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Speaker 1: I guess what will what's that? So some years ago

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Speaker 1: I watched this movie at Rooftop Films and it was

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Speaker 1: about this guy who defected from the American army during

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Speaker 1: the Korean War. He was just kind of like fed

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Speaker 1: up with being yelled at by his sergeants, so he

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Speaker 1: put his hands up and then just walked across the border.

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Speaker 1: And it was all about how he'd lived the rest

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Speaker 1: of his life in North Korea. Right, you can do that,

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Speaker 1: You can just walk over the border like that, I guess. So.

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Speaker 1: I mean he's lived there and learned Korean. He smokes

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Speaker 1: a lot of cigarettes and drinks and and he's treated

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Speaker 1: like this elite there. But the thing is he's had

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Speaker 1: to work for that status. And one of the things

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Speaker 1: he's been doing is acting. So he is one of

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Speaker 1: the few white guys in North Korea. I think he's

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Speaker 1: one of four defectors. So he was tasked with playing

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Speaker 1: the villain in every single propaganda movie they've done. Little

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Speaker 1: tast fifty years or something. But the weirdest thing to

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Speaker 1: me is that Kim Jong ill thought that he could

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Speaker 1: make this guy's kids spies since they're, you know, basically

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Speaker 1: white looking. So he thought they'd lend into American society,

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Speaker 1: But the footage of these kids is so sad, Like,

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Speaker 1: first of all, they're on camera, so everyone knows what

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Speaker 1: they look like. And it's also kind of hard to

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Speaker 1: train as a spy and pick up a perfect English

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Speaker 1: language when you're studying at North Korean schools. So there's

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Speaker 1: just a lot of unrealistic hope that was pinned to

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Speaker 1: their success. But watching that movie made me wonder, like,

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Speaker 1: what is life really like in North Korea? How did

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Speaker 1: the country get to be so isolated? And has it

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Speaker 1: always kept a distance from the world or is this

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Speaker 1: a new phenomena. So that's what we're discussing today day

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Speaker 1: their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will

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Speaker 1: Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good friend

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Speaker 1: man guest show Ticketer and on the other side of

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Speaker 1: the soundproof glass. Just ativated by this terrible monster movie,

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Speaker 1: I mean it is terrible called Pulga Sorry, he's watching

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Speaker 1: this on his laptop. Tristan pay Ant, engineer, that's our

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Speaker 1: attention and producer Tristan McNeil. And if you've never heard

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Speaker 1: of Pulgasari, it's definitely worth checking out. So the monster is.

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Speaker 1: It's basically North Korea's answered to Godzilla, right, and it's

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Speaker 1: produced by Kim Jong Ill back in the mid nineteen eighties. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's a pretty well story. So when Kim John Iill

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Speaker 1: was in charge of North Korea, he had this nasty

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Speaker 1: habit of, you know, kidnapping people from the surrounding countries

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Speaker 1: to do his bidding. And in nineteen eight he snatched

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Speaker 1: a famous South Korean film director, this guy named Shin

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Speaker 1: sang ok and his actress ex wife, and Kim was

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Speaker 1: supposedly this big movie buff and he wanted his captives

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Speaker 1: to help him create this North Korean film industry. But thankfully,

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Speaker 1: Shin and his ex were eventually able to escape while

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Speaker 1: they were attending a film festival in Vienna. But that

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Speaker 1: was actually after eight years of captivity, and during that time,

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Speaker 1: Shin was forced to direct a total of seven films

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Speaker 1: for Kim, and Pulgasari was actually the last of those.

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Speaker 1: So it's a standard Godzilla movie or what I mean.

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Speaker 1: There's a rumor that the director secretly intended the monster

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Speaker 1: to be a metaphor for Kim Jong il, and uh,

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Speaker 1: that's pretty easy to take away when you look at

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Speaker 1: the movies plot, which is all about this oppressed feudal society.

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Speaker 1: It's eventually liberated thanks to the help of this monster,

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Speaker 1: who the citizen's view is their benign hero. But in

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Speaker 1: the end, the monster betrays the people. He goes on

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Speaker 1: a rampage and the peasants he once protected. Then I

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Speaker 1: have to rise up and destroy him. You kind of

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Speaker 1: just spoil the movie for me, Mega and and for

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Speaker 1: all of our listeners. You might need to put a

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Speaker 1: warning at the beginning of this Christan But obviously there's

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Speaker 1: a lot of hardship in North Korea, and for years

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Speaker 1: now we've heard these rumblings of what life was like

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Speaker 1: under Kim Jong ill and then under his son, Kim

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Speaker 1: Jong Un. But you know, you think about things from

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Speaker 1: food shortages to power outages, military conscription, slave labor camps.

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Speaker 1: But despite the severity of these claims, many of us

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Speaker 1: really don't know the first thing about North Korea, and

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Speaker 1: for many of us, including exactly where to find it

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Speaker 1: on a map. And so you can think of today's

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Speaker 1: episode as a bit of a primer on the country.

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Speaker 1: So we'll be looking at why the Korean peninsula split

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Speaker 1: and arrival nations and how the Kim family use that

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Speaker 1: to secure its enduring power. But we'll also take a

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Speaker 1: closer look at everyday life in North Korea, including a

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Speaker 1: few faint glimmers of hope for the future. But what

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Speaker 1: do you want to start with, Mango, Well, I thought

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Speaker 1: we could start with some of those basics you mentioned,

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Speaker 1: like what and where North Korea is, So for starters,

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Speaker 1: the country is officially known as the Democratic People's Republic

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Speaker 1: of Korea, so d P R K and I think

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Speaker 1: we'll still call it North Korea for the today's episode.

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Speaker 1: Geographically speaking, North Korea is a relatively small country. The

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Speaker 1: whole thing is roughly the size of Mississippi, and if

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Speaker 1: you bust out your world map, you can look to

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Speaker 1: either the left of Japan or the right of China

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Speaker 1: and you'll spot the Korean Peninsula, which is made up

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Speaker 1: of as you might expect, you know, North Korea on

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Speaker 1: the top in South Korea on the bottom. And the

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Speaker 1: last thing to know about North Koreas layout is that

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Speaker 1: it's capital, the South, a city of Pyongyang, is the

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Speaker 1: most developed and densely populated region of what is an

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Speaker 1: otherwise largely rural country. So North Korea has about twenty

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Speaker 1: five million citizens, and three million of them live in Pyongyang. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I was actually reading where most of the country's government

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Speaker 1: buildings and shopping districts are are located there, and as

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Speaker 1: you might expect, most North Koreans of any kind of

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Speaker 1: wealth or influence tend to live there in the capital.

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Speaker 1: That's particularly in the fancy downtown area that's been nicknamed

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Speaker 1: pyeong Hatton. And of course the residents they're enjoy all

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Speaker 1: kinds of luxuries that the vast majority of citizens never

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Speaker 1: really get to experience. And I'm not just talking about

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Speaker 1: gourmet restaurants and fancy clothes either. I mean that's definitely

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Speaker 1: part of it, but even something as basic as reliable electricity,

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Speaker 1: I mean that that's really only reserved for the upper class.

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Speaker 1: In fact, this is pretty interesting to look at. You

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Speaker 1: can find pictures of this, but astronauts aboard the International

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Speaker 1: Space Station have taken images of the Earth at night,

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Speaker 1: and if you look at them, Pyongyang is the only

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Speaker 1: part of North Korea that's really live it up, and

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Speaker 1: it's it's really eerie to look at. But you see

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Speaker 1: South Korea and China, they're both super bright, and then

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Speaker 1: there's just this dark gap that blends right in with

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Speaker 1: the Yellow Sea and the Sea of Japan, and you

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Speaker 1: really can't even tell where the country's coastlines are, you know.

