or maybe OP could check his visa if the entry part still looks like this:
(the 3rd one is Tumangan)
You won't get a visa to keep anymore. You get an extra slip for entry, and they take your passport and the slip and keep them until you leave.
OP, can you tell me with a straight face that there were any reasons to go there other than for self interest? Because you were curious? Because watching a country living is the past is awesome? Is that worth ignoring the dark things or do you really think you are doing a good thing because you bought some beer from poor people?
Of course I can't. I was there as a tourist, so my primary interest is to educate myself and learn something of humanity, so it's a selfish reason. I have lived in Bangladesh, been in the slums of Cape Verde, favelas of Mexico, ran down villages of Tanzania, the ruins of the fallen Soviet empire - they aren't places you go to indulge or try to save people, but places where you can gain perspective to how societies operate under difficult circumstances.
That isn't to say that you wouldn't consider the ethical dilemma before going to any of these areas. Many people here think the people of DPRK is worse off because of tourists, I think any external influence is useful - different opinions.
I went to North Korea in 2010 and some of my impressions and conclusions were pretty different to OP.
Pyongyang is incredibly clean and it's true that they have people constantly trimming and keeping it generally nice. But it wasn't mentioned that the people cutting the grass are generally forced labourers. You'll see rows of impoverished, hungry people crawling along grass verges cutting all the grass with scissors. I doubt they're fresh from B&Q, either.
I wouldn't called the country "serene". That serenity is an ominous, nerved and pervasive silence that is the symptom of a collective national psychological condition, the result of a successful totalitarian regime. It is fear, shadows. I didn't see anyone happily making their way to work - I saw people just standing in the middle of the fields doing nothing because there were no crops.
As a PS I've seen a lot of moral hand-wringing about OP going to Korea. A lot more than when I went - everyone here was interested and only a couple people questioned my choice. Just an interesting change in worldview over the past 4 years, probably more right than wrong. However, when a group of North Korean kids were waving and smiling at me, and I got the chance to smile and wave back, I knew I'd made the right choice. Because the majority of times they see westerners it's as graphic propaganda depicting us as wolven monsters who rape and mutilate Korean women.
If we ever liberate this country, as is our moral imperative, I'd be happier knowing that even a fraction of those people knew us as humans who can smile and wave, rather than monsters salivating over sawing a woman's boob off (actual poster).
I agree with your assessment, your conclusions are very similar to the ones I came when reflecting everything that I encountered on my trip. However, I could not honestly stay that would have been the
first impression for me, I'm not that clever, that's where I got after thinking of how everything worked. Why was everything so clean? Who were the people working? Why were people running to do their chores? Those are the questions I will ponder for days and weeks to come, and the answers to which will forever haunt me.
With regards to the people doing the grass and doing the farm work, pretty much everyone below a certain level is expected to do it. They will get assignments, told where to go to do farm work. Even our English speaking guide. I don't mean that that would be any better than all of them being prisoners from labour camps - it is still essentially forced labour all the same. They have been thought all their life that it's an important and expected thing to do, by the speakers blasting the messages.
With regards to the PS, I don't think people's stance has changed one bit in the last few years, North Korea and going there is generally viewed as really bad. I think the reaction here is more due to the tone I chose to do the OP with.
North Korea is not going to reach any state of normalcy in our lifetimes. Whether or not the regime crumbles. If that happens it will present all whole load of other problems in the region.
You have obviously much more experience on the subject than I do, but my sense is that if there is a change the country could change rapidly. I mean, look at how far China or Cambodia has come in the last 20 years. Sure, their starting place wasn't nearly as grim, but this is a country of ostensibly intelligent and hardworking people, so given the opportunity and resource, I absolutely believe they could make rapid progress.
