Kim Il Sung Square hosts the big rallies with the soldiers marching in huge numbers past whichever great leader is in power. We visited the day before the big hundredth anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth. The day was cool and foggy. We had one of the most amazing experiences of our lives. See all those groups of people in the second picture? I’m not sure why they were there[…] Keep reading →

I believe a king lived here and that the building dates from around 1400, but I don’t remember. Still, it’s one of the few historical buildings they have or architectural references to a leadership other than the Kims. Sorry I don’t remember the details (perhaps a reader who knows can remind me), but you start tuning out the guides and the stories glorifying the Kims and their regime sometimes, even[…] Keep reading →

More images of North Korean monuments… I think this sphere and orbit building was part of a technology museum on the road to and from the airport. We didn’t enter it though we went near it. I suspect it’s not in active uses. We saw this church, one of the few religious things outside of the government’s state sponsored religion. I don’t know if it has active serviced or is[…] Keep reading →

North Korea likes to do things big and nationalistic. Here are some images of their bigger monuments. Above is the (in)famous Ryugyong non-Hotel, started in 1987 for completion in 1989 but never finished. When the Soviet Union collapsed, North Korea had insufficient resources to finish the building, which was costing 2% of the country’s GDP at the time. I’ve read that using too-low-quality concrete and crooked elevator shafts make the[…] Keep reading →

From my notes while I was there in April: North Korean performance art: technical perfection while appearing effortless … emote wonder and hokey joy … layer it on … add difficulty. Zero subtlety. That just about describes it. I also noted the following. Something tells me that the technical perfection in North Korean arts reflects middling ability in its leadership to prove its self-worth. Maybe I extrapolated too far, but[…] Keep reading →

The pictures below don’t even approach showing the almost unbelievable performance ability of North Korean children. Joseph’s pictures showcase their talent better. But no images can show the professionalism, dedication, and raw talent these kids have. The pictures below are from the Children’s Palace, which trains children to perform and create art and puts on incredible performances. After their performance last time, my travel groupmate who was starting a school[…] Keep reading →

I don’t have any story behind the guy in the picture below. We were at the cemetery for North Korea’s martyrs on the anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth, which was like being at Arlington on July 4th. As you can see behind him, columns and columns of soldiers paid respect from before we arrived until after we left. As for him, I couldn’t tell if he held authority or[…] Keep reading →

Non-North Koreans had a field day with the videos of people crying they saw after Kim Jong-Il’s death last year. People saw it as over-the-top and probably forced at the pain of punishment. I wrote on that crying before. On this trip, on April 15 — the hundredth anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth — we got to visit the newly unveiled colossal statue of Kim Jong-Il next to his[…] Keep reading →

A detour brought us to something few non-North Koreans, and probably few North Koreans, get to see — the other side of the tracks in Pyongang. April 15 was the celebration of the hundredth anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth, something like July 4, 1776 in the United States. Amid the hubbub, they detoured our bus from whatever our route was supposed to be to a driving along some dilapidated[…] Keep reading →