North Korea: March 1995
"Please bow to the Great Leader"
We were often asked why we were planning a trip to NK. Why would anyone want to holiday in a backward, dour, isolated, run-down extremist country? Both Rick and Paul are communist aficionados, but there's another reason. For the budget traveller, communist countries offer extremely low prices (see also our travelogues on Poland, Czechoslovakia, Moscow and The Baltics), VIP treatment, interesting food, and a chance to experience truly foreign cultures and vistas that haven't (yet) been overrun by Western advertising. For no extra charge, you also get a fascinating insight into one of the major (but doomed) ideological movements of the 20th century: Stalinism. Stalinism acts like a preserving agent, leaving countries like North Korea in pretty much the same state as they were 50 years ago. It's like a trip back in time, but whether it was to 1945 or 1984 we couldn't decide.
It's no longer true that one has to participate in the dubious pleasures of group travel in order to visit places like NK. Individual travel has been a possibility since 1986 and that is why our trip was able to be organised in just a week. The transport and guided tour would have also been supplied even if only one of us had ended up going. It's not certain whether this is optional or compulsory, but it's certainly the easiest way to get around a country about which so little information is available.
Next Page - Beijing to Pyongyang