June 15, 2015
ASIA / PACIFIC
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 3
Holiday in socialist fairyland? North Korea woos tourists
By Eric Talmadge
The Associated Press
YONGYANG, North Korea — If you’re still
looking for somewhere exotic to go this summer
and don’t mind a vacation that comes with a heavy
dose of socialist propaganda and leader worship, North
Korea believes it’s just the place for you.
Fresh off a drastic, half-year ban that closed North
Korea’s doors to virtually all foreigners over fears they
would spread the Ebola virus — despite the fact that there
were no cases of Ebola reported anywhere in Asia — the
country is once again determined to show off its “socialist
fairyland” to tourists.
The focus on tourism is with the blessing of Kim Jong
Un himself and, in typical fashion, officials have set lofty
goals in their effort to please their leader.
About 100,000 tourists came to North Korea last year,
all but a few thousand of them from neighboring China.
Kim Sang Hak, a senior economist at the influential
Academy of Social Sciences, told The Associated Press the
North hopes that by around 2017, there will be 10 times as
many tourists and that the number will hit 2 million by
2020.
Pyongyang’s interest in attracting tourists may sound
ironic, or even contradictory, for a country that has taken
extreme measures to remain sheltered from the outside
world.
But Kim said the push, formally endorsed by Kim Jong
Un in March 2013, is seen as both a potentially lucrative
revenue stream and a means of countering stereotypes of
the country as starving, backward, and relentlessly bleak.
“Tourism can produce a lot of profit relative to the
investment required, so that’s why our country is putting
priority on it,” he said in a recent interview in Pyongyang,
adding that along with scenic mountains, secluded
beaches, and a seemingly endless array of monuments
and museums, the North has another ace up its sleeve —
the image that it is simply unlike anywhere else on earth.
“Many people in foreign countries think in a wrong way
about our country,” Kim said, brushing aside criticisms of
its human-rights record, lack of freedoms, and problems
with hunger in the countryside. “Though the economic
sanctions of the U.S. imperialists are increasing, we are
developing our economy. So I think many people are
curious about our country.”
Opponents in the west say tourists who go to North
Korea are helping to fill the coffers of a rogue regime and
harming efforts to isolate and pressure Pyongyang to
abandon its nuclear weapons and improve its
human-rights record. For safety reasons, the State
Department strongly advises U.S. citizens not to travel to
North Korea.
None of that has stopped the number of American and
European tourists from gradually increasing, and such
concerns are not so strong in the areas North Korea is
most actively wooing — China, Russia, and Southeast
Asia.
“About 80 percent of the tourists who come are from
neighboring countries,” said state tourism official Kim
Yong Il. “It’s normal to develop tourism within your
region, so our country is not exceptional in that way. But
we are also expanding to European countries as well.”
While the overall quality of life in North Korea hasn’t
shifted much in the past few years, efforts to build
attractions for visitors and the infrastructure required to
host them are already beginning to change the face of the
capital and some scattered special tourism zones recently
established across the country.
Amid the generally Spartan context of their
surroundings, those attractions, which are also used by
average North Koreans at much lower fees, can be quite
striking.
In Pyongyang, some of the more popular tourist sites
include a new, high-tech shooting range, where visitors
can hunt animated tigers with laser guns or use live ammo
to bag real pheasants, which can be prepared to eat right
there on the spot. There is also a new equestrian center, a
huge water park, and revamped “fun fairs” replete with
roller coasters, fast-food stands, and a 5-D theater. After a
P
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SOCIALIST FAIRYLAND? North Korean women talk over pots of burning charcoal for cooking seafood on a pier leading to Jangdok Island at
dusk, in Wonsan, North Korea, in this July 28, 2014 file photo. A luxury ski resort was recently opened just outside of Wonsan and a number of new res-
taurants have sprung up along the city’s beachfront area, which is popular with tourists and locals alike for swimming, clambakes, and outdoor barbe-
ques. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E, File)
year of feverish construction, Pyongyang’s new
international airport terminal could open as soon as this
month.
Outside of the showcase capital, where funds,
electricity, and adequate lodging are much scarcer,
development has been focused on the area around Mount
Kumgang and Wonsan, a port city on the east coast.
A luxury ski resort opened recently just outside of
Wonsan and a number of new restaurants have sprung up
along the city’s beachfront area, which is popular with
tourists and locals alike for swimming, clambakes, and
outdoor barbeques.
But like everything else, North Korea is approaching
tourism “in its own way.”
Tourists of any nationality can expect constant
monitoring from ever-watchful guides and a lot of visits to
model hospitals, schools, and farms, along with
well-staged events intended to impress and promote
Pyongyang’s unique brand of authoritarian socialism.
Like all other visitors to the North, they have precious few
opportunities to interact with average people or observe
their daily lifestyle.
Tourists can also expect severe repercussions if they
step out of line.
Tours to Mount Kumgang by South Koreans were quite
popular for about a decade until 2008, when they were
halted after a South Korean housewife who walked into a
restricted area was shot dead by a North Korean guard.
More recently, an American tourist who impulsively left a
bible in a provincial nightclub was detained for nearly six
months until the Pentagon sent a plane to Pyongyang to
pick him up.
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