Tuesday, May 01, 2007

DPRK V: DMZ and Kaesong


After our visit to the mausoleum we drive south towards Kaesong, the only large DPRK city which escaped destruction in the war. IT is a terribly good 4-lane interstate quality road.....enroute we stop at a rest stop built over the four lanes like an Italian Autogrill. Only 4 flights of stairs to reach the service area. In 160 kms to Kaesong we pass: 2 dogs, 5 tractors, 5 motorcars and 4 trucks. The country's economy is sub desparate. The land is heavily cultivated - in fact cultivated in areas which are truly not arable. It is VERY sad....exaccerbated by the fact that they haven't a friend left in the world...the USSR has disappeared, China fears a Mariel-boatlife invasion of poverty stricken Koreans...sad sad.

Kaesong...a city with some few blocks of the OLD Korea..but still surrounded by the Ceaucescu buildings of the new Korea....we drive to the DMZ...fairly dramatic! I have been on the southern side which is even more paranoid....here lots of spring flowers bloom...we go to the huts where treaties were signed...the DPRK calls it the Korea-American imperialist war....they erect vast monuments to their "victory" which is no more true of course than OUR victory (how long has it BEEN since the US has won a war...well I guess we knocked the heck out of Grenada).

An army major escorts us through the zone, spewing forth visceral propaganda the entire time, eventually becoming redundant and easily tuned out. One perk on the North Korean side is the site of the signing of the Armistice. Tourists on the south side cannot access this hallowed ground. Later we are taken (at great length) to a hillside - again passing mile after mile of parched farmland - from which we can observe through military scopes the "concrete wall". According to our hosts the wall stretches coast to coast. At least from here we can see a garrison perched on the hill opposite us, undoubtedly staffed by soldiers looking back at us!

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