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Speaker 1: Even that small patch of light that emerges from Pyongyang

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Speaker 1: is it's kind of pitiful when you compare it to

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Speaker 1: other places. According to NASA, that light emission from North

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Speaker 1: Korea's capital city is really kind of the equivalent to

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Speaker 1: that of small towns in South Korea, So it kind

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Speaker 1: of gives you an idea of how technologically behind North

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Speaker 1: Korea really is. Well, what's strange is that it's not

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Speaker 1: really anything new to the region, right, Like, Korea has

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Speaker 1: been called the Hermit Kingdom going back to as far

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Speaker 1: as the eighties, and that was well before the nation

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Speaker 1: split into a North and South. So the nation has

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Speaker 1: always had a little interaction with its immediate neighbors like

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Speaker 1: China and Japan, But otherwise Korea has kept to itself

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Speaker 1: for the better part of a thousand years. And that

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Speaker 1: really only started to change towards the end of the

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Speaker 1: nineteenth century in Japan invaded and rudely took control of Korea,

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Speaker 1: which it continued to subjugate and terrorize all the way

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Speaker 1: through World War Two and just to make sure that

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Speaker 1: we're all clear on our history here. Like, it was

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Speaker 1: only after World War Two that the country split in two, right,

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Speaker 1: I mean it was sort of like what happened with

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Speaker 1: East and West Germany. Yeah, So the Allies had pushed

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Speaker 1: hard for the entire Korean peninsula to go democratic after

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Speaker 1: the war, but the Soviets opposed this because they thought

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Speaker 1: I would reduce their influence in the region. So, just

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Speaker 1: like with Germany, one half of Korea fell under the

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Speaker 1: communist rule, that's the North, and the other half became

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Speaker 1: a democracy. In South Korea elected its first president, and

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Speaker 1: something different took place in North Korea. So that year,

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Speaker 1: instead of a freely elected president, the former monarchy got

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Speaker 1: its first totalitarian dictator. His name was Kim Il Sung,

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Speaker 1: and he was a Korean Communist. He had strong ties

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Speaker 1: to the Soviet Union, and during the build up to

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Speaker 1: World War two, Kimen worked closely with the Soviets to

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Speaker 1: wage all this guerilla warfare against the Japanese. And once

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Speaker 1: the war was over, the Soviets knew they needed to

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Speaker 1: install a puppet leader to you know, uphold their interests,

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Speaker 1: and they're old friend Kimmel Sung just seemed like the

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Speaker 1: perfect choice. It made total sense. You know, not only

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Speaker 1: does this guy have communist leanings, but he could be

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Speaker 1: portrayed as this authentic national hero because of his military service.

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Speaker 1: All right, so we obviously lived through some of Kim

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Speaker 1: Jong il, his son's reign. But but what was his

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Speaker 1: dad like as a leader. He was also a dictator.

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Speaker 1: So I was looking at the timeline here, and the

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Speaker 1: very same year he took power, Kimmel Sung set to

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Speaker 1: work building this ruling political party as well as a

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Speaker 1: standing army with all his old pals from the guerrilla

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Speaker 1: squads that he ran. And it wasn't enough for Kim

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Speaker 1: to just have total control of the political and military might.

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Speaker 1: He also wanted to control his culture, so he created

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Speaker 1: this thing called the North Korean Federation of Literature and Art,

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Speaker 1: and this was basically his propaganda arm You see this

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Speaker 1: used in other places too, but he used this to

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Speaker 1: put out state control media and art and to build

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Speaker 1: his cult of personality and the propaganda it really portrayed

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Speaker 1: him as this godlike figure throughout he was almost destined to,

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Speaker 1: uh you know, transformed this abused nation into the socialist utopia.

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Speaker 1: That's how it's depicted. And of course, in reality, Kim

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Speaker 1: was doing just the opposite. But one thing we do

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Speaker 1: know about Kim Il sung is that he invaded South

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Speaker 1: Korea nineteen fifty and this wasn't an attempt to unify

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Speaker 1: these two Koreas. Of course, he wanted to rule them

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Speaker 1: both himself, that's right, and he didn't have the backing

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Speaker 1: of Stalin and the Soviet forces, and that's what actually

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Speaker 1: spiraled into the Korean War. The US jointed South Korea

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Speaker 1: in the fight, and when the fighting finally ceased in

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty three, this was about after five million soldiers

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Speaker 1: and civilian lives have been lost, there was no exchange

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Speaker 1: of territory. There was no clear victor. Instead, the two

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Speaker 1: Koreas signed this armistice agreement and they established this demilitarized

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Speaker 1: zone between their borders. And since this basically amounted to

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Speaker 1: a truce, there was no formal peace treaty between the nations.

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Speaker 1: So the two Korea's they're still technically at war with

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Speaker 1: one another even to this day. Oh, I didn't, I

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Speaker 1: didn't realize that. Actually, it's kind of wild to just

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Speaker 1: speaking of weird facts around this, because not only has

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Speaker 1: North Korea held onto the same war, for nearly seventy years.

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Speaker 1: It's actually kept the same president as well. So how

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Speaker 1: do you mean, because Kim Il sung died in four

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Speaker 1: and then uh, Kim John Ill took over, and then

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Speaker 1: he died in two thousand eleven. And I mean, now

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Speaker 1: there's Kim Jong un in there, but they dress alike

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Speaker 1: and they act like but those are different people. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean, of course that's true. I'm not not getting

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Speaker 1: weird here with all of that. But after Kim Il

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Speaker 1: sung died in the nineteen nineties, the North Korean constitution

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Speaker 1: was amended, and they amended it so that they could

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Speaker 1: declare him the eternal president. And actually this happened again

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Speaker 1: after Kim Jong ill passed away, So both of them

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Speaker 1: are now considered the eternal leaders of North Korea, you know,

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Speaker 1: and poor Kim Jong un has to settle for just

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Speaker 1: being the first secretary. And there's a term for this

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Speaker 1: kind of setup. It's called a necrocracy, and that that's

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Speaker 1: when a country still operates under the rules of a

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Speaker 1: dead leader. And as you might guess, North Korea is

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Speaker 1: the only one of those in the world. Well, it's

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Speaker 1: a good term for scrabble, I guess. But you know,

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Speaker 1: it's since you brought up funny titles, I do have

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Speaker 1: to mention some of the really ridiculous ones that Kim

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Speaker 1: Jong ill used to be called. So the state press

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Speaker 1: typically referred to him as dear Leader, as he might

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Speaker 1: have heard, and that's what it also called his father.

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Speaker 1: But these are what some North Korean journalists have also

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Speaker 1: called him, the Guiding Sun Ray, the ever victorious, iron

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Speaker 1: willed commander, and probably my favorite dear Leader, who is

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Speaker 1: a perfect incarnation of the appearance that a leader should have. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: they really covered all their all their bases with that one.

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Speaker 1: You know, things like that are why so many of

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Speaker 1: us on the outside holds such contradictory ideas about North Korea. Like,

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Speaker 1: on the one hand, we know it's this highly militaristic

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Speaker 1: nation that absolutely tramples on human rights, but then on

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Speaker 1: the other hand, they are all these examples of really

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Speaker 1: kind of over the top propaganda, these absurdly transparent posturing moves,

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Speaker 1: and it just really makes its leaders seem somewhat cartoonish,

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Speaker 1: to be honest. And for instance, I was reading about

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Speaker 1: this fake village that North Korea built and the demilitarized zone.

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Speaker 1: This was back in the nineteen fifties and it was

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Speaker 1: just called Peace Village. Now, on the surface it seems

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Speaker 1: pretty legit, but they're a bunch of well cared for buildings.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's a school and a hospital, and according

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Speaker 1: to the North Korean government, some two hundred families called

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Speaker 1: the village home. But in reality, the whole thing is

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Speaker 1: just this elaborate propaganda displayment to convince outsiders of the

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Speaker 1: country's economic success, and its main purpose is really just

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Speaker 1: to try to lure defectors from South Korea. And so

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Speaker 1: there's actually this interesting right up that was in Slate.

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Speaker 1: I'll just read this piece from it. It It says, viewed

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Speaker 1: from a distance, Peace Village is unremarkable if a little drab.

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Speaker 1: Look closer, however, and the trickery is revealed. Residential buildings

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Speaker 1: have no glass in their windows, electric lights and unheard

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Speaker 1: of luxury for rural North Koreans, operate on an automatic timer.

