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 Machetetaco
Location: Tucson, Arizona
Gender: Male
"The Patriots?"
 |  |  | Exploring In North Korea?
< on 8/18/2012 3:15 AM >
|  | | | So I just got done watching a Vice documentary on North Korean labor camps in Siberia and I just started wondering what it would be like to go UEing in North Korea? I know a lot of you guys love Soviet era architecture and that's pretty much all that country is made up of!
There is nothing that makes a person more interesting than a complete disregard for their own well being. |
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Machetetaco
Location: Tucson, Arizona
Gender: Male
"The Patriots?"
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 1 on 8/18/2012 3:33 AM >
| | | | 1.
This is the Ryugyong Hotel... it was abandoned for 16 years, but construction on it has resumed even though it has been exposed to the elements for such a long time
There is nothing that makes a person more interesting than a complete disregard for their own well being. |
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Steed
        
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 2 on 8/18/2012 5:53 AM >
| | | | Of course it's always best to take everything Vice says with a pound of salt, especially their North Korea porn.
That said there are some legit UE things you can get away with on the official tour that I won't talk about out in the open. I actually contacted the Egyptian company working on the Ryugyong prior to a visit in 2010, and due to the difficulty of communicating in that country didn't get a reply in time. When I got back out to China, there was an e-mail waiting for me saying that the CEO was willing to meet me in Pyongyang.
Pyongyang was built by East German architects, so it resembles a more post-apocalyptic, decayed Soviet East Germany. It's actually more colourful and greener than Seoul in the south, and the architecture is beautiful. Someday after a regime change I hope we get to find out a lot more about what they've been hiding.
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douggie
Location: Sherman Oaks, USA; Sydney, Australia; Paris, France
Gender: Male
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 3 on 8/18/2012 8:29 PM >
| | | | Posted by Steed
Of course it's always best to take everything Vice says with a pound of salt, especially their North Korea porn.
That said there are some legit UE things you can get away with on the official tour that I won't talk about out in the open. I actually contacted the Egyptian company working on the Ryugyong prior to a visit in 2010, and due to the difficulty of communicating in that country didn't get a reply in time. When I got back out to China, there was an e-mail waiting for me saying that the CEO was willing to meet me in Pyongyang.
Pyongyang was built by East German architects, so it resembles a more post-apocalyptic, decayed Soviet East Germany. It's actually more colourful and greener than Seoul in the south, and the architecture is beautiful. Someday after a regime change I hope we get to find out a lot more about what they've been hiding.
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Do you think they might have a whole load of underground bunkers and a rail network like soviet Russia? I'd love to know if they really have the capabilities they claim they have.
doug. |
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Steed
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 4 on 8/19/2012 5:34 AM >
| | | | Posted by douggie
Do you think they might have a whole load of underground bunkers and a rail network like soviet Russia? I'd love to know if they really have the capabilities they claim they have.
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They have a fair amount of underground stuff obviously, but we'll have to wait for a regime change to find most of it. Of course visitors to Pyongyang can ride the subway, which is amazing, and there are some old bunkers used by Kim Ilsung during the war that are open to tourists. And if you're in South Korea there are three infiltration tunnels dug by the North that can be visited.
If they were capable of 1/10 of what they claimed, right now we'd all be speaking Korean and eating kimchi. They put nearly all their energy into pomp and bluster.
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Darmon_Richter
Location: Eastern Europe
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 5 on 10/12/2012 1:33 PM >
| | | | I actually went over there fairly recently... and yes. It would be an EPIC destination for UE, but it's difficult to shake your tour guides for long enough to get away with it.
I got a good look around the metro system, which was pretty spectacular - lots of old clunky trains with manual shutting doors, chandeliers, and huge communist murals!
I guess the Ryugyong Hotel would be the ultimate target, though. I was thinking of writing a 'what if' piece on it, with all my photos from the exterior of the building... then I found out that they have actually started letting people inside! There are some photos of the interior on NKNews.org, taken by Westerners working for a tour agency over there.
Awesome.
