Posted on 08/15/2004 6:29:28 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
/begin my translation
N. Korea is such a changed country now. It is not the same country I had left two years ago. They say, "Rivers and mountains change after 10 years." However, N. Korea is changing so much in just a year. While the country remains the same, people have been changing dramatically. Seen across Tumen and Yalu River, N. Korean landscape has hardly changed. Crumbling apartments and houses, no cars in the streets except some ox carts making noise while passing.
Every hill is denuded to the last tree, making rooms for corns, wheats, and barleys planted at slopes, thanks to tireless efforts of N. Korean people, who is in all-out struggle for survival.
Nevertheless, people living in the country have changed so much. They cannot rely on anybody. They have only themselves to rely on for survival. Once upon a time, they were given lectures on 'Juche'(self-reliance) every night. Now they fully learned in their everyday life what 'Juche' is, 'Only yourself to rely on.'
There is nothing they can expect from Kim Jong-il and the state. N. Korean people, hardened and sharpened by 'the March of Suffering'(note: large-scale famine in late 90's) which killed off 3 million people, now only rely on themselves, using only their own ability to survive in this world.
Not long ago, I met Dr. Kim Nam-soo, a famous acupuncturist and the president of 'Toom Sarang' Association, who had visited Pyongyang. I asked him about what is his impression on Pyongyang.
He told me that, aside from the repeated mention of 'Dear General'(the reference to Kim Jong-il), the atmosphere of the city reminded him of S. Korea in 70's.
N. Korea is changing now. Kim Jong-il must sense everything the passage of time brings. N. Korea makes little kicking steps toward the market economy. People own things, and pay for things instead of state owning things and paying for things on their behalf. Obviously, Kim Jong-il can't find any way to resist such changes.
It was unthinkable in the past to see people running restaurants, billiards parlors and pay taxes(for business.)Markets have sprung up everywhere in Pyongyang, where private business is booming.
Kim Jong-il care only about money. With enough money, anybody can get in N. Korea, or open a joint venture in N. Korea. Bring in cash, while not questioning the source of money, allow business, and just pay taxes to the state.
N. Koreans, who have experienced all these events, now begin to realize that there is nothing Kim Jong-il can do anymore and it is only a matter of time for N. Korea to collapse. They know full well that Kim Jong-il's politics is wrong and his dictatorship will crumble in not-so-distant future.
Everybody is willing to do anything to make money. 'Dear General' decreed that it is money that matters. So we should make money... we got to have money. So they said.
Despite all these, Kim Jong-il is still trying to shore up his autocratic power. However, nobody is paying attention now. Although they won't spell it out, they are all thoroughly fed-up with Kim Jong-il's rule.
I only spent a year in S. Korea. Still, I found myself hopelessly behind the time. They have watched so many S. Korean dramas and broadcasts that they knew all about S. Korean actors/actresses I have not even heard of....they have watched so many porns....they said they were now beyond 'that phase'(note: manic porn-watching.)
They said that, if a war breaks out between S. Korea and N. Korea, they want the South to win. They all said that the better time could only come after the fall of Kim Jong-il regime.
They were convinced that the Korean unification would come in 4-5 years... Kim Jong-il could not hold out any longer. I found myself feel embarrassed .
N. Korea I used to know has changed so much. Talking about N. Korea without visiting there now is like talking about the ancient past.
/end my translation
Ping!
"They cannot rely on anybody. They have only themselves to rely on for survival."
Sigh. Americans came to that conclusion when they created a government that was compelled to allow its people to engage in their own quest for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It sounds like the people of North Korea are 'getting their minds right' by simply recognizing reality. When they stretch the 'dear general's' neck, maybe we should invite them over here to give lectures in economics to the DNC.
At last a job for Al Gore.
"Making rooms for corns, wheats, and barleys"?
Well, that might need the services of Jimma Carter.
Sounds like Iran
Every old left over communist despot leader knows that capitalism left unfettered will eventually be the end of communism.
"N. Korea is changing now. Kim Jong-il must sense everything the passage of time brings. N. Korea makes little kicking steps toward the market economy. People own things, and pay for things instead of state owning things and paying for things on their behalf. Obviously, Kim Jong-il can't find any way to resist such changes.
"It was unthinkable in the past to see people running restaurants, billiards parlors and pay taxes(for business.)Markets have sprung up everywhere in Pyongyang, where private business is booming. "
Hopefully cancer or someother terminal disease for Kim Jong will hasten the coming regime change.
Perhaps the logic of the "sunshine policy" was at heart a sound one. That the ruling elite of North Korea was composed of people who could be bought. That honey would work better than vinegar.
No nation can live on slogans and speeches and rallies forever. If the ultra-revolutionaries do not deliver on the promises of a better life the result is a classic Thermidorian reaction in which the a cynical country rejects idealism run amok.
It happenned in Russia, it happenned in China.
The change in N. Korea now is not the work of "Sunshine policy." It is due to the collapse of N. Korean economy, which led to famine. The system could not feed ordinary people. People had to fend for themselves. The state has no choice but to relinquish its control over people grudgingly. All news and movies, videos, came over Sino-N. Korean border. Not over DMZ.
Sunshine policy ended up only fattening the regime's ruling elite and military.
When a police state or any kind of authoritarian system cracks up, it was because the ruling elite no longer believed in their own slogans. Like the French aristocrats reading Voltaire or the Soviet nomenklatura of the '80s in American jeans or the collapse of Maoism and the arrest of the Gang of Four practically before Mao's body was cold.
Perhaps the Sunshine policy, the corruption of the North Korean ruling elite, their complete collapse of faith in a system that has made their country an island of wretchedness in a rich region, had a certain logic. Maybe the North Korean nomenklatura is willing to be bought by other Koreans.
Better yet, maybe his court jesters will see the handwriting on the wall and hang the Dear Leader from the nearest tree...
"Making rooms for corns, wheats, and barleys"?
Well, that might need the services of Jimma Carter.
Yeah, add peanuts.
Peanuts added.
BTW ... know where they can get any plans for the various rooms? Just the corns, wheats, and barleys ... Jimma has the peanuts plans. ;)
Maybe algore could help them sucker some tobacco....
"Maybe his court jesters will see the handwriting on the wall and hang the Dear Leader from the nearest tree...'
There aren't many trees left in N Korea, but they could find something if there are any ropes in N Korea.
Yeah! That's right!
Algore is a tobacco suckerer. I had forgotten all about that part of his schooling.
BTW ... wouldn't that be tobaccos?
I mean ... I mean ... if they are building rooms for corns, and they are building rooms for wheats, and they are building rooms for barleys ... wouldn't they build rooms for tobaccos?
Or would that be ... builds rooms fors tobaccos?
TLR, thanks for a good article.
Ping.
Powerful force for change in North Korea?
(Another bomb go off in a NK train carrying Syrian chemical warfare/rocket engineers?)
Fortunately, the dnc is only slightly more interested in power than personal wealth: Promise them money, and they will take the power themselves.
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