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Speaker 1: The only people in sight are maintenance workers occasionally dispatched

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Speaker 1: to sweep the streets in order to give the impression

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Speaker 1: of ongoing activity. It's so crazy that they even bothered

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Speaker 1: to keep up this shrade, right, I mean, North Koreans

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Speaker 1: have to know it's like a prop town and that

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Speaker 1: nobody actually lives there. Yeah, I mean, I kind of

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Speaker 1: doubt anybody's falling for it, whether they're inside North Korea

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Speaker 1: or outside North Korea. And you know, it's tough to

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Speaker 1: say that with certainty since most North Koreans don't have

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Speaker 1: access to journalists and likely wouldn't feel safe enough to

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Speaker 1: speak freely even if they did. But we do have

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Speaker 1: some estimates from North Korean defectors, and they claim that

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Speaker 1: only around of the current population actually believes what the

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Speaker 1: regime tells them. Oh, that's pretty wild. So we should

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Speaker 1: definitely talk about what's driving that sea change. But before

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Speaker 1: we do, why don't we spend some time on what

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Speaker 1: it's actually like to live in North Korea? All right, Well, first,

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Speaker 1: let's take a quick break. If you're listening to Part

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Speaker 1: Time Genius and we're talking about the hidden secrets of

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Speaker 1: life and the Hermit Kingdom, all right, mango, So we

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Speaker 1: just discussed the propaganda village that North Korean officials used

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Speaker 1: to try and pretend that all is well in their country,

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Speaker 1: and now we want to give the flip side and

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Speaker 1: talk about what life there is really like. But full

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Speaker 1: disclosure on this I mean, it's not such an easy

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Speaker 1: thing to do. The North Korean government goes to a

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Speaker 1: lot of trouble to make sure that visiting journalists and

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Speaker 1: curious tourists only see what it wants them to see.

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Speaker 1: And you know, when you add to that that culture

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Speaker 1: of silence that's been cultivated among North Korean citizens, you know,

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Speaker 1: getting that clear picture of what life is like there,

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Speaker 1: it really starts to look impossible. Yeah, that's definitely true.

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Speaker 1: And I was reading a few accounts from people who

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Speaker 1: have actually visited North Korea, and it was wild to

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Speaker 1: see how controlled the experience is for Western tourists. Like

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Speaker 1: when you first get to the country, you have to

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Speaker 1: temporarily surrender all your personal electronics except for cameras, so

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Speaker 1: cell phones, tablets, laptops, video games, all that gets turned

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Speaker 1: over to border agents and then returned at the end

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Speaker 1: of your trip. It's not just electronics, like books and

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Speaker 1: magazines are another thing that also got confiscated at the border.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I get that taking all the electronics is

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Speaker 1: a way to prevent visitors from sharing information within the country,

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Speaker 1: but but why would they take away books. I mean,

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Speaker 1: the government isn't just worried about Westerners leaking secrets to

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Speaker 1: the outside world. They're also worried about tourists sharing information

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Speaker 1: with North Korean's it's in the government's best interest to

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Speaker 1: keep the citizens as clueless as possible when it comes

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Speaker 1: to what they're missing out on, as well as how

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Speaker 1: the rest of the world views their country. I mean,

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Speaker 1: in that case, I'm surprised they let people keep their cameras. Actually,

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Speaker 1: I mean, the government is also pretty desperate to convince

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Speaker 1: people that North Korea is normal, and I guess coming

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Speaker 1: back from vacation without a single picture kind of undercuts

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Speaker 1: that idea. But photography is still restricted, just like everything else.

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Speaker 1: So tourists are actually a signed state approved tour guides

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Speaker 1: reminders whose job it is to show you, like the

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Speaker 1: authorized sites, they avert your gaze from the stuff you

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Speaker 1: aren't supposed to see. I had a friend who went

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Speaker 1: to North Korea and was told only to point his

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Speaker 1: camera in certain directions. And these guys really stay on

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Speaker 1: top of you pretty much the whole time, Like they

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Speaker 1: even get their own rooms in whatever hotel you're staying in.

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Speaker 1: I mean, so you basically have a babysitter the whole

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Speaker 1: time you're in the country. There, and are you not

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Speaker 1: allowed to explore on your own at all? No, your

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Speaker 1: your itinerary has to be completely planned out and improved

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Speaker 1: in advance, and you aren't allowed to deviate from the

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Speaker 1: plan or even leave your hotel without the guide say so.

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Speaker 1: This way, they can be sure that you only see

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Speaker 1: what they want you to see, and there's no chance

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Speaker 1: for you to like wander the countryside, or check out

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Speaker 1: a rural town, or or even investigate how an average

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Speaker 1: person lives. Instead, you're loaded on these buses and trucked

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Speaker 1: around Pyongyang to all the tourist friendly landmarks and museums

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Speaker 1: and monuments, and and those are the things that the

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Speaker 1: nation's leadership really wants you to see and what they

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Speaker 1: find agreeable. And while you're free to take photos of

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Speaker 1: these attractions once you're on site, you aren't allowed to

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Speaker 1: take pictures during bus rides between locations. And that's just

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Speaker 1: because they don't want any evidence gathering about how poor

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Speaker 1: and underdeveloped so much of the country is. I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: have to say, this does not sound like a fun vacation.

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Speaker 1: I feel like I'd be stressed out the entire time.

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Speaker 1: I'm curious what kinds of places are allowed on these

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Speaker 1: government approved tours. So one common stuff is called the

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Speaker 1: Grand People's Study House. It's this pagoda style library is

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Speaker 1: at the university in Pyongyang, and it's included on the tour.

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Speaker 1: Not only is this impressive example of architecture, but also

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Speaker 1: as a way to show how modern North Korean life is.

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Speaker 1: Like there's this massive bank of computer terminals that the

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Speaker 1: guides always point out, but the illusion doesn't always work.

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Speaker 1: Like I was reading about the one time when all

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Speaker 1: the lights suddenly went out in the library and there

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Speaker 1: was all this panic effort to like kind of say

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Speaker 1: face and get them back on as fast as possible,

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Speaker 1: and for the people visiting, they said it seemed like

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Speaker 1: the electricity was only used when the Westerners were there

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Speaker 1: to see it. It's so creepy and just so strange.

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Speaker 1: And I'm guessing the computers are likely just for show

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Speaker 1: in that case. But what about the books. I mean,

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Speaker 1: if they confiscate knowledge at the border, I'm guessing the

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Speaker 1: library shelves aren't exactly packed with good stuff. There's supposedly

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Speaker 1: room for about thirty million books, but the actual collection

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Speaker 1: seems to be much smaller than that, and most of

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Speaker 1: us there is propaganda and North Korean literature, But there's

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Speaker 1: also a decent stock of government approved foreign publications, just

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Speaker 1: nothing too recent. So you can find like a whole

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Speaker 1: shelf of Jane Austin books apparently, but very little from

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Speaker 1: the last fifty years or so of Western literature. Plus

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Speaker 1: you have to get special permission to check out foreign

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Speaker 1: books anyway, Yeah, that's not not surprising. It sounds like

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Speaker 1: a trip to North Korea mostly means a trip to

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Speaker 1: the capital city, But do tours ever get a chance

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Speaker 1: to visit some of the more rural areas well. It

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Speaker 1: used to be that pyong Young was pretty much the

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Speaker 1: only stop for tourists, but in recent years the guides

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Speaker 1: have been allowed to take visitors to some of the

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Speaker 1: more pleasant parts of the countryside. But even in those cases,

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Speaker 1: you still get the sense that you're part of some

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Speaker 1: elaborate hoax, or that things aren't quite as they appear.

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Speaker 1: For example, I was reading about this trip on Atlas

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Speaker 1: Obscura and and the author talks about the day when

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Speaker 1: his tour group was bust into one of the rural

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Speaker 1: provinces in the afternoon, and just listen to what happened. Quote,

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Speaker 1: I visited a waterfall one time near case Song, where

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Speaker 1: our group ran into a horde of uniformed school children

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Speaker 1: on a day trip. Nearby, several families sang karaoke and

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Speaker 1: danced beside a barbecue in the woods. It was an

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Speaker 1: idyllic scene until I remember that it was the school holidays.

