic but she tells me not many of her countrymen have seen it. She and Lee have heard of James Bond but not seen the movies. I suspect Die Another Day would not be popular here.
After dinner, we drive to my hotel. This is on an island in the middle of the river. Really. I am told that I can walk around it but should not walk far or leave the island. The hotel is clean but not luxurious. I do not have clean water in my room, so I boil water (taking >5 minutes in my Soviet-style kettle) and then place the boiled water in my fridge. I hope the resulting water is clean to drink.
Day Two
Breakfast is tomato, toast, some kind of sour milk-based drink, and eggs. The breakfast room has a huge mural up but otherwise could pass for a youth hostel. On the way out, Yu tells me that the license plates are divided into various colours. Red and blue are for foreigners, yellow for privately owned, black for the military, and white for the government. Almost all of the cars have white plates, but I see a few black. A couple of hours later, Yu draws my attention to one yellow plate.
We head out to see a monument dedicated to the Leaders (Kim Il Sung, President, and Kim Jong Il, General. But no Kim Jong Un, Marshal). It is very important that we buy flowers and leave the flowers at the Leaders’ feet, and also bow. I ask why Kim Jong Un isn’t there. Yu tells me Kim Jong Il was too modest to put himself there, and only after KJI’s death was he added, by Kim Jong Un. I ask whether KJU will be added if he were to pass away, but Yu thinks this is an inappropriate question, and I apologise profusely.
We see two wedding parties there. Lee tells me it is expected that all Koreans visit this memorial on the day of their marriage. I think “all” Koreans is a stretch, since we see only two, but I accept it is a tradition.
We head to the DPRK national power museum. It is full of exhibits dedicated to the Korean machinery and industrial strengths, and their ways of creating power. These exhibits are dimly lit: there is no electricity due to a power cut.
I ask to eat at a restaurant for locals rather than for tourists. Lee and Yu agree to this, but when we arrive, there are no locals. I ask about this and am told that locals work until 12:30 or so (it is 11:45 when I arrive). We have a leisurely drawn out lunch, in which I ask a lot of questions – and answer quite a few of theirs – and when it finishes it is 1:30. One family has shown up. I think they’re Chinese tourists.
It has buttons on the table with which to call servers. While we are talking, I see Lee raise his hand with fingers outstretched, then move fingers down one by one (starting with the thumb) to count to five and place them back up to count to ten. I ask about this and I am told it is the normal Korean way of counting. (After leaving DPRK, I ask a South Korean friend, and she counts the same way)
While we are chatting, I learn more about Yu’s personal life. Although she is slim by western standards, she wants to lose weight and is on a diet.
Another universal human experience, untainted by living in a country ravaged by famine.
Yu also tells me that there are no homosexuals in North Korea and she doesn’t “understand how it can work”. I don’t press that point.
After lunch, we visit a series of museums about the Korean war, where we learn how the North “liberated” Pyongyang (the later DPRK defeats are skimmed over or ignored: we focus on the part of the war where the North advanced in the south, liberating mile by mile). As far as I can tell, the war reports are close enough to reality, and the main propaganda is in word choices and missing out specific items, rather than making up battles altogether.
I like the reporting on the USS Pueblo. This is an American ship which (according to the DPRK museum) strayed into Korean waters and was attacked by several Korean ships. After surrendering, seven Koreans boarded and arrested the 83 US soldiers on board. The museum guide makes a big thing out of how those seven Koreans overcame a huge numerical disadvantage, and she stresses the numbers on each side. I think it doesn’t take a lot of people to arrest an enemy who has already surrendered, but I keep this observation to myself. There is a signed letter from the US confirming they had spied on the DPRK.
Western sources tell the story differently: the Pueblo was attacked while its location was disputed (the US claims it was in international waters) and an agreement was reached that the US would sign a document agreeing its ship had spied on Korea, then the soldiers would be released, then the US would retract the confession. The captain of the Pueblo deliberately wrote a confession saying “we paean the North Korean state” – with the hidden meaning of “we pee on the North Korean state”. That must have taken serious cojones to write; I guess paean is stored in the balls.
