September 21, 6:00PM
Here we are on another 2-plus hour bus ride to somewhere outside of Pyongyang. Last night we got to live like true DPRK elite and go bowling at the Pyongyang Gold Lane bowling alley. They were nice enough to open the building and staff it for us. Usually they are closed. One game of bowling costs more than most North Koreans can make in a month. But we were able to flash our Euros, Dollars, and Yuans to get the star treatment.
The only money accepted in North Korea.
The bowling alley was straight out of 1972, fully equipped with bowling balls that ripped the skin off our thumbs, computers that didn't keep score right, and strike animations that featured a stick man apparently having a stroke. I was able to entertain the staff with my enormous feet that couldn't fit into any sort of shoe they had, so watching me bowl in the indoor sandal-esque shoes drew quite the crowd of spectators. It happens in South Korea, too.
Of course, no North Korean building is complete without a picture of Kim Il-Sung checking things out for himself.
And in case you really want to get deep into what happened on that great day in 1994, you need only look to the right of this photo to see...
The exact path he took during his visit. I believe the stars indicate where he humbly shifted his weight to his left side and let out a silent pass of gas. I hear his smelled of lavender.
We wrapped up after a quick game as a few of us were trying to gauge our real scores since we attempted to "make it interesting." The computers, however, decided our ultimate fates so we ditched the idea of losing a Euro to random chance. We had a sort of gross duck dinner and went back to the hotel, per usual. We kept ourselves entertained by going to the hotel's noraebang and had a nice time singing with some of our guides as well as the Middlesboro women's soccer team from England. They were in the country playing a few games against some Korean women's teams to celebrate 10 years of diplomatic relations between the UK and the DPRK. We even went to one of their games to watch them get slaughtered by the Korean women's B team.
In Middleboro's defense, they weren't playing for their lives.
The song choices were slim and the sound qualities questionable, but our North Korean guides stunned everyone with their gorgeous voices. I think this was the night where many of the men on the tour fell in love with Ms. Kim.
Today we went to the big statue of Kim Il-Sung. It is a 20-odd-meter high massive bronze behemoth on top of a hill towering over the entire city. We were to pay our respects in the form of flowers and a bow before we were free to get our photos of the thing. There was one rule that the guides were pretty stern on, and that was that we had to take a photo of the ENTIRE STATUE. They said this many times. Do not just take a picture of his head. Don't cut out his feet. The ENTIRE BODY must be in the frame. So we get out and wander around the plaza looking up at this guy and getting our pictures done. "Hey Richard," I say. "Get a shot of me in front of this thing."
Richard had made his intentions of my fate on this trip obvious from the start.
Next we had a visit to the Grand Peoples' Study House where we were able to see some North Korean education in action. Reading books, learning English, listening to music, surfing the Intranet, you name it. We were guided around and told how great the education system is here; that people could learn whatever they wanted, so long as it was from North Korea. I didn't say Internet before, I said Intranet.
The desks were adjustable to make them higher or lower or slightly angled for ease of study. Kim Il-Sung's idea of course. Great Leader, Great Modifier.
Keeping the most important books behind glass.
If you can't find your answer in text, come ask this Juche Philosopher. He'll tell you that Kim Il-sung did it.
Checking their Juche-mail.
I was able to snag a few more videos as well.
From the top of this building, we got a great view of a lot of people practicing whatever it is they're going to do on October 10th in the big Commie Plaza beneath us. Here is a video.
We took a quick swing by Kim Il-Sung's alleged birthplace, which looks surprisingly new considering he was born there in 1912, and also that people were most likely living there for many years before that.
WiFi available here.
The agenda then called on us to go to the Korean War museum, where we were to hear the "real" story on how the war started, played out, and ended. We had a nice little soldier guiding through the museum. She spoke English so there was no need for our guides to translate. I was getting sick of them translating, anyway. When the North Koreans would say "American imperialist invaders" our guides would just say "Americans" to keep our feelings unharmed. And there I was starting to think that the US didn't invade the unprepared North in 1950 for no good reason other to spread their imperialist capitalism empire before being embarrassed and slaughtered by the much courageous North.
Getting our daily fix of brainwash.
The tank that helped to liberate Seoul. Hear about it here.
Captured American weapons.
Shot-down American plane. Ego much?
This Australian guy was in the Korean War and helped construct the DMZ. He had a blast in here. Specifically pointing out which American captured weapons and vehicles weren't American.
The evening plans brought us to make a decision. We could either go see the Middleboro soccer team get even more slaughtered by an even better team, or watch children drones perform music, dance, and artistic ability for us to absolute perfection. I chose the latter.
We were lead around in this "Children's Palace" from room to room seeing various performances on accordions, guitars, pianos, or just singing, as well as artistic things like sewing pictures or Korean character drawing. We then sat in a big theater to watch all of the students perform one hour-long show together. To say that these children were anything short of perfection is an understatement. Their mass performance at the end, in which they performed various kinds of song and dance, put the Beijing Olympic ceremony to shame.
Here are some videos.
Song. There are three girls singing in this video. The other three looking into the mirror went next. They sang a completely different song. In this video they are practicing their song. A bit creepy.
I had a very cool experience after we left the Children's Palace. We were sitting on the bus waiting for everyone to mosey their ways back on. I was sitting there staring blankly out the window watching the students march away in perfect formation when I noticed one lone little girl, probably about 10 years old, standing outside our bus staring in at us. I smiled and waved to her and she ran up closer to the bus. I opened the window and said "Annyong!" and she held out four pieces of gum in motion for me to take one. I did. "Quick! Give me something to give her!" Someone tossed a box of Chinese candy at me and I gave it to her and she started jumping up and down in absolute joy before running back into her formation. I enjoyed those five minutes. The people living in North Korea live terrible lives under their repressive government, but still show such unity and solidarity. It's quite amazing.
11:45PM
We're at a different hotel now. A rustic fixer-upper two hours either north-northwest or south-southeast of Pyongyang. Welcomed by another huge mural of the Kims, we're told not to be shocked when the power goes out without warning (which is ironic because we still can't figure out how to turn our room light off), and also that hot water will be available between 7 and 8AM tomorrow morning. The shower keeps turning on by itself.
Calling for a waiter's attention in North Korea translates to "Over here my comrade brother!"
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