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Speaker 1: The families were still there when we left. As we

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Speaker 1: boarded our coach, the only other transportation insight was another

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Speaker 1: bus featuring government issued number plates. It was hard not

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Speaker 1: to conclude that we had been surrounded by actors all afternoon. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I said, the last thing was creepy, like this gets

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Speaker 1: even creepier and performance art. It's so weird. I mean,

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Speaker 1: it feels like the Twilight Zone episode where everybody has

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Speaker 1: to smile and think happy thoughts or else they'll get

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Speaker 1: banished to this corn field. But I mean, it really

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Speaker 1: makes me wish we could hear directly from the North

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Speaker 1: Koreans and get a better sense of what they're going through,

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Speaker 1: you know, beyond the tourist perspective here in the meantime

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Speaker 1: that I think we'll have to settle for foreign intelligence

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Speaker 1: and the word of North Korean defectors. Just as an

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Speaker 1: example of this, I mean, we know that life in

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Speaker 1: Pyongyang and a few other cities is increasingly modern, but

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Speaker 1: the vast majority of North Koreans still lack sick necessities.

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Speaker 1: I mean things like access to heat and clean water,

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Speaker 1: or you know, infrastructure like roads and all of that.

404
00:20:06,520 --> 00:20:08,640
Speaker 1: I mean, they don't have access to this stuff. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean the roads are especially bad, and according to

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Speaker 1: the CIA, only three percent of North Korea's roads are paved.

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Speaker 1: So obviously citizens being able to travel freely isn't this

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Speaker 1: top priority for them? In fact, it's estimated that there's

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Speaker 1: only one car for every thousand people in North Korea.

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Speaker 1: And I heard one expert say that owning your own

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Speaker 1: car is pretty much what a private jet is to

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Speaker 1: the ordinary American. Well, and you know, public transportation is

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Speaker 1: available in the more urban areas as ancient and rundown

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Speaker 1: as those busses and trains maybe, but bicycles are actually

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Speaker 1: the main mode of transportation for most North Koreans. And

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Speaker 1: this is largely thanks to the emergence of gray market

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Speaker 1: trading over the last decade or two, and that finally

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Speaker 1: made bikes more accessible and more affordable. And you know,

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Speaker 1: before they were really viewed as something as a luxury item.

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Speaker 1: But you know, nothing is easy in North Korea, and

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Speaker 1: I do have to point out that North Korean women

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Speaker 1: have been banned from riding bicycles since I think it

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Speaker 1: was around nine six or so, and this was supposedly

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Speaker 1: done in response to a senior officials daughter being killed

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Speaker 1: in a bike accident, but there have also been statements

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Speaker 1: made by state media about how women on bicycles are

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Speaker 1: quote contrary to socialist morals. So I mean the band

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Speaker 1: is really just this tool of control rather than any

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Speaker 1: expression or any true concern for these people. Well, speak

430
00:21:25,480 --> 00:21:28,439
Speaker 1: of control. You know those computer terminals I've mentioned earlier,

431
00:21:28,840 --> 00:21:31,119
Speaker 1: It turns out that they really can be used for something.

432
00:21:31,200 --> 00:21:34,800
Speaker 1: So university students, government officials, and citizens who are wealthy

433
00:21:34,920 --> 00:21:38,000
Speaker 1: enough to own a smartphone are all allowed to access

434
00:21:38,040 --> 00:21:43,000
Speaker 1: the country's Internet. Did you say in trunnet or internet Internet?

435
00:21:43,119 --> 00:21:46,280
Speaker 1: So North Korea's online service isn't actually connected to the

436
00:21:46,320 --> 00:21:49,879
Speaker 1: Worldwide Web. Instead, they've gotten Internet, which is this self

437
00:21:49,920 --> 00:21:53,280
Speaker 1: contained private network that grants access to state control media.

438
00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:57,520
Speaker 1: So users have access to things like email, electronic national library,

439
00:21:57,560 --> 00:22:00,280
Speaker 1: but they can actually only visit a handful of North

440
00:22:00,359 --> 00:22:03,560
Speaker 1: Korean websites. And I really do immune a handful. So

441
00:22:03,680 --> 00:22:05,240
Speaker 1: back in two thousand and sixteen, a list of the

442
00:22:05,240 --> 00:22:09,720
Speaker 1: country's registered domain names was mistakenly leaked to the actual Internet,

443
00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:12,440
Speaker 1: and uh, it turns out that there are less than

444
00:22:12,560 --> 00:22:15,720
Speaker 1: thirty websites on their wow. But to be fair, you know,

445
00:22:15,800 --> 00:22:18,360
Speaker 1: those two dozen sites or so do cover a lot

446
00:22:18,400 --> 00:22:22,080
Speaker 1: of ground, everything from sports and news to food recipes.

447
00:22:22,119 --> 00:22:25,880
Speaker 1: There's even some obscure type of social media that they use.

448
00:22:26,000 --> 00:22:29,520
Speaker 1: But again, all this content is strictly regulated by the government,

449
00:22:29,600 --> 00:22:32,000
Speaker 1: and there's no world news that makes it on there

450
00:22:32,040 --> 00:22:35,440
Speaker 1: before being scrubbed. First. You know, when you look at

451
00:22:35,720 --> 00:22:38,880
Speaker 1: at the population there, the majority of North Koreans live

452
00:22:39,040 --> 00:22:42,280
Speaker 1: in extreme poverty and they're surviving on an average annual

453
00:22:42,280 --> 00:22:45,000
Speaker 1: income of I think it's less than eighteen hundred dollars

454
00:22:45,040 --> 00:22:47,800
Speaker 1: per person by most estimates. So it's not like that

455
00:22:47,840 --> 00:22:50,560
Speaker 1: many people own a smartphone or the means to travel

456
00:22:50,600 --> 00:22:54,000
Speaker 1: to a computer with online access exactly. But you won't

457
00:22:54,000 --> 00:22:55,920
Speaker 1: ever hear the North Korean government own up to any

458
00:22:55,960 --> 00:22:58,400
Speaker 1: of that. So listen to this statement that I found

459
00:22:58,400 --> 00:23:00,760
Speaker 1: on the country's official website. This is what the leadership

460
00:23:00,800 --> 00:23:02,840
Speaker 1: there would like you to know about their country. Quote

461
00:23:03,200 --> 00:23:06,520
Speaker 1: the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a genuine workers

462
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:09,960
Speaker 1: state in which all the people are completely liberated from

463
00:23:10,040 --> 00:23:14,920
Speaker 1: exploitation and oppression. The workers, peasants, soldiers, and intellectuals are

464
00:23:14,960 --> 00:23:17,320
Speaker 1: the true masters of the destiny and are in a

465
00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:20,960
Speaker 1: unique position to defend their interests, which is always super convincing.

466
00:23:20,960 --> 00:23:22,320
Speaker 1: When someone tells you out of the blue that they

467
00:23:22,359 --> 00:23:25,439
Speaker 1: aren't being oppressed or exploiting anyone, You know, this is

468
00:23:25,480 --> 00:23:28,600
Speaker 1: not suspicious at all. Yeah, not at all. Well, I mean,

469
00:23:28,960 --> 00:23:31,160
Speaker 1: as grim as things look for North Korea, there has

470
00:23:31,200 --> 00:23:34,560
Speaker 1: been some evidence of progress in recent years, even if

471
00:23:34,560 --> 00:23:37,000
Speaker 1: it's just a small amount of evidence. But I do

472
00:23:37,080 --> 00:23:38,679
Speaker 1: think we should wind down the show by looking at

473
00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:41,040
Speaker 1: a few of those glimmers of hope and and the

474
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:43,760
Speaker 1: forces that seem to be spurring them on. Sounds good

475
00:23:43,760 --> 00:24:01,280
Speaker 1: to me. But first, let's take another quick break, all right, Mago,

476
00:24:01,320 --> 00:24:03,119
Speaker 1: So let's talk about a couple of promising changes that

477
00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:06,000
Speaker 1: are gaining steam in North Korean society right now. Now.

