Why would you want to read a book there or go to an amusement park. I thought no one had money over there.

I really want to go visit North Korea. Aside from the fact that I need to check Kim Il Sung off my "Embalmed Communist Leaders World Tour" list, I'd like to see the country for myself. I always get the feeling that with places like Best Korea that the media is showing only what they want us to see that fits in with their narrative.

Flint Ironstag: rynthetyn: I really want to go visit North Korea. Aside from the fact that I need to check Kim Il Sung off my "Embalmed Communist Leaders World Tour" list, I'd like to see the country for myself. I always get the feeling that with places like Best Korea that the media is showing only what they want us to see that fits in with their narrative.

I suspect they're actually showing us the 'good' parts, because you can only go where they let you. Hence no pictures of their prison camps etc.

That their 'good' parts look like shiat to us just makes it obvious that their 'bad' parts must be really bad.

/Do North Koreans near the border get South Korea TV?

And this is why I want to go for myself--the "good" parts don't really look much different to me than other developing parts of the world that I've visited. If that house that the farmer woman in that photoset is photographed in is really where she lives, that's nicer than where I lived while I worked in Vietnam. No doubt that there are a lot of shiatty things in North Korea, but I'd like to see it for myself. After realizing that half the stuff we got told about the Soviets when I was a kid were nothing but propaganda and distortions, I don't like taking other people's words for it.

I still think the nighttime satellite images of the region are more telling than anything.

Fark em. If they want freedom they can overthrow the government. And if they fail, well, then I guess that they did not want it bad enough.

ShawnDoc: What's wrong with 12?  When I was growing up (starting around age 10) I used to help with baling and loading hay.  We'd do a couple tons worth a day.  What are you some sort of city slicker who's never seen a farm?  Its normal for the kids to help out with manual labor when they're not in school.

/The start of deer season was also treated as a week long holiday, and teachers knew not to schedule any major homework or tests during that time, due to how few kids would actually attend classes.

And it's not like they're dressed in rags or anything. If they're working full time and not going to school that's a problem, but we don't know one way or another from the picture. It goes back to why I'd like to visit North Korea myself because even photos can be interpreted to mean something they're not, but without visiting there's no way to tell.

Gig103: Obligatory Oatmeal comic: (hotlinked)
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It's a shame the North Koreans suffer while South Koreans enjoy a GDP of over $1 trillion US

all because of international sanctions.
because you know, communism is evil.

meanwhile in the US

Yeah! 'Cause it's so much better here in the civilized world, right? Right?

Subby:





/is that how it's done?
//troll mode off

@Devil's Playground: Well, shiat. Same picture? Really?

GET OUT OF MY HEAD!

timelady: Wanebo: Funny. There's nobody obese in any of those until you see Dear Leader.

Not funny haha.

That's the bit that strips I me. That and the eroding sorrow and hardship etched into the face of the farmers.

Yeah, even the soldiers look like they'd be better for a few solid meals. When the best off class still looks hungry....dude, your country is really f*cked.

Oh, the onions.

Gyrfalcon: timelady: Wanebo: Funny. There's nobody obese in any of those until you see Dear Leader.

Not funny haha.

That's the bit that strips I me. That and the eroding sorrow and hardship etched into the face of the farmers.

Yeah, even the soldiers look like they'd be better for a few solid meals. When the best off class still looks hungry....dude, your country is really f*cked.

by and large (pardon the pun) they're healthier than most in the US I'd bet.

#30 - North Korean war veterans. Is that a 3 star general up front?

33 looks strangely like John Wayne in the movie Jet Pilot.

Pointy Tail of Satan: 33 looks strangely like John Wayne in the movie Jet Pilot.

I wonder if they still have working MiG-15's over there. Good plane at the time, but that was before guided missiles.

JerkyMeat: I wish the U.S. would get something right for once and assassinate that fat pugsley of a leader.

And then what?

