When I grew too old for the Youth League, I had no choice but to join one of these militias. In my case, it was the Laborers’ and Farmers’ Red Army. I enlisted when I graduated from high school and embarked on a period of training.
The training was professional enough. We learned how to dig trenches and fight to protect our position. We were well trained as snipers. Groups of individuals who were used to working together were formed into military units. The idea was that, in the event of a crisis, the units could be mobilized very quickly. We had exercises twice a year, at the hottest and the coldest time of year. We’d do things like climb a mountain or dig trenches out of the frozen ground. Right from the start, the one thing I kept asking myself was this: What was with the party’s obsession with militarizing the entire nation?
At the end of a particularly grueling training period, I said to my closest friend, “Jesus! I can’t do this anymore. It’s just too hard!” If a member of the secret police had overheard even this petty gripe, I’d have been sent to a concentration camp at once. I wasn’t the only one who complained, but it was dangerous to do so.
It was difficult for me to understand why no one ever seemed to question the point of the training, but I had to remember that they’d been brainwashed since they were babes by one or another barking, hysterical voice. When they were kids, it came from their teachers; later, it came from party officials, who drilled the same messages into them day after day after day. “The dictator of South Korea started the Korean War! He was a pro-American imperialist! The leader of a puppet government! A poodle!” As a result, the militarization of the nation was entirely justified in their eyes. They were the only bulwark against imperialist American or South Korean attacks. And anyone who doubted or questioned this wisdom must have been a counterrevolutionary. A subversive. A traitor.
As you question whether they could really have been so completely brainwashed, keep in mind that North Koreans had never experienced a liberal democracy. They had no concept of what it was or what it meant. My comrades had only ever known or heard of colonial rule at the hands of Japan and dictatorship at the hands of Kim Il-sung. And before that was the miserable feudal period of the Korean dynasties. They’d only ever known bondage. North Koreans didn’t have anything to compare their country with because they’d never experienced anything else. Even when Kim Il-sung did something particularly brutal or horrific, no one raised an eyebrow. “Remember the time of Japanese colonial rule!” “Never forget the cruelty of American imperialism!” Without any other information at their disposal, young North Koreans simply fell for the propaganda.
April 1964. It was our fourth year in North Korea. It was freezing cold. If you’re thinking that April should have meant the onset of spring, forget it. The snow outside came up to my waist. April 15, 1964, was Kim Il-sung’s birthday, therefore one of the year’s biggest holidays. That particular year, it was a total catastrophe for my family.
Everyone in North Korea celebrated that wretched day. Every family received two and a half pounds of pork and some sweets and fruit—unheard-of luxuries at any other time of year. Amazingly, people were duped by these “gifts”; they really thought Kim Il-sung cared for them. I never fell for the ploy, but my sisters and I nonetheless still looked forward to the occasion as much as everyone else. Pork and sweets and fruit all in one day? It was the only day of the year when I wasn’t hungry. What was not to like?
During our first years there, my father used to go out on the eve of the great celebration to sell a few household goods we’d brought from Japan so that he could buy some meat and alcohol. And, lo and behold, when the great day came, our neighbors would suddenly appear out of nowhere to pay a visit to my mother—whom they usually ignored unless they needed her help with the delivery of a baby. On the Great Leader’s birthday, they were all smiles.
People came to our house from far and wide. Party and military bigwigs, some guy known as the “combat commander,” the village headman, and various hangers-on all made an appearance. Though our house was in the depths of the mountains, they somehow all managed to get there. They were no fools. They knew we had delicious food and drink to share. They knew that our crummy Japanese house was—shock and horror—clean. And, perhaps most important, they knew that there was an abundance of alcohol to be had.
That year, 1964, my mother and I made a fire in the kitchen, and she cooked for hours. All the hypocrites and parasites arrived and had a grand old time enjoying the fruits of her labor. Everyone got drunk and laughed and sang until one or two o’clock in the morning. Eventually, everyone filed out, except for a barber named Han Ju-han, who was so wasted, he couldn’t stand up. Bizarre as it may sound, barbers were something of a rarity in North Korea at the time, so he was favored by various higher-ups. Though we asked him to stay overnight, he insisted on going home, finally managing to stand up and stumble out into the dark. There were no streetlamps, and he didn’t have a flashlight. And there was an unbelievable amount of snow. He could easily fall into a river or slip off a mountain path. But he insisted on leaving, and my parents, my sisters, and I were so tired that we went to bed as soon as he left.
I woke up feeling unbearably hot. When I opened my eyes, flames were licking the ceiling. At first, I thought I must be dreaming. Then I leaped from my bed and screamed at everyone to get up. But they were sleeping soundly, their bellies full of good food. I shook my parents and then my sisters, yelling at them to wake up. My heart was racing, and I was sure we were all going to die. I finally succeeded in waking them, and when they saw what was happening, they jumped up.
We didn’t have time to get dressed or bring anything with us. Seconds after we left the burning building, the whole thing collapsed. It really was that narrow an escape. I have nightmares about it to this day.
It turned out that the celebrated barber had caused the fire. Confronted with the impenetrable snow and his inebriation, he’d stumbled back to our house. But instead of coming inside, he staggered to the shed where we kept straw and firewood. He made himself a bed of straw, drunkenly lit a cigarette, and promptly fell asleep. The whole place went up like a tinderbox. Apparently, he woke up and tried to shout, but he was too drunk and panicked to do anything more. He was so scared, he just crawled away into the night.
Soon enough, several villagers came out into the street and scrambled to help us try to put it out. Some of them formed a line from the well to the house and passed buckets of water. Others brought water up from the paddy field in whatever containers they could find. Some even tried to use snow. But their efforts were futile. Our house was completely incinerated. Along with everything we owned. Just like that, we became homeless. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any harder, everything collapsed around us. I couldn’t help but feel we were cursed.