478
00:24:06,359 --> 00:24:08,560
Speaker 1: One that I was surprised to find is that capitalism

479
00:24:08,880 --> 00:24:10,880
Speaker 1: is gaining more of a foothold in the country than

480
00:24:10,960 --> 00:24:13,720
Speaker 1: ever before. So just looking at the numbers here, as

481
00:24:13,720 --> 00:24:16,119
Speaker 1: of this year, there are roughly four hundred and forty

482
00:24:16,200 --> 00:24:19,919
Speaker 1: officially licensed markets in North Korea. Now that's double the

483
00:24:19,920 --> 00:24:22,120
Speaker 1: amount the country had back in two thousand and ten.

484
00:24:22,640 --> 00:24:26,159
Speaker 1: And the result of that growth is that, despite international sanctions,

485
00:24:26,320 --> 00:24:28,520
Speaker 1: the economy and the overall quality of life in North

486
00:24:28,600 --> 00:24:31,600
Speaker 1: Korea are actually both on the upswing. So, I mean,

487
00:24:31,640 --> 00:24:33,639
Speaker 1: that's good news for North Koreans, But I'm kind of

488
00:24:33,680 --> 00:24:35,720
Speaker 1: stuck on that number of markets you mentioned. What was

489
00:24:35,720 --> 00:24:39,119
Speaker 1: it like four forty, Like, if the official population is

490
00:24:39,720 --> 00:24:42,199
Speaker 1: million people, how on earth can they only have like

491
00:24:42,320 --> 00:24:45,600
Speaker 1: that few hundred grocery stores, right, Like, I mean, where

492
00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:48,080
Speaker 1: have they been getting their food all this time? Actually?

493
00:24:48,160 --> 00:24:50,679
Speaker 1: I wondered that myself and what I found that and

494
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:54,000
Speaker 1: this is according to Reuters, roughly sev of all North

495
00:24:54,080 --> 00:24:58,040
Speaker 1: Korean citizens rely on state controlled food distribution and that's

496
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:02,800
Speaker 1: their primary source of food, So not markets or subsistence farming,

497
00:25:02,800 --> 00:25:06,320
Speaker 1: but actual government handouts. And the existence of such a

498
00:25:06,359 --> 00:25:09,000
Speaker 1: program really points back to what's always been a major

499
00:25:09,080 --> 00:25:12,280
Speaker 1: issue for North Korea, and that's the scarcity of food there.

500
00:25:12,920 --> 00:25:15,000
Speaker 1: Now a lot of that problem can be traced back

501
00:25:15,000 --> 00:25:18,199
Speaker 1: to the country's growing conditions. So North Korea has a

502
00:25:18,240 --> 00:25:21,280
Speaker 1: ton of mountains and honestly, even it's flat terrain is

503
00:25:21,560 --> 00:25:24,480
Speaker 1: is pretty the rocky and not really well suited for farming.

504
00:25:24,880 --> 00:25:26,439
Speaker 1: Then you look at the climate there, I mean, the

505
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:28,840
Speaker 1: climate is pretty cold, and so it makes the growing

506
00:25:28,840 --> 00:25:32,120
Speaker 1: season short. And you know, even on a really basic level,

507
00:25:32,119 --> 00:25:35,600
Speaker 1: there's a lot working against these North Korean farmers. And

508
00:25:35,600 --> 00:25:37,720
Speaker 1: so for decades, North Korea has managed to meet its

509
00:25:37,720 --> 00:25:40,639
Speaker 1: food needs thanks largely to Soviet connections, you know, the

510
00:25:40,680 --> 00:25:43,240
Speaker 1: ones that the Kim family forged back in the nineteen forties,

511
00:25:43,400 --> 00:25:46,399
Speaker 1: nineteen fifties. And then you fast forward a bit, the

512
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:50,399
Speaker 1: Soviet Union collapses and that just takes down North Korea's

513
00:25:50,480 --> 00:25:53,719
Speaker 1: economy and of course their food supply with it. So

514
00:25:53,920 --> 00:25:57,440
Speaker 1: Russia emerges from the ashes, and it then decides to

515
00:25:57,480 --> 00:26:00,960
Speaker 1: cut ties with North Korea almost completely, and so they've

516
00:26:01,000 --> 00:26:04,160
Speaker 1: lost their biggest ally, their biggest trading partner in North

517
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:07,600
Speaker 1: Korean's were plunged into the worst famine in the nation's history.

518
00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:10,960
Speaker 1: Now this was a massive, massive famine. It's estimated to

519
00:26:11,040 --> 00:26:14,359
Speaker 1: have killed more than two million North Koreans. That's nearly

520
00:26:14,440 --> 00:26:17,600
Speaker 1: ten percent of the total population. Now, it was such

521
00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:19,960
Speaker 1: a disaster that state officials had no choice but to

522
00:26:20,000 --> 00:26:23,639
Speaker 1: set aside that isolation as stands, and even request international

523
00:26:23,680 --> 00:26:25,920
Speaker 1: aid for one of the first times in its history.

524
00:26:26,359 --> 00:26:29,000
Speaker 1: So Ever, since then, food distribution has been handled almost

525
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:32,240
Speaker 1: exclusively by the government, and most of what's sold out

526
00:26:32,280 --> 00:26:35,000
Speaker 1: is still coming from foreign food aid. But from what

527
00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:38,200
Speaker 1: I understand, that system doesn't even seem to be working either, right, Like,

528
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 1: I read this report that the u N put out

529
00:26:40,880 --> 00:26:43,480
Speaker 1: last year, and they estimated that around eleven million North

530
00:26:43,520 --> 00:26:47,400
Speaker 1: Koreans currently suffer from some form of malnutrition. And that's

531
00:26:47,400 --> 00:26:50,680
Speaker 1: a full fort of the total population and roughly six

532
00:26:51,200 --> 00:26:54,119
Speaker 1: of all North Korean children. Yeah, I mean, it's a

533
00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:58,040
Speaker 1: heartbreaking situation, and the public belief in the government's propaganda

534
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:02,080
Speaker 1: campaigns has definitely declined as a direct result of these shortages.

535
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:04,480
Speaker 1: When the food went away during the Great Famine in

536
00:27:04,520 --> 00:27:06,800
Speaker 1: the mid nineties, a lot of the public trust and

537
00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:10,520
Speaker 1: support went with it and and really just never came back. Yeah.

538
00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:12,439
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of hard to buy into that

539
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:15,000
Speaker 1: glorious utopia you're supposed to be living in when there's

540
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:17,360
Speaker 1: nothing to eat, right, But you know, now that you've

541
00:27:17,400 --> 00:27:19,440
Speaker 1: laid it all out, I can see why those markets

542
00:27:19,480 --> 00:27:21,360
Speaker 1: you mentioned are such a big deal. I mean, if

543
00:27:21,359 --> 00:27:24,680
Speaker 1: the country can sustain privately owned markets, that must mean

544
00:27:24,680 --> 00:27:27,399
Speaker 1: there's enough food to stock them and enough people with

545
00:27:27,440 --> 00:27:29,919
Speaker 1: money to shop there, right, Like that does sound like

546
00:27:30,000 --> 00:27:32,919
Speaker 1: some sort of progress. Yeah, absolutely. I mean there's actually

547
00:27:32,960 --> 00:27:35,680
Speaker 1: more to celebrate here too, because in addition to those

548
00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:38,399
Speaker 1: sanctioned markets I mentioned, there are also you know, many

549
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:41,600
Speaker 1: more illegal street stalls. And while sanctioned markets have to

550
00:27:41,640 --> 00:27:44,040
Speaker 1: pay a fee for that right to sell their goods,

551
00:27:44,080 --> 00:27:47,159
Speaker 1: those pop up stalls allow private citizens to make a

552
00:27:47,160 --> 00:27:50,520
Speaker 1: little bit of money without any direct benefit to the government. Now,

553
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:53,360
Speaker 1: these stalls are known as grasshopper markets because of how

554
00:27:53,440 --> 00:27:55,600
Speaker 1: quickly the vendors have to set up and take down

555
00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:59,159
Speaker 1: the stalls just to avoid being detected. Really, but the

556
00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:01,720
Speaker 1: hope is that the ongoing growth of these markets, both

557
00:28:01,800 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 1: legal and illegal, will give rise to a greater feeling

558
00:28:04,760 --> 00:28:07,680
Speaker 1: of community among North Koreans and kind of a sense

559
00:28:07,720 --> 00:28:10,800
Speaker 1: that they're individuals that are connected through this shared experience

560
00:28:10,880 --> 00:28:14,400
Speaker 1: and interest and not just cogs in this authoritarian machine.