The museums have beautiful scenery. I am not allowed to take photos of the gorgeous parts - I don’t know why - but their mock battlefields and jungle scenes are more intricate than any I have seen outside DPRK. We visit the Palace school, which is immensely beautiful and full of marble, chandeliers, etc. A young girl comes to greet me; she claims to be 13 (which means 12, since Koreans start counting from age 1) but looks younger. She begins to rattle off facts about the school in Korean, which Lee translates into English. I ask questions about the school but Lee explains she is shy.
I see a clock face, with a map on it. In this map, Korea is approaching the size of the United States. I comment that “I have seen some maps where the countries have different sizes than this one”. I get a smile out of Lee.
The children study an extra-curricular activity for two hours a day. Some children learn to dance, some sew, some sing, some play Go, and some use computers. Both Yu and Lee learned to sing. Yu also did the accordion. When we enter the sewing room, no children look up. Two other visitors walk over to one desk and inspect the children’s work. No children look up. They just keep sewing. I wonder how exactly the children were trained.
In the dancing room, every single child is smiling and dancing. I ask Lee about this and he says “well, if you come to my house, my wife and I smile when we see you”. That analogy doesn’t land with me, but I don’t press the point.
When we see the photos of martial arts on the walls, Lee asks if I have done them. I tell him I studied Choi Kwang-Do, which is a Korean martial art. I can count in Korean, and I remember a few odd phrases, mostly words for punching. They have not come in useful. Miss Yu has taught me some more appropriate phrases, so that I can greet and thank people. At least, I think they are appropriate phrases. It’s hard to be sure.
After dinner I visit a funfair. It is free to enter and instead you pay on the way out. The funfair tour guide tells me (through Lee as a translator) to skip the line. I prefer to queue, which takes a while to translate and explain. Power cuts make me uncertain about DPRK engineering practices, so I opt for a ride taken by Kim Jong Un last week, when it was officially opened. In the whole of human history, this may be the funfair whose engineers had the strongest incentives to make the rides safe.
Later we head back to the hotel, where we drink together with Oh, another tour guide (with great English) and Rowan, an Australian from the tour company who helped book this. He talks to our waitress about how he misses the waitress who was here before – Monny – and asks where she is. Our waitress blushes. Later, Yu tells me that Monny *was* the waitress and Rowan hadn't recognised her.
I ask Yu and Lee about Korean drinking games and they play Rock Paper Scissors where the loser drinks. Except that their scissors is thumb and forefinger outstretched, not the first two fingers. I later check this out by asking three Asian friends: the one South Korean girl uses her thumb and forefinger, while the others use the first two fingers.
The five of us go on to karaoke. On the way we see people bare-chested in a sports room playing table tennis.
Day Three
We are going to the Mausoleum, where President and General are laid out for state visits. This is very, very serious. Most people have ties. I wear my least crumpled clothes. Yu tells me to leave most of my things in the bus and take only my wallet, from which I remove everything other than money.
We start by walking across a device that cleans our shoes. Then we pass through metal detectors and then I am patted down.
We step onto a series of travelators that take us perhaps 200 metres. They proceed at maybe 15cm/second, and we do not walk on them; we just stand. We are facing a series of soldiers in full military dress coming the other way. Perhaps 80% of the soldiers are staring at me. It’s a little disconcerting to be stared at by ~100 North Korean soldiers in full military uniform.
When we reach the end, we walk through a series of halls with many important-looking portrait photos of President Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il. The area is incredibly ornate. Dozens of chandeliers adorn every ceiling and I would guess each of them cost thousands. Guards in full military uniform are standing strictly to attention at most corners. I do not see any of them move while I am there. Instead the actual guarding is done by a small number of suited men who occasionally yell out commands in Korean when a visitor steps slightly out of line. The men in suits scare me.
For the actual visiting of the tombs, we pass first through an air tunnel, to clean our suits. We then line up into a darkened room. Kim Il Sung’s body is in a glass cage, and it is very well preserved. We walk around it from all sides in a prescribed queue, bowing once to the feet, once to the left, and once to the right. We do not bow to the head.
