Koryo Hotel Pyongyang

And so the day to leave North Korea finally arrived. Just to make a full circle, we had come to Pyongyang on a cloudy day, and now we were leaving on a cloudy day. Everything else in between was gorgeous.<br><br>Before checking out from the hotel, I had to do one more last thing. I still owed Michael those 42 yuan from two days before, and I would have hated to leave the debt unsettled until Beijing. So I tried to break one of my hundred-yuan bills at the exchange office desk inside ...

There was no let-up to the relentless pace of our tour in North Korea. Regardless of the fact that we had not been sitting around in the morning, and also had a two-hour ride back to the capital in the afternoon, as soon as we had returned to the Pyongyang, they whisked us to another museum. The latest one in the long line of museums we had visited here was so-called Three-Revolution Exhibition.<br><br>As far as museums in North Korea go, there now seemed to be a marked decline in their ...

... aside for cars running the red light. There are no traffic lights in Pyongyang, a person takes care of that task. It's a remarkable sight to see them turning and pointing and arranging traffic. The guide told me that they do 1 hour shifts with 3 hour breaks because the work is hard.<br><br>First stop was the tower of the Juche idea. In Pyongyang you can buy<br>many books on the Juche idea, which is the ...

Parasta Pohjois-Korean matkassa oli pienet "täh?!"-elämykset, jotka toisaalta kielivät maan heikosta taloustilanteesta ja eristäytyneisyydestä ja toisaalta toivat mieleen millaista matkailun Neuvostoliittoon on täytynyt olla 25 vuotta sitten. Värikäs Arirang Mass Games -show, johon osallistui jopa 100 000 esiintyjää, loi vahvan kontrasin muuten harmaaseen katukuvaan. Absurdeimpia paikkoja oli kuitenkin Kim Il-sungin mausoleumi, jonne jokainen ...

... että pääsisin lähtemään matkalle, mikäli en kertoisi siitä muille. Seuraavana aamuna lääkintäviranomaisten tullessa ottamaan lisätestejä muilta henkilöiltä pakkasin kimpsut ja kampsut kasaan ja poistuin vähin äänin lentokentälle. Jo pelkkä lentomatka Pjonjangiin oli pieni elämys vanhalla Tupolevilla. Nousu oli hidas ja vähän hapuileva (tätä mieltä oli myös seurueessamme ollut ammattilentäjä). Lennon ...

Time in North Korea ran fast indeed. Come to think of it, in two days our stay here would come to an end. It only meant I was most certainly not bored here.<br><br>Traditionally, I was first up for breakfast, joined by Nicole and Mathew, as usual. Then came Pim and he was followed by another guy whom I'd never seen before. He spoke excellent English. Better than me. Which was hardly surprising if one knew he was a Brit. Andy was his name. He too came to North Korea through Koryo Tours, but ...

Trip back to Pyongyang was to a large extent a reverse of what we'd had on our way down south. We stopped at the same spot midway through, played there football again, and this time Mr Sung and Mr Lee joined us, as well. After that the only difference in comparison with the first leg of our excursion to Kaesong was that now somebody turned on the video &#8211; or DVD &#8211; and we were treated to a selection of revolutionary entertainment in the form of video spots. Those who hungered ...

... queue. Or at least the queue we couldn&#8217;t jump. Not that we really saw a huge crowd around us. There was a unit of soldiers who were led inside roughly by the time we arrived and a handful of seemingly loitering local dignitaries on the square in front of the entrance gate. There was a light-blue Mercedes, a bit outdated, parked nearby and two more tourist buses, and that was all. Not exactly the football-game type of the crowd. But nevertheless, we waited. <br><br>The ...

But what increasingly drew attention of us all were ever more frequent groups of local people, same as the first one under that pine tree, sitting around, eating, drinking and, believe it or not, having fun. Of course, why wouldn't they have fun? But then again, we had all arrived in North Korea, each with our own baggage of prejudices, and some of them certainly held that notion that North Koreans were living in such an authoritarian society where everyone possibly spied on everyone ...

You couldn't exactly accuse the flight to Pyongyang of being overbooked. Fourteen of us, fifteen with Simon, were easily the good half of entire passenger list. The rest was made of handful of North Koreans and probably an odd Chinese or two. One could tell this was not the line you needed to book a ticket for months in advance. <br>I wasn't aware of any particular seats assigned to any of us, so in theory I guess we could sit wherever we pleased. Except that on Air Koryo flights it may not ...