I posted this a few days ago but didn't get any attention:<p><i>A Year in Pyongyang:
The fascinating account of a British guy who spent a year in North Korea working as a literary reviser for their totalitarian government</i>
<a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1178719" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1178719</a><p>I've started reading the book since then and it really paints a full and seemingly realistic picture of N Korea.
I've always been fascinated by the pictures people manage to get out of North Korea. This Flickr account is home to an incredible collection of photos inside of Pyongyang <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/kernbeisser/collections/72157603652517132/" rel="nofollow">http://www.flickr.com/photos/kernbeisser/collections/7215760...</a> and out in the country <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/kernbeisser/collections/72157603652581080/" rel="nofollow">http://www.flickr.com/photos/kernbeisser/collections/7215760...</a>
"I see you have some cows here."<p>"Ah yes. Flour. Very good."<p>"Excellent work on this bucket. But why orange? Ha ha ha!"<p>"What is this, a fishery for ants?"
Gotta love how the only photo where he is smiling is where he is holding a bottle of vodka :)<p><a href="http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/kcna_03_12/k23_00000010.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bi...</a>
If you're looking for some more insight into this country, watch this video set over the weekend:<p><a href="http://www.vbs.tv/watch/the-vice-guide-to-travel/vice-guide-to-north-korea-1-of-3" rel="nofollow">http://www.vbs.tv/watch/the-vice-guide-to-travel/vice-guide-...</a><p>A real eye opener.
I'm fascinated by North Korea. I think these pictures say a lot. The details are interesting... close-up shots, framed without showing much context. Practically everybody has a pad of paper. Intriguing stuff.
When I saw the pictures of Kim Jong-il surrounded by a store filled with fresh fruit while his citizens starve, I was reminded of the final years of the rule of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceauşescu. In Ceauşescu's case, to some extent it appears his lieutenants went to great lengths to present him with a sanitized view of the state of his country.<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceauşescu#Tensions" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceauşescu#Tensions</a><p>I'm curious if this is also the case in North Korea.
Some of those photos look photoshopped. In #10, his glasses are broken, whereas in others (14, 19) he looks very out of place. In many, his hat stand out particularly.
Lest we be too proud of our ability to detect the forced, artificial nature of these photographs, this link from the 'Big Picture' comment thread should be considered:<p><a href="http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2010/02/obama_being_forced_to_look_at.html#photo=1" rel="nofollow">http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2010/02/obama_being_forced_to_l...</a><p>(Our photo op rituals aren't <i>that</i> much better. US photographers show a lot more creativity in composition, though.)
<a href="http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15579841" rel="nofollow">http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_i...</a><p>An excellent (and short) analysis of North Korea from Banyan, the Economist's excellent new Asia columnist.
In some ways North Korea is one of the few countries that feels really foreign to me nowadays, but I think that might be because there is so little verifiable information about it.<p>Regardless, looking at these photos I only think: Kim is looking really old.