Ryugyong Hotel Pyongyang

... number of them were a „Mercedes“.

The crowd eyed us with caution and again with only a covert curiosity, if at all. But we had no time any more to marvel at such details. Our guides took us inside the station and onto the platform.

And inside it was even busier than outside. There was only one train in sight, our 10:10 connection to Beijing being almost ready for departure. Mr Lee gave us our tickets, which in true communist fashion were group ones ...

... themselves. Then it’s off to the exhibition halls. It comes as no surprise to anyone who has ever lived in a communist country that those halls, in the best of communist traditions, are devoted to industry, heavy and light, electronic industry, agriculture, technological innovation and so on. The only thing you could have never possibly found anywhere else was the exhibition hall devoted to the works on the Juche idea. A part inside that particular one was set aside for bits ...

... between North and South Korea. Beside the arirang legend it also portrayed the time that Kim Jong Il was born in a log cabin on Mt Paekdu, the separation between North and South Korea, the goals of the country in science, the war for independance and other things.

The show was about 1,5 hours and it was amazing, especially the acrobatics, all the synchronized movements and the backdrop.

... tuli huoneeseen maskit yllään ja jatkoivat yläkertaan sanomatta mitään (tai en ainakaan kuullut). Näky oli vähintäänkin omituinen ja hieman kuumottavakin. Sitten selvisi, että yhdellä huonetovereista epäillään sikainfluenssaa ja kaikkia samassa huoneessa olleita uhkaa viikon karanteeni jossakin pekingiläisessä hotellissa. Sen jälkeen uni ei oikeen tullut silmään ennen kuin hostellivirkailija kertoi kahden ...

... br>War Victory Historic Site grounds are a combination of a museum and network of underground tunnels and chambers where the bigwigs of the armed struggle against the Americans in Korean War retreated into hiding and plotted the course of their struggle for freedom. We were not aware of any holidays in North Korea today, but for some reason – or perhaps quite commonly so, for all we knew – there were loads of people around. All dressed up in what might be their best, they too ...

... take a few pictures in this glorious sunny afternoon.

No matter what one may think about the old Kim and his immortal exploits, the Three Charters Monument is outright spectacular. As it was meant to be, I am sure. Two women, with outstretched arms are more than 30 metres high and the symbolism they convey is unmistakeable. At the foot of the monument, on either side of the motorway, there is a pair of large bronze relief slabs, each one depicting citizenry carrying torches and ...

... which length the ruling class of North Korean society is prepared to go to in order to preserve and upkeep this personality cult.

The day was glorious. Same as the day before at the same time, it was somewhat windy and chilly, but magnificently sunny. Whichever Gods they had in North Korea, they smiled upon us in favour.

When we arrived, though, we couldn’t go right in. For the first time since our arrival in Pyongyang we seemed to be in a spot where there was ...

... too often for the rest of merited claims to be taken at face value without an impartial examination. Knowing all that, I was inclined to give North Koreans benefit of doubt on this one. As true to the form, Americans maintained the Koreans had captured it in international waters. Koreans said otherwise.

„Pueblo“ may in reality be an insignificant little ship and its importance noticeable only when measured in local, North Korean units. On the global geopolitical ...

... was the first one to break the ranks and step on the grass. A group of young people - the young are the more courageous lot anyway - at least ten of them, were inviting enough that I went up to them, smiling broadly and they smiled back. I shook hands with whoever was ready to shake them, and many were. That brought forth a lot of laughter. The whole atmosphere was very jovial and relaxed, and in this suddenly baking hot early afternoon most of the guys in this particular group were ...

... definitely not helped by the fact that all those flight attendants still had face expressions that made them look almost like prison guards. I suppose that here too, just like reputedly in so many other things, North Korean officials simply went against common wisdom and instructed those girls aboard their planes on international flights to look unfriendly and intimidating. Smile was obviously one commodity in short supply up in North Korean sky. An item that clearly hadn't made it ...