It's not exactly urbex, but if you're interested, feel free to check out my photos and report from the capital city of Pyongyang.
Bohemian Urbex: Urban Decay & other curiosities. |
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Steed
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 6 on 10/12/2012 3:45 PM >
| | | | I was wondering when those pictures would show up here.
| Generally labelled communist, the self-styled ‘Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’ is perhaps better described as a military theocracy. |
You totally nailed it. I've always said the most capitalistic country I've ever visited is China and the most religious one is North Korea.
I had many similar experiences there in 2010, although I'm surprised they let you try dog. What restaurant served that? Also, it's amazing how quickly they got the statue of Kim Jong-il up in Mansudae after his death.
Which amusement park did you visit? The run-down one in Mangyongdae or the super-modern one in Kaeson?
I'm glad you had a similar eye-opening experience to mine, in which a lot of things I'd come to take for granted were turned on their side up there. And I was surprised by what they got right: making good beer and soju, switching to the solar calendar and age counting system, beautiful architecture. A lot of North Korean ideology you saw is also present in South Korea, but not in the same totalitarian manner.
One of your commenters basically made the claim that you only got to see what they wanted you to see. I'd argue that pretty well any country's tourism industry would do the same. Even South Korea's tourism industry isn't so good at figuring out what to show tourists and how to present it, so I wouldn't expect North Korea to be totally on message. For instance, I thought the Myohyangsan museum was working counter to the message they were trying to present, instead highlighting the opulent materialism of the leaders.
You were only allowed to photograph certain things, but you can still see with your eyes what's between those sites, and you get to see how North Koreans react to foreigners (not much differently from rural South Koreans).
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Darmon_Richter
Location: Eastern Europe
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 7 on 10/17/2012 10:08 PM >
| | | | Yes, exactly - whatever exactly they're doing, it does have a very religious feel to it.
The dog soup was actually served at a restaurant down south, in Kaesong - I think it was called the Kaesong Folk Custom Hotel. They didn't think we'd want it, so it wasn't on the set menu. They mentioned that this was the traditional day to eat it though, so I demanded! It wasn't bad... stringy, fatty, but very meaty.
As for the amusement park, it was the new, central one - in that corner up to the back left of Mansudae Hill. Not the newest one which was built this year, but the one built just before that... I think someone said they have four in Pyongyang alone, now!
I completely agree with you - there are so many things that these guys do well. I absolutely love the architecture and murals, the provision of facilities in Pyongyang itself is superb, and North Korea produces the best beer I have ever tried in Asia! I know little about the south, but I'm so curious to see it now. The comparison between the two cultures must be really fascinating.
Also, I take your point about the 'guided tourism'. Any country wants to be seen at its best. I think for every criticism that can fairly be levelled at the DPRK, there is another country somewhere doing it worse, and getting away with it.
ie. people talk about the poverty in NK - but it's not as bad per capita as is Brazil.
their hunger problems have never been on a par with many of the north African countries... or even Ukraine in the 50s and 60s.
Flooding and disease are both worse in China.
Then there's the propaganda... but is it any worse than the brainwashing we get towards buying stuff we don't need - which ultimately puts so many people into debt and effective slavery?
My own experience in North Korea was far freer than I ever expected. I never had my bag searched, and nobody asked to look at my camera or my laptop. I took thousands of photos, and not once was I told to put my camera away. Also, as the week went on our guides got more and more relaxed - on the last night they left early, and let us find our way back from the bar to the hotel on our own!
I suspect I would have had a much harder time dealing with US customs...
Bohemian Urbex: Urban Decay & other curiosities. |
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Steed
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 8 on 10/18/2012 12:18 AM >
| | | | You're right, coming from the South gave us an interesting perspective the other tourists didn't get. For us, it was like travelling back in time or visiting a parallel dimension. It was like home but with these weird little tweaks that made everything different.
Our guides got more and more stressed as time went on as they began to suspect that we were journalists (we weren't).
