Date: May 28th, 2010
Location: University of Seoul
Speakers: North Koreans Repatriates, living and studying in Seoul share their experiences of North Korean life, and immersion in a new culture. Written by Rhea Lee.
I arrived late. There were two speakers, a young man and a young woman, in their early twenties. The gentleman was speaking first, and then a young lady, both who were currently students. For now, I wish to keep their identities anonymous, but I want to explain what I heard. Here are some snippets of my notes, through a translator, and paraphrased:
NORTH KOREAN REPATRIOT ONE:
Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il held the North Korean people for 60 years as slaves. As soon as you are born, you see photos of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il on the wall. Your first words are not “Mom” and “Dad,” it’s “Thank you Kim Il Sung. Thank you Kim Jong Il.”
If you are standing there for a long time, you will never try to escape.
I heard the truth by listening to the radio.
I tried to escape numerous times and was punished and served time in jail. While trying to escape, there are three options:
1)Shot to death
2)Flee
3)Suicide
Thanks to the poor infrastructure and transportation system, escape can be possible. I did make it. Though it wasn’t easy. At my worst, I dropped from 42kg. to 31kg. (as an adult man). I was so thin, I looked like I had the eyes of a westerner, because even the extra skin around my eyes was sunken in. My hair was falling out. I was just bones.
But I can’t feel sorry for myself. I saw women who fared much worse.
(He goes on to describe the experience of a friend, who was not present at the talk.) She was a young North Korean lady, caught with child from a South Korean man. At 8 months pregnant, she was put on a table, tied down, and without any painkillers, they simply reached into her and ripped out the baby. They threw it to the floor and stomped on it until it was dead. They thought she was dead, so they threw her out on the ground. She wasn’t dead though, and she did escape to tell her story.
NORTH KOREAN REPATRIOT TWO:
1996 was the hardest year. The stories you hear are true, about the “gojaebi” (swallows), the children lying down and dying in the marketplace, from hunger.
I lived in China for years, with my mother, who was fortunate enough to marry a nice Chinese man. My mother suggested I come to South Korea, where I could be a citizen of a country, so I did. I want to be an intellect, to study and to help people understand what is happening.
In North Korea, now people learn their own way to survive. I personally think that foreign aid is important, as long as it can be distributed to the people who need it somehow. But that is not the fundamental problem. Propaganda is the fundamental problem. People need to learn to survive on their own.
What has to be done is to change North Korean society, not just giving food. It’s not just a starvation issue. It’s a propaganda issue. We want Korean university students, and other people to be interested in our issues.
Join our bicycle tour in July:
(Her organization’s website:)