Yu has checked with me before we visit the tomb that I am going to bow. She has warned me, in a fearful voice, that it can cause offence to refuse to bow. I do not know what "cause offence" is a euphemism for and I do not intend to find out. When I am supposed to bow, I bow as if my life depends on it.
I’m not sure it doesn’t.
Kim Jong Il’s body also lies in state, and we go through an identical ceremony for him in the next room. We also have numerous other things to see: a giant wall-sized map for each leader, showing which state trips he made abroad (106 for KIS, 18 for KJI). We see their cars: one sleek-looking black car, and one that is basically a golf cart for twelve people. We see their trains. KJI’s train has many of his personal effects. It includes trousers and his jacket. I asked about his jackets (he is always seen in the same jackets) and am told he has a small wardrobe due to his modesty. Next, I see his yacht, which is maybe 100ft. This was finished only a year before his death, so was barely used. It is now part of his official museum, and will never be used again.
I also see the collection of medals that both leaders owned. Each has one room dedicated to his medals and at the top has ~10 big portraits/photos with foreign dignitaries. KJI received an honorary doctorate from some Russian university, and two of his ten photos are from this event.
The journey out is the reverse of the journey in, passing by all the same exhibits, and then we go sit in the park outside. After this, I am taken to a memorial to soldiers. It shows sculptures of ~100 soldiers’ head and shoulders. Lee translates a few of the inscriptions: one soldier was being tortured by the Japanese for information, so he bit out his tongue to avoid giving them any. The Japanese then shot him. Kim Il Sung awarded medals to him and his mother, and put their busts on the mountain.
After this we visit the birthplace of the President. It is very clean and looks like a museum. There is a well outside his house, from which we pull up water. We drink the water: Yu tells me I will live ten years longer after drinking it. I ask Yu whether, when General Kim Jong Il died, the Korean people knew Marshal Kim Jong Un would be the next leader. She tells me yes, everyone knew he was well-known, and KJI’s favourite. I ask her whether any of Kim Jong Un’s family are similarly well known and she says they are not. She thinks he has one daughter but knows very little about his family. I infer that Marshal’s successor is not known.
For lunch I ask to taste dog. Yu thinks I am very odd for asking to try this. The restaurant charges me $5 extra. It tastes like chicken.
After lunch, we visit the subway. This is fascinating. Apparently it was founded in 1973, and spans ~35 kilometres, with 17 stations. The entrance is unimpressive (photo), the escalator down to the station is slow, and the walls are perfectly grey. Then we arrive in the station, which is a perfect example of “this is what we want the world to see”. The underground station is covered in gleaming lights and pretty pictures. Lee and Yu tell me to take a lot of photos of these.
We get on a train and get off at the next stop, where I am again encouraged to take photos of the (very pretty) mural surrounding the wall. We then get back on and go through four more stops. I am not directed to take photos of these; they are mostly just granite and marble. I take a photo anyway (after checking with Lee), so I can show people what most of the stations look like. Honestly, these are comparable with London tube stations.
To take the subway costs 5 won, which is 5 cents at the official exchange rate, or 0.04 cents at the black market rate – i.e. you could ride it 25 times for a penny.
We get out at the arch of triumph, which is modelled after the French one but slightly bigger. It was a 70th birthday present for Kim Il Sung. “We copied the French but cranked up the size. Happy birthday!”
We arrive at the airport and I bid goodbye to Mr. Driver, Mr. Lee, and Miss Yu. I had learned only after arriving in DPRK that tips should be in new banknotes, and I have to give them slightly crumpled ones. I sort of want to set up an arbitrage business in which I buy crumpled banknotes at a 10% discount, then exchange them in countries where small crumpling is a non-issue. But I leave this to others more entrepreneurially minded than I.
Airport border control offers to stamp my passport with a DPRK stamp. This feels like an offer I will regret accepting, so I decline. With that, I board my plane, and leave the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.