Interesting to note they still do the whole boknal thing up there (roughly translated to "the dog days of summer"). I wouldn't have thought they'd still observe such a custom. You're actually supposed to either eat dog or ginseng chicken soup, at least in the South since most people don't eat dog anymore. I definitely didn't make it to any hotels in Kaesong.
I just had a look and it appears they've rebuilt some of the amusement parks since my visit. It seems to be something Kim Jongun is really into.
And yes, the North Korean beer is surprisingly good. The microbrewery at Rakwon Department Store was the best I've had, but I know there were a few more microbreweries that might give it a run for its money.
The reason why it's good is pretty odd actually. First of all, Kim Jongil was a huge alcoholic, and knew what he liked. Also, they would keep all alcohol production moving, even during famines, whereas in South Korea during famines they stopped producing alcohol so the grains could be used for food, saving lives and also killing a lot of distillation/fermentation traditions.
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Darmon_Richter
Location: Eastern Europe
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 9 on 10/30/2012 1:54 PM >
| | | | I never knew that about the breweries... I guess it makes sense though, that Kim Jong Il would have kept the beer flowing at all costs! Interesting stuff.
I didn't make it to the Rakwon microbrewery, but I visited one in Kaesong - and they actual produce their own beer at the Yanggakdo Hotel in Pyongyang, too.
It sounds really fascinating being able to compare North and South. I'm going to have to get to South Korea some time for a look around - my only real point of reference at the moment is Gangnam Style...
Actually, it looks like I'm heading to North Korea again next March. I found a volunteer program on a goat farm near Rason! Should be one hell of an experience... plus, it means hanging out with farmers, rather than meticulously trained government guides. Really hoping I'll be able to find a few abandoned factories or other industrial facilities to explore out there... 
Bohemian Urbex: Urban Decay & other curiosities. |
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Steed
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 10 on 10/30/2012 2:34 PM >
| | | | Posted by Darmon_Richter
I never knew that about the breweries... I guess it makes sense though, that Kim Jong Il would have kept the beer flowing at all costs! Interesting stuff.
I didn't make it to the Rakwon microbrewery, but I visited one in Kaesong - and they actual produce their own beer at the Yanggakdo Hotel in Pyongyang, too.
It sounds really fascinating being able to compare North and South. I'm going to have to get to South Korea some time for a look around - my only real point of reference at the moment is Gangnam Style...
Actually, it looks like I'm heading to North Korea again next March. I found a volunteer program on a goat farm near Rason! Should be one hell of an experience... plus, it means hanging out with farmers, rather than meticulously trained government guides. Really hoping I'll be able to find a few abandoned factories or other industrial facilities to explore out there...
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Good luck with getting out there.
The Yanggakdo had a great microbrewery; the bartender taught me how to say 조선민주주의인민공화국. Somehow I remembered it all despite being heavily intoxicated. Christ I could go for some North Korean beer right now.
If you're ever in South Korea look me up, but don't expect me to take you anywhere near Gangnam; the place is infested with yuppies.
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Darmon_Richter
Location: Eastern Europe
| | | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 11 on 11/1/2012 8:48 PM >
| | | | Haha! I'll remember that... cheers!
Bohemian Urbex: Urban Decay & other curiosities. |
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2tung
Location: Newcastle, Australia
Gender: Male
| | Re: Exploring In North Korea?
<Reply # 12 on 1/12/2013 9:36 AM >
| | | | Posted by Darmon_Richter
I actually went over there fairly recently... and yes. It would be an EPIC destination for UE, but it's difficult to shake your tour guides for long enough to get away with it.
It's not exactly urbex, but if you're interested, feel free to check out my photos and report from the capital city of Pyongyang.
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Awesome blog. It's good to see someone actually come from an empathetic angle without the usual sensationalized soviet kitsch "these guys are rooooly crazy!" crap.
I plan to travel to NK in the later half of the year (I'll be based in Hong Kong), how difficult did you find the visa process? As this destination is becoming more accessible and popular I've read of the small amount of foreigners allowed in is get filled quickly. I'm a student and have little idea of what gets considered for entry.
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