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The Monument to the Three Charters for National Reunification
Like many such states, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea does public art on a big scale. The many statues of the Dear Leaders are well known, but perhaps a little less so is this rather astounding example, the Monument to the Three Charters for National Reunification.
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Gallery: the art of the propaganda poster in North Korea
Any visitor to North Korea can’t fail to be struck by the absence of what we take for granted both at home and in most countries we visit: advertising. Only state-produced goods are available, so with no competition for customers, there is no need to advertise. But that doesn’t mean that there no eye-catching posters clamouring for our attention in the streets.
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Taking a ride on the Pyongyang Metro
A highlight of any visit to North Korea’s capital is a ride on their metro. This is one of the deepest subway systems in the world (our guide said the deepest) at over 110 metres below ground level, and is designed to double as a citywide bomb shelter, with blast doors at the foot of each lengthy escalator.
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Saying prayers for Korean reunification
One person I did not expect to meet in North Korea was a monk. In this famously atheist country, where tourists are forbidden to disseminate religious texts and the prevailing religion might be said to be belief in the supremacy of the Dear Leaders and the Juche idea, true religious conviction is hard to find. And I am still unsure whether or not I found it here.
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Gallery: Wonsan Kalma International Airport sits deserted
Our arrival at Wonsan’s International Airport delivered another of those surreal ‘only in North Korea’ experiences; a glitzy but surreally empty new airport, built for international flights that never come!
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Where the Kims of North Korea were born – or were they?
The former leaders of North Korea have almost mythological status in the country: the Eternal President and Great Leader Kim Il Sung, and his son, the Dear Leader Kim Jong Il. As such, their birthplaces have become pilgrimage sites for their adoring people, and compulsory stops for visitors to the country.
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Spending time with the children of Chongjin
Visit most countries and you will be shown their grand monuments, historic sites, beautiful landscapes. Visit North Korea and you will see those sights too. But they are also keen that you meet some of their people and see how they live. Carefully selected people, that is. In the city of Chongjin, where major sights are relatively few, we had the chance to visit two very different schools.
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Keeping North Korea clean and beautiful
It was the morning after the storm in Pyongyang, and even quite small children, dressed ready for school, assembled on street corners armed with buckets, mops, brooms – all doing their bit to keep the city clean. They were engaged in a civic duty that will be theirs for the rest of their lives. Elsewhere, on the Taedong River that runs through the centre of the city, a flotilla of small boats was gathering weeds that had accumulated, washed down by the heavy rain of yesterday.
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Chongjin, a very different North Korean city
While Pyongyang is very much a showpiece city for the DPRK, the same cannot be said of Chongjin. This industrial city in the north east of the country has only relatively recently opened up to tourism. And it’s easy to see why. North Koreans, both as a government and a people, like to show visitors the best of their country. They want us to be impressed by their progress and modernity; they want us to see the nation as the success they believe it to be.
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Gallery: statues of the Great Leaders
When Kim Il Sung, President of North Korea, died in 1994, the role of Leader passed to his son, Kim Jong Il, but the title of President did not. Instead, Kim Il Sung was declared ‘Eternal President’ of the nation, and the presidential office was written out of the constitution.
