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(#9) They Make You Fill Out a REALLY Creepy Customs Form
While North Korea is sealed off for its actual residents, it's surprisingly possible (though not easy) to enter as a tourist. When you fly into Pyongyang, be prepared to fill out an ominous customs form that asks you to declare if you have everything from "killing devices" to seeds to publishing works of any kind to drugs. And any kind of electronic device you have must be logged. None of these can be brought into the country.
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(#2) They Published a Letter From "Abraham Lincoln" to Obama
It's common for the North to throw operatic insults at the military and diplomatic skill of both South Korea and the US. In April 2016, they went one step further, conjuring a letter from deceased 16th president Abraham Lincoln to President Obama. The "Lincoln letter" was published on the internal state-run website DPRK Today, and was titled "Advice from Lincoln to Obama."
Concern trolling Obama by saying that it looks like he has "a lot on his mind," the letter scolds him and the US for not reducing their nuclear weapons stockpile, while simultaneously demanding the DPRK reduce theirs. "Lincoln" even throws himself under the bus, saying the American people won't stand to be deceived the way he did back in the day.
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(#5) They Once Nearly Went to War Over a Tree Stump
The "Axe Murder Incident" of 1976 started as a simple operation and nearly turned into a shooting war. UN Checkpoint 3 had been the site of numerous North Korean attempts to kidnap US troops. But the view of it was partially blocked by a tree, so US troop went out to cut it down. They were ambushed by North Korean troops, who claimed the tree had been personally planted by Kim Il Sung. They attacked the lightly armed US troops with axes, killing two.
The US responded by mobilizing massive force to remove the tree, sending hundreds of soldiers armed with machine guns and rocket launchers, moving tanks and attack helicopters into attack positions, and putting every American soldier in South Korea on alert. The tree was cut down without incident, but two North Korean observation posts were vandalized and the stump was left as a reminder of UN power.
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(#11) If You Take a Picture of Kim Il Sung, You Have to Capture His Whole Body
The regime has insanely specific and detailed rules for how to capture and protect the image of Kim Il Sung, his son Kim Jong Il, and his grandson, current ruler Kim Jong Un.
Among the rules that one North Korean tourist was given are:
-If you take pictures of any of Kim, you have to capture their whole figure, head to toe. No cropping is allowed.
-Printed materials depicting the Kims can't be creased, damaged, thrown away, or used as wrapping paper.
-Whenever you visit a Dear Leader statue (and they're everywhere) your group must line up single-file in front of it, and bow, with hands at your side. Your hands can't be anywhere else.
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(#16) Kim Jong-un is Cracking Down on Western-Style Clothing
In preparation for the May 2016 Party Congress, Kim Jong-Un dropped the hammer on North Koreans wearing western clothing. Among the items that will now be policed by "inspection units" are t-shirts, short skirts, jeans, along with piercings and long hair. Kim had already mandated that men use his high-and-tight haircut. The ban applies to all of North Korea, but will be especially enforced in villages near the Chinese border.
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(#13) They Built Another Museum Dedicated to American Attrocities
Located in southwest North Korea, the Sinchon Museum of American War Atrocities was re-opened in 2014 to pay tribute to the DPRK citizens brutally killed during the Sinchon Massacre, where up to 35,000 people were systematically massacred over a three month period.
Except historians can't agree on what actually happened, what role Americans had in the killing (as opposed to vengeful South Korean troops), and even if the massacre took place at all. It's likely that the US officer the North blamed for organizing the killings never existed, and many scholars have said the killings were actually committed by communists eliminating less ideologically reliable communists.
Whatever really happened at Sinchon, the North clearly blames the US for it. As such, the Museum contains dozens of gory exhibits showing Americans torturing, mutilating, and slaughtering innocent DPRK citizens. The displays are unbelievably graphic.
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About This Tool
North Korea is still a country with a relatively closed regime. For decades, it has seldom interacted with other countries. The outside world knows little about it, people can only speculate based on various public news reports or the observations of a few travelers. Even travelers cannot communicate with too many locals, foreign tourists come into contact with are mainly tour guides, drivers and hotel attendants, etc.
Do you want to travel to North Korea one day? It is a chance to know some weird truths about North Korea, the random tool collected these 16 stories from the Internet.
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