561
00:28:14,880 --> 00:28:17,200
Speaker 1: So I actually found another reason to be hopeful about

562
00:28:17,200 --> 00:28:19,520
Speaker 1: this budding autonomy that we're starting to see over there.

563
00:28:19,560 --> 00:28:22,679
Speaker 1: And you know that gray market network you mentioned, the

564
00:28:22,680 --> 00:28:25,479
Speaker 1: one that North Koreans are getting their bikes through well.

565
00:28:25,640 --> 00:28:29,040
Speaker 1: The other big sellers are consumer electronics and personal media,

566
00:28:29,080 --> 00:28:34,080
Speaker 1: so we're talking smartphones, tablets, radios, DVDs, USB drives. These

567
00:28:34,080 --> 00:28:38,040
Speaker 1: are all sold preloaded with content, and more and more

568
00:28:38,040 --> 00:28:40,480
Speaker 1: of these items are being smuggled in from South Korea

569
00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:43,560
Speaker 1: and China every single day, and since the North Korean

570
00:28:43,560 --> 00:28:46,479
Speaker 1: economy is seeing relative growth right now, more people than

571
00:28:46,520 --> 00:28:48,640
Speaker 1: ever are finding ways to get their hands on this stuff.

572
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:51,479
Speaker 1: And so not only is this providing North Koreans with

573
00:28:51,520 --> 00:28:54,280
Speaker 1: some much needed entertainment, it's also giving them a glimpse

574
00:28:54,320 --> 00:28:57,000
Speaker 1: into the world outside their borders. And the more of

575
00:28:57,040 --> 00:29:00,000
Speaker 1: this information is shared among friends and neighbors, less power

576
00:29:00,000 --> 00:29:02,520
Speaker 1: are full of the state propaganda becomes yeah, and I

577
00:29:02,520 --> 00:29:04,880
Speaker 1: feel like that's a good thing for all of us, really,

578
00:29:04,920 --> 00:29:06,320
Speaker 1: because you know, I don't know if you've heard this

579
00:29:06,440 --> 00:29:08,440
Speaker 1: or not, Mengo, but North Korea actually has a pretty

580
00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:10,880
Speaker 1: successful nuclear program going on in there. I feel like

581
00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:12,960
Speaker 1: it's been in the news a couple of times, but

582
00:29:13,320 --> 00:29:15,880
Speaker 1: it is easy to forget this, but that nuclear capability

583
00:29:16,000 --> 00:29:19,320
Speaker 1: was really a product of North Korea's isolation. So the

584
00:29:19,320 --> 00:29:22,479
Speaker 1: country was completely shaken by events in the nineteen nineties,

585
00:29:22,520 --> 00:29:25,480
Speaker 1: you had the Soviet collapse, the Great Famine, all these

586
00:29:25,520 --> 00:29:29,080
Speaker 1: imposed sanctions, lots of trading partners, I mean, the list

587
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:31,520
Speaker 1: goes on and on. But as North Korea began to

588
00:29:31,600 --> 00:29:34,960
Speaker 1: look more and more like a failed state, foreign intervention

589
00:29:35,000 --> 00:29:38,680
Speaker 1: started to seem inevitable. And so the North Korean leadership

590
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:41,440
Speaker 1: was terrified that the United States or whoever else was

591
00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:43,959
Speaker 1: going to swoop in at any moment and just topple

592
00:29:44,040 --> 00:29:46,720
Speaker 1: the regime and take over. And that really is what

593
00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:49,479
Speaker 1: led the country to make what's called the nuclear choice.

594
00:29:49,560 --> 00:29:51,920
Speaker 1: And so they dusted off the nuclear program that had

595
00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:55,320
Speaker 1: been started under Soviet supervision back in the nineteen fifties,

596
00:29:55,640 --> 00:29:57,760
Speaker 1: and they really doubled down on the one thing that

597
00:29:57,840 --> 00:30:01,760
Speaker 1: was guaranteed to make potential invaders thing twice. Now, that

598
00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:04,160
Speaker 1: decision for North Korea to go its own way is

599
00:30:04,200 --> 00:30:06,960
Speaker 1: what allows the country's people to be ruled with such

600
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:09,760
Speaker 1: a tight grip. So it is pretty exciting to hear that.

601
00:30:09,840 --> 00:30:11,960
Speaker 1: You know, there's a growing number of North Koreans that

602
00:30:12,000 --> 00:30:15,280
Speaker 1: are finding ways to look outward again. And of course

603
00:30:15,320 --> 00:30:18,880
Speaker 1: nothing is guarantee, they're no quick fixes for our country's problems,

604
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 1: but pulling away from that central government and really connecting

605
00:30:22,840 --> 00:30:25,240
Speaker 1: more on an individual level. It does seem like a

606
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:28,280
Speaker 1: good place to start for, you know, some form of revolution.

607
00:30:28,800 --> 00:30:31,240
Speaker 1: Well here's hoping. And you know, since we've been talking

608
00:30:31,240 --> 00:30:33,600
Speaker 1: about how access to food and new technologies have shaken

609
00:30:33,640 --> 00:30:35,720
Speaker 1: up things in North Korea, I did want to quickly

610
00:30:35,760 --> 00:30:37,800
Speaker 1: tell you about a story I found that combines both

611
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:40,640
Speaker 1: of those things. So for starters, did you know that

612
00:30:40,680 --> 00:30:42,920
Speaker 1: North Korea got his first ever pizza place back in

613
00:30:42,960 --> 00:30:46,800
Speaker 1: two thousand nine? Didn't? Apparently Kim Jong Ill had this

614
00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:50,600
Speaker 1: lifelong dream of opening a pizzeria in North Korea, and

615
00:30:50,920 --> 00:30:53,320
Speaker 1: even at a team of Italian chefs slown in back

616
00:30:53,320 --> 00:30:56,480
Speaker 1: in the Es, they taught some local chefs their pizza

617
00:30:56,560 --> 00:30:59,200
Speaker 1: making secrets, you know where they were asking these very

618
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:01,520
Speaker 1: specific questions like how many olives do you put on

619
00:31:01,560 --> 00:31:04,280
Speaker 1: a slice? And eventually this led to the opening of

620
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:07,120
Speaker 1: the first North Korean pizza parlor. And you know, being

621
00:31:07,120 --> 00:31:09,960
Speaker 1: the ever victorious, iron willed commander that he was, Kim

622
00:31:10,040 --> 00:31:12,400
Speaker 1: Jong Ill came up with the perfect name for this

623
00:31:12,600 --> 00:31:15,680
Speaker 1: new jewel crown of his restaurant empire. He called it

624
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:20,640
Speaker 1: Pizza Restaurant. That is truly inspired. I mean I tell

625
00:31:20,680 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 1: you his creativity knew no about. Yeah, I mean, that's

626
00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:27,280
Speaker 1: why he's president for eternity. But anyway, the thing about

627
00:31:27,280 --> 00:31:30,720
Speaker 1: pizza restaurant is that almost nobody can afford to eat there,

628
00:31:30,760 --> 00:31:33,360
Speaker 1: Like even a decade later, and with multiple other pizza

629
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:36,320
Speaker 1: rios on the scene, the average cost of pies, you know,

630
00:31:36,720 --> 00:31:39,960
Speaker 1: between five and ten dollars. And while that doesn't sound

631
00:31:39,960 --> 00:31:41,960
Speaker 1: like much to us, you have to remember that North

632
00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 1: Koreans make less than two grand a years, so ten

633
00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:47,000
Speaker 1: bucks is like a serious investment for most people. Yeah,

634
00:31:47,040 --> 00:31:48,719
Speaker 1: I mean, it really speaks to what a mess their

635
00:31:48,840 --> 00:31:51,160
Speaker 1: leaders have made there. I mean, if pizza, of all things,

636
00:31:51,160 --> 00:31:53,960
Speaker 1: can be a luxury delicacy there. But I mean, now

637
00:31:53,960 --> 00:31:55,320
Speaker 1: that we're all up to speed on the state of

638
00:31:55,320 --> 00:31:57,720
Speaker 1: North Korean pizza, well, what's the story you wanted to

639
00:31:57,760 --> 00:32:01,440
Speaker 1: tell about food and tech? So there's this South Korean artist,

640
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 1: his name is Juan Kim, and earlier this year he

641
00:32:04,800 --> 00:32:08,160
Speaker 1: was in the news for smuggling contraband into North Korea.

