defector
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North Korean Soldier's Choco Pie (NOT Lifetime Supply)
Last month, Oh Chung-sung, a 24-year-old North Korean soldier, made an audacious sprint across the intensely guarded border that separates North and South Korea. He was dragged to safety by South Korean soldiers after fleeing a hail of gunfire. He sustained five gunshot wounds, and after undergoing surgeries, he woke
Neungra Bapsang: North Koreans in the South Gain Self-Sufficiency through Food
North Korean defector Lee Ae-ran introduces South Koreans to the food of the North. With her restaurant Neungra Bapsang, she also helps other female defectors make a living. Dressed simply with short hair, Lee exudes confidence. The 53-year-old has a Ph.D. in nutritional science and food management from prestigious
Inter-Korean Marriage and Pursuit of Assimilation
A North Korean woman, alone in her cheap government housing, asks, “I want to get married. Where is my love?” She daydreams of being only in her underwear, straddling her ideal South Korean man, and calling out to him in affection, “My dear husband.” That controversial advertisement by a matchmaking
The Republic of Konsumerism
Upon entering a supermarket in Seoul for the first time, I was completely lost. What I thought would be a simple challenge became nerve-wrecking: choosing a tube of toothpaste. Everywhere I looked, each product claimed to be better and cheaper than the last. “Three for the price of two”, “20%
A North Korean Views South Korea
It has been more than a decade since I left North Korea, but every time I read George Orwell’s Animal Farm I am reminded of my life back ‘home’. The novel points to the North Korean regime’s hypocrisy without using complex language. Published on 17 August 1945, just