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Start Planning Your North Korea 2010 Trip Now, Or Else
They won't take our advice, but they'll still take our money: Despite an absence of diplomatic relations between the countries, Americans can still travel to North Korea, so long as you go when they want you to go, and with whom.
Visiting North Korea is allowed only during the annual Mass Games involving thousands of North Koreans performing complicated choreography and moving into intricate patterns like a college marching band on steroids. The games are normally held August through October, during which Westerners can travel with a tour group—since the government will assign you an escort to make sure you only see the North Korea they want you to see. Now is the time to start planning and booking those trips.
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Help The Blind Read By Visiting North Korea
Wilderness experts teach campers to leave a place better than they found it. A tour group responsible for more than half of all Westerners visiting North Korea has taken that sentiment to heart, asking travelers to donate to help children in the impoverished, often aid-rejecting country.
Koryo co-founders Josh Green and Nicholas Bonner, both Brits, came up with the idea for the company when Green was working for a shipping company in Pyongyang in the early '90s. Using his connections, they were able to connect with the Korea International Travel Company, an official government agency that ushers foreigners in and out of the DPRK, and now contribute to the Pyongyang International Film Festival and produce documentaries as well as leading tours.
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North Korea Inviting South Korea Over For The Weekend
Who's game for a nice little package trip to North Korea? Anyone? Bueller?
It was announced yesterday that Kim Jong-il is feeling a little neighborly lately and less bomby, and wants to restart family reunion trips from South Korea. Although South Korea hasn't yet said yes to allowing their people to venture over the border, North Korea is re-opening an enclave for reunions at Mount Kumgang, which was once a major money generator for the poor country.
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Clinton Kicks North Korea Into Giving Back Jailed Journalists
Thinking about heading to North Korea for the Arirang Mass Games? You better hope that former President Bill Clinton has got your back, just like he has with the two Current TV journalists who were arrested on the North Korean border in March and sentenced to 12 years in a hard labor camp for "committing hostilities against the Korean nation and illegal entry.”
During Clinton's brief visit, which focused solely on negotiating the freedom of the women—Laura Ling, 32, and Euna Lee, 36—and not North Korea's recent nuclear tests, he met with good old Kim Jong-il, who wasn't looking all that ill.
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Despite North Korea's Test, Umbrella Drinks in Hawaii Remain Safe
In case you don’t pay attention to the news over the weekend—we barely do—North Korea launched a long-range rocket. Their government insists that the launch was simply an attempt to get a communication satellite into orbit, but everyone else thinks that they want to know how far they can get a missile to go.
This test was pretty much a failure according to US officials, and both phases of the rocket fell into the ocean near Japan without making it to orbit. We’re not going to get into the political issues about this launch, but we do want to talk about how it may affect your travel plans for a tropical vacation.
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Dictatorship Travel: Eating Like Kim Jong Il
After North Korea agreed to turn off its biggest nuclear reactor last week, it officially fell off the United States' list of countries that sponsor terrorism. So we figured, why not indulge in some Communist cuisine to celebrate?
In Cambodia, along with about 200 other countries, state sanctioned and supported North Korean restaurants serve as unofficial embassies of the country's creepy culture.
Turns out Pyongyang Restaurant in Phnom Penh is a microcosm of North Korea's Arirang Festival, in which tens of thousands of children create moving mosaics at Pyongyang's May Day Stadium.
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Dictatorship Travel: Pyongyang and Kim Jong Il's Arteries Both Doing Splendidly
Despite what the South Park guys identified as chronic "roneriness", Kim Jong Il's health is just fine, thankyouverymuch. At least that's what the Dear Leader's propaganda machine is insisting. Stroke? Don't even suggest it. Seriously. They'll arrest you.
This past week, an envoy of journalists were given a controlled, guided tour illustrating the country's booming economy and happy populace, of course. This is how an Asia Times reporter recounted his trip to Pyongyang:
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Communist Choreography in North Korea
You might've thought that when Bush called North Korea a member of the "Axis of Evil" that he killed your chances to ever visit the world's most reclusive country. But every year between August and October the so-called Democratic People's Republic of Korea will grant visas to US citizens so they can attend the Mass Games--a colorful, tightly choreographed gymnastics display involving almost 100,000 performers.
Unfortunately, tours of the DPRK are just about as choreographed. Regime-approved guides keep a close eye on what travelers do, say and take photos of, and they certainly won't break from the party line if asked questions about the quality of life in the country.
That doesn't mean it won't be a fascinating experience, just don't plan on heading off willy-nilly with your point-and-shoot. Tourists supposedly have to yield their passport and plane ticket out of the country to the police during their trip.