My sister knew someone who had ended up going into North Korea (I didn't understand how, or whether it was even intentional.) He was caught, and apparently what they do when they catch a foreigner in the country is take him on a "tour" of the country to show off how great everything is. So they brought him to this park full of cheerful people passing the time. He noticed there was one guy a ways away who was painting a picture, presumably a landscape or something. He went to go see what the guy was painting, even though the guide seemed disinclined to want to do this. When he got over, he saw that this man was not actually painting anything: it was a blank canvas that he was just dragging a dry brush over.

And this Twilight Zone moment was when he realized the whole park scene was totally staged.

Flint Ironstag: rynthetyn: I really want to go visit North Korea. Aside from the fact that I need to check Kim Il Sung off my "Embalmed Communist Leaders World Tour" list, I'd like to see the country for myself. I always get the feeling that with places like Best Korea that the media is showing only what they want us to see that fits in with their narrative.

I suspect they're actually showing us the 'good' parts, because you can only go where they let you. Hence no pictures of their prison camps etc.

That their 'good' parts look like shiat to us just makes it obvious that their 'bad' parts must be really bad.

/Do North Koreans near the border get South Korea TV?

One book I read about NK defectors mentioned one guy who picked up SK television. Apparently, although the NK televisions are tuned to the NK government channel, they're still standard TV's, able to pick up any channel. They have channel-changing buttons on the circuit board, but the holes where the exterior buttons would go are covered by a government seal, which is periodically inspected. This guy found that by poking a needle through the seal, he could reach the switches to change channels, and began watching SK television; he was boggled and flabbergasted at the lives the SK citizens led, which helped bring him to the decision to defect.

Devil's Playground: Yeah! 'Cause it's so much better here in the civilized world, right? Right?

There are poor people everywhere, but n Korea is a nation of beggars

Smashed Hat: JerkyMeat:
I believe you, but it wouldn't be to change the country, it would just to change that shiatty smug look at that fat farks face. Forever.
He looks like a spoiled asshole who could use a hole in his head.

I fail to see smugness in that expression. I can't see anything but 'duh'.

[cdn.theatlantic.com image 850x574]

You kind of have to wonder what they did to him, because this is allegedly a picture of him when he was at school in Switzerland, about 2000.



The picture was verified by Esquire magazine as being from his school, so it's probably him...and if that's the case, he looks pretty much like a normal kid. So what the hell did his dad and the secret police do in the ten or eleven years between the time he one day vanished from school and then turned up running Best Korea? Seriously, he looks like he was subjected to some hardcore brainwashing.

randomjsa: I still think the nighttime satellite images of the region are more telling than anything.

Hopefully they stfu the folks posting pics comparing poverty in America to absolute destitution in best Korea.

See? North Korea can't be as evil as it once was. All those photos are in color!

The "People's Pleasure Ground"? Weirdest boner etc....

Number 16 is tragic. I've never seen such a sad, pathetic bar.

For the person who asked if the people near the border get tv, it is possible, but they have to disable the device in all North Korean televisions that disable outside signals, and then they have to put it back before the state TV inspector randomly stops by to check that it is still there and functioning. I wish I was kidding.

For anyone who wants to read more about North Korea:

Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea
The author conducted interviews with defectors living in the south. Fascinating view of the lives of ordinary people. My favorite anecdote is a former Pyongyang university student (keep in mind only the elite are allowed to attend) who manages to get hold of a very illegal copy of Orwell's 1984. He says the book hit him like a ton of bricks and that in his opinion, perfectly describes the NK regime.

Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty
A more formal history, this book outlines how Kim Il Sung took control of the country. There is much discussion of real history versus the offical NK version of events. Jong Il's rise is also described. There are also many interviews with defectors, although here they mostly describe the horrific labor camps, but there is one very interesting account of someone who was in the army.

I don't recall which book it was in, but another anecdote for you- a defector describes making it across the Yalu river (border with China) and being desperately hungry and cold stumbled upon a bowl of rice and meat outside a house. It was only as he was eating it that he realized it must have been left out for the dogs, and it was better than he had eaten in years.