642
00:32:08,520 --> 00:32:10,760
Speaker 1: Al Right, well, let me guess he was somehow smuggling

643
00:32:10,760 --> 00:32:13,120
Speaker 1: pizzas across the border or what. No, I mean, that

644
00:32:13,120 --> 00:32:16,000
Speaker 1: would be great, like across the border, but when he

645
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:19,240
Speaker 1: was actually smuggling where five DVDs of a home cooking

646
00:32:19,240 --> 00:32:22,240
Speaker 1: show he had produced called Pizzas for the People, And

647
00:32:22,320 --> 00:32:24,600
Speaker 1: it was kind of an act of resistance, meant to

648
00:32:24,640 --> 00:32:28,040
Speaker 1: make citizens questioned the status quo, because you know, in

649
00:32:28,080 --> 00:32:30,400
Speaker 1: the middle of all these cooking tips and at home

650
00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:33,560
Speaker 1: pizza hacks, you know. Kim also raised the question of

651
00:32:33,560 --> 00:32:36,280
Speaker 1: why only certain citizens in North Korea can afford to

652
00:32:36,360 --> 00:32:39,840
Speaker 1: eat pizza, and Atlas Obscura actually explained some of this.

653
00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:43,600
Speaker 1: They're right quote. Pizzas for the People is a cooking

654
00:32:43,600 --> 00:32:47,320
Speaker 1: show slash fake documentary series that follows several South Korean actors.

655
00:32:47,640 --> 00:32:50,600
Speaker 1: The film is intended to be a highly stylized satire

656
00:32:50,680 --> 00:32:53,360
Speaker 1: of North Korea, where you need to be part of

657
00:32:53,400 --> 00:32:56,960
Speaker 1: the political elite to eat pizza. But his films also

658
00:32:57,000 --> 00:33:00,320
Speaker 1: asked the audience to imagine the unthinkable. What if Northkorea

659
00:33:00,360 --> 00:33:04,200
Speaker 1: became democratic? What mechanisms will be at play in this transformation,

660
00:33:04,600 --> 00:33:08,200
Speaker 1: and what will North Koreans do with their new found freedom.

661
00:33:08,200 --> 00:33:10,520
Speaker 1: That's a pretty cool idea. And is there any word

662
00:33:10,560 --> 00:33:12,600
Speaker 1: on how the message is being received or is that

663
00:33:12,680 --> 00:33:15,120
Speaker 1: kind of feedback impossible to know given the state of

664
00:33:15,160 --> 00:33:17,360
Speaker 1: things there. Yeah, I mean, it's tough to judge the

665
00:33:17,400 --> 00:33:20,120
Speaker 1: impact long term, but the project is pretty new at

666
00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:23,400
Speaker 1: this point. Kim has said that smugglers eventually brought him

667
00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:25,800
Speaker 1: back some fan mail from North Koreans who would watched

668
00:33:25,800 --> 00:33:27,720
Speaker 1: the video, and the best part is that many of

669
00:33:27,760 --> 00:33:30,280
Speaker 1: these fans included photos of themselves posing along with their

670
00:33:30,320 --> 00:33:34,240
Speaker 1: homemade pizzas. So if nothing else, Kim's videos are giving

671
00:33:34,240 --> 00:33:36,720
Speaker 1: some people their very first taste of pizza and and

672
00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:39,800
Speaker 1: that's a win in itself. I think, yeah, and progress

673
00:33:39,880 --> 00:33:42,440
Speaker 1: is progress, and it feels like you've got to start somewhere.

674
00:33:42,440 --> 00:33:44,680
Speaker 1: But well, in our case, I think we should probably

675
00:33:44,680 --> 00:33:47,960
Speaker 1: in there for today sort of on a positive note

676
00:33:48,000 --> 00:34:00,160
Speaker 1: and and move into the fact off sounds great. H So.

677
00:34:00,240 --> 00:34:02,480
Speaker 1: One of the stranger exhibits in North Korea is the

678
00:34:02,520 --> 00:34:06,760
Speaker 1: International Friendship Exhibition Hall, which houses this massive collection of

679
00:34:06,800 --> 00:34:09,000
Speaker 1: gifts given to Kim Il sung and Kim John Yelle

680
00:34:09,040 --> 00:34:13,479
Speaker 1: by various communists and despotic regimes. And the hall has

681
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:17,080
Speaker 1: over a hundred thousand gifts, according to Alice Obscura, including

682
00:34:17,440 --> 00:34:21,200
Speaker 1: railway cars from Mao and Stalin, a full size bronze

683
00:34:21,239 --> 00:34:24,799
Speaker 1: tank from the USSR, this jewel encrusted sword, from Ara

684
00:34:24,880 --> 00:34:28,080
Speaker 1: Fat there's a giant bare head. It's mountain on a pillow.

685
00:34:28,200 --> 00:34:31,040
Speaker 1: But perhaps the most surprising gift in these halls is

686
00:34:31,080 --> 00:34:34,600
Speaker 1: the one that Madeline Albright gave. It's a basketball signed

687
00:34:34,600 --> 00:34:37,400
Speaker 1: by Michael Jordan's and, as one of the hall guards

688
00:34:37,440 --> 00:34:40,959
Speaker 1: told a reporter quote, when the general plays with that ball,

689
00:34:41,280 --> 00:34:44,000
Speaker 1: it proves that he controls the whole world in his hand,

690
00:34:44,760 --> 00:34:48,759
Speaker 1: just like Jordan's. Yeah, just like alright. Well, one of

691
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,080
Speaker 1: North Korea's biggest exports is actually giant statues, and this

692
00:34:53,160 --> 00:34:55,400
Speaker 1: of course makes sense when you consider how invested in

693
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:59,680
Speaker 1: propaganda North Korea is. So the statues, murals, and reliefs

694
00:34:59,680 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 1: in North Korea are all produced by one group known

695
00:35:02,680 --> 00:35:05,560
Speaker 1: as the Man Sude Art Studio. Now that's been serving

696
00:35:05,640 --> 00:35:09,040
Speaker 1: Kim's propaganda needs since like nineteen fifty nine, I think,

697
00:35:09,120 --> 00:35:12,880
Speaker 1: and actually as a staff of over four thousand people.

698
00:35:13,400 --> 00:35:16,320
Speaker 1: But they also take commissions from dictators and regimes around

699
00:35:16,360 --> 00:35:19,400
Speaker 1: the world. That looks like they've produced statues for governments

700
00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:23,279
Speaker 1: in Benine Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, I think there

701
00:35:23,280 --> 00:35:26,800
Speaker 1: were two giant Robert Mugabe is waiting to commemorate his death,

702
00:35:26,840 --> 00:35:29,920
Speaker 1: and apparently the studio has earned tens of millions of

703
00:35:29,960 --> 00:35:33,879
Speaker 1: dollars for North Korea through this art. That's fascinating. So

704
00:35:34,000 --> 00:35:35,440
Speaker 1: one of the more bizarre things to me is how

705
00:35:35,440 --> 00:35:38,359
Speaker 1: many tunnels North Korea has had in waiting. There are

706
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:42,040
Speaker 1: four quote tunnels of aggression, and they're meant to move

707
00:35:42,040 --> 00:35:45,400
Speaker 1: thirty thousand soldiers per hour through them to flood into

708
00:35:45,440 --> 00:35:47,920
Speaker 1: South Korea in the case of war. And these are

709
00:35:47,920 --> 00:35:49,799
Speaker 1: just the ones that have been discovered, but they lead

710
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:52,680
Speaker 1: right into the country. So for years North Korea had

711
00:35:52,760 --> 00:35:55,759
Speaker 1: denied they existed entirely, and then once they were forced

712
00:35:55,800 --> 00:35:58,080
Speaker 1: to admit they've built all these tunnels, they started claiming

713
00:35:58,080 --> 00:36:00,560
Speaker 1: they were just coal mines and they start rubbing all

714
00:36:00,600 --> 00:36:03,880
Speaker 1: this black coal dust on the walls masket. Of course,

715
00:36:03,920 --> 00:36:05,880
Speaker 1: no one was buying it. But what's funny is that

716
00:36:05,920 --> 00:36:08,920
Speaker 1: nowadays the South has totally taken advantage of these tunnels.

