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Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

mydiplomaticlife.com

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Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#21

Post by netsharc »

notdonspaulding wrote: post #19
netsharc wrote: post #3

The last paragraph talks about being cut-off and isolated. He didn't mention Internet or phones for private use, so I wonder if they didn't have that. I can imagine smartphones being disallowed, and even if allowed, limited to home WiFi...

They did not have internet. From the article: > You were in a country that really was sealed off from the rest of the world. No internet or social media. All press and TV (one channel) dedicated not for news but solely for the glorification of the Leader. That is the Kim dynasty and the regime.

Obviously the average citizen don't have Internet, but an embassy without Internet (most probably through satellite) is unthinkable, they need to be able to talk to their home government.

But if we go back 20 years (others have said this is written in the early 2000's), satellite communication was probably worse than 28.8k modems and really expensive, so yeah, it could've been there but only for official and not personal use.

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#22

Post by BizarreByte »

victorbjorklund wrote: post #17
Scoundreller wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> North Korea can take you with whatever justification they feel like and return you as a vegetable. That’s most/all countries (or their embassies) you visit, no? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khash...

A big political enemy of the saudi family that been a pain in their ass (rightly so since they are an evil dictatorship) vs random student that just took a poster as a souvernir. Not the same thing. Anyone can be killed in North Korea. 99,99999999999% of people are not on the saudi familys enemy list.

> random student that just took a poster as a souvernir.

Let's not mince words here, he stole government property in a country with some of the harshest laws on earth.

Did he deserve to die for it? No, but it was an incredibly stupid thing to do.

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#23

Post by roywiggins »

notdonspaulding wrote: post #19
netsharc wrote: post #3

The last paragraph talks about being cut-off and isolated. He didn't mention Internet or phones for private use, so I wonder if they didn't have that. I can imagine smartphones being disallowed, and even if allowed, limited to home WiFi...

They did not have internet. From the article: > You were in a country that really was sealed off from the rest of the world. No internet or social media. All press and TV (one channel) dedicated not for news but solely for the glorification of the Leader. That is the Kim dynasty and the regime.

Later on they talk about installing a satellite dish for diplomatic communication, so the embassy might have had some sort of internet connection over that.

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#24

Post by ceejayoz »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #18
FrancoisBosun wrote: post #12

I'm mostly surprised about the free admission of bribery: > However, I soon found that a bottle of Johnie Walker Black Label handed out at particularly frustrating moments made things miraculously happen a lot quicker. Oh how the North Koreans loved their whiskey.

That's just diplomacy.

Long history of it, too.

The US made special clear coke in nondescript bottles for Marshal of the Soviet Union Zhukov so he could look like he was drinking vodka instead of the illegal Western drink.

https://www.businessinsider.com/us-secret-clear-coca-cola-fo...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Coke

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#26

Post by ozim »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #18
FrancoisBosun wrote: post #12

I'm mostly surprised about the free admission of bribery: > However, I soon found that a bottle of Johnie Walker Black Label handed out at particularly frustrating moments made things miraculously happen a lot quicker. Oh how the North Koreans loved their whiskey.

That's just diplomacy.

[flagged]

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#27

Post by M5x7wI3CmbEem10 »

unixhero wrote: post #16
stuff4ben wrote: post #2

This was fascinating! If I could do it all over again, I'd have gone into the US Foreign Service. Maybe not to places like North Korea (which we don't have a presence in anyways), but I'd have loved to travel the world. Maybe in the next life...

Sure, if you could get in. I tried for 5 years in a row to get into my country's service. It failed. Pivoted to information security, hey at least I am a millionaire now.

may I ask if you have any career advice?

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#28

Post by contingencies »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #18
FrancoisBosun wrote: post #12

I'm mostly surprised about the free admission of bribery: > However, I soon found that a bottle of Johnie Walker Black Label handed out at particularly frustrating moments made things miraculously happen a lot quicker. Oh how the North Koreans loved their whiskey.

That's just diplomacy.

Re-gifting would have likely occurred. Like: obtain bottle, pass to your superior, cement next-level promotion.

Re: Three years in North Korea as a foreigner (2021)

#30

Post by starik36 »

gwbas1c wrote: post #4

Weird, I tried to click on "Kimchi Harvest" to see a larger version. Instead, the link was to https://mydiplomaticlife.com/how-to-survive-3-years-in-north... , which just took me to the top of the article.

Oddly enough, Soviet Union had a thing similar to "Kimchi Harvest". I remember workers in my town having to go work at a collective farm for a week harvesting things.

They also had something called "subotnik", aka voluntary Saturday labor. This was a practice where citizens, including workers and students, participated in unpaid labor on Saturdays. These activities included various tasks like cleaning up the city (that's what I remember doing as a kid). There was nothing "voluntary" about it.

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