717
00:36:09,239 --> 00:36:11,880
Speaker 1: Visitors can actually go on tours from the South Korean

718
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:15,160
Speaker 1: side and even visit gift shops along the way before

719
00:36:15,239 --> 00:36:17,480
Speaker 1: hitting a concrete barrier that they've put up to separate

720
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:20,800
Speaker 1: the two countries. Wow. Well, just because they're not totally

721
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:23,719
Speaker 1: invested in electricity doesn't mean North Korea doesn't have a

722
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:27,239
Speaker 1: bunch of scientists hard at work on doing unbiased research.

723
00:36:27,320 --> 00:36:30,960
Speaker 1: So according to a two thousand eleven government study, North

724
00:36:31,040 --> 00:36:34,040
Speaker 1: Korean scientists discovered that quote China is the happiest nation

725
00:36:34,080 --> 00:36:37,360
Speaker 1: in the world, followed by North Korea, so their second

726
00:36:37,400 --> 00:36:40,320
Speaker 1: on the list. Now, weirdly America came in dead last.

727
00:36:40,400 --> 00:36:44,080
Speaker 1: And how science works that way, I guess once we

728
00:36:44,160 --> 00:36:46,319
Speaker 1: handed over that Jordan side ball, you know, I guess

729
00:36:46,320 --> 00:36:49,680
Speaker 1: things are the trigger I think about that. So here's

730
00:36:49,719 --> 00:36:52,440
Speaker 1: one of the strangest stories I've heard, and it's from courts.

731
00:36:52,520 --> 00:36:55,719
Speaker 1: But apparently in two thousand and fourteen, Alessandro Ford was

732
00:36:55,840 --> 00:36:58,319
Speaker 1: the first foreigner allowed to do a study abroad in

733
00:36:58,360 --> 00:37:01,440
Speaker 1: North Korea. His dad is a European diplomat and he

734
00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:04,880
Speaker 1: helped coordinated this whole thing. But Ford's experience was pretty interesting.

735
00:37:05,239 --> 00:37:08,359
Speaker 1: So according to him, the facilities were totally bare. They

736
00:37:08,360 --> 00:37:12,880
Speaker 1: had squat toilets and no showers. Everyone bathed communally like Romans.

737
00:37:12,920 --> 00:37:16,040
Speaker 1: He said. Uh. The dorm also ran out of hot

738
00:37:16,080 --> 00:37:18,400
Speaker 1: water for two weeks during the winter when it was

739
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:21,479
Speaker 1: frigid cold, so that that was difficult. But he said

740
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:24,120
Speaker 1: the students had a lot of interesting insights. Apparently they

741
00:37:24,160 --> 00:37:27,279
Speaker 1: hate the American government, but they're okay with American people.

742
00:37:27,400 --> 00:37:30,440
Speaker 1: They just feel like they're merely misled. Um. Most of

743
00:37:30,480 --> 00:37:33,480
Speaker 1: them think prison camps are just re education camps. And

744
00:37:33,520 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: as he put it and made it sound like they'd

745
00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:37,480
Speaker 1: missed doing their math homework so they have to make

746
00:37:37,560 --> 00:37:41,920
Speaker 1: up with some extra classes afterwards. And they're particularly fascinated

747
00:37:41,960 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 1: to learn that some countries don't have compulsory military service.

748
00:37:45,480 --> 00:37:48,919
Speaker 1: To them, that's totally mind blowing and just completely baffles them.

749
00:37:49,400 --> 00:37:51,839
Speaker 1: They also have questions on how does home ownership work,

750
00:37:51,880 --> 00:37:54,120
Speaker 1: because again that's all handed to you by the government.

751
00:37:54,160 --> 00:37:57,319
Speaker 1: They can't even imagine this. But one thing that's fun

752
00:37:57,360 --> 00:37:59,640
Speaker 1: to look through is the slogans that North Korean's came

753
00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:02,200
Speaker 1: up with for the seventieth anniversary of the country back

754
00:38:02,200 --> 00:38:04,839
Speaker 1: in two thousand and fifteen. I think they rolled out

755
00:38:04,920 --> 00:38:07,359
Speaker 1: like three hundred new ones. And here are some of

756
00:38:07,360 --> 00:38:11,239
Speaker 1: my favorites. As reported by the BBC, let us turn

757
00:38:11,239 --> 00:38:13,920
Speaker 1: the whole country into a socialist fairyland by the joint

758
00:38:13,920 --> 00:38:16,480
Speaker 1: operation of the army and the people. That seems like

759
00:38:16,480 --> 00:38:21,160
Speaker 1: a great slogan. Let this socialist country resound with the

760
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:24,320
Speaker 1: song of Big fish hall and be permeated with fragrant

761
00:38:24,320 --> 00:38:28,160
Speaker 1: smell of fish and other seasons and then my absolute

762
00:38:28,200 --> 00:38:30,880
Speaker 1: favorite as good as those where we are the happiest

763
00:38:30,960 --> 00:38:32,960
Speaker 1: in the world, which of course the government's own study

764
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:35,799
Speaker 1: showed was wrong because North Korea is the second in

765
00:38:35,840 --> 00:38:39,080
Speaker 1: the world. That's a good point. And I think you

766
00:38:39,120 --> 00:38:41,440
Speaker 1: in this round since you found the one error in

767
00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:44,480
Speaker 1: their propaganda, and you know it's the only one. Congrat

768
00:38:44,760 --> 00:38:47,080
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. And that's it for today's Part

769
00:38:47,080 --> 00:38:49,399
Speaker 1: Time Genius. Of course, there's so many more great facts

770
00:38:49,440 --> 00:38:51,359
Speaker 1: about North Korea. We would love to hear those from

771
00:38:51,400 --> 00:38:53,200
Speaker 1: you guys, and of course if any of our listeners

772
00:38:53,440 --> 00:38:55,319
Speaker 1: have ever been to North Korea and want to share

773
00:38:55,400 --> 00:38:58,000
Speaker 1: some of those experiences, you can always reach us part

774
00:38:58,040 --> 00:39:00,160
Speaker 1: Time Genius at how stuff Works dot com or us

775
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:02,920
Speaker 1: up on Facebook or Twitter, or from Gabe, Tristan Mango

776
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:19,280
Speaker 1: and me. Thanks so much for listening, Thanks again for listening.

777
00:39:19,400 --> 00:39:21,560
Speaker 1: Part Time Genius is a production of How Stuff Works

778
00:39:21,560 --> 00:39:24,160
Speaker 1: and wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do

779
00:39:24,200 --> 00:39:27,280
Speaker 1: the important things. We couldn't even begin to understand. Christa

780
00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:29,879
Speaker 1: McNeil does the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme

781
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:32,880
Speaker 1: song and does the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland

782
00:39:32,960 --> 00:39:36,160
Speaker 1: does the exact producer thing. Gabe Bluesier is our lead researcher,

783
00:39:36,200 --> 00:39:39,160
Speaker 1: with support from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan

784
00:39:39,200 --> 00:39:41,520
Speaker 1: Brown and Lucas Adams and Eve. Jeff Cook gets the

785
00:39:41,520 --> 00:39:43,680
Speaker 1: show to your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like

786
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:45,600
Speaker 1: what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe, And if you

787
00:39:45,640 --> 00:39:47,600
Speaker 1: really really like what you've heard, maybe you could leave

788
00:39:47,600 --> 00:39:50,080
Speaker 1: a good review for us. Do we do? We forget Jason?

789
00:39:50,360 --> 00:40:02,359
Speaker 1: Jason who