4 ms·

As you've said, a video call would suffice for that. What can NK offer that other countries can't and why this needed to travel there?

by sfttty 7y ago

whymauri 7y ago
There's an adrenaline rush from going to somewhere where travel is explicitly prohibited, and it's not that expensive to boot. I've seriously considered going on my non-American passport but have decided not to for two reasons: * Even though my birth country is on allied terms with NK, I'm unsure how my dual citizenship with the US would pan out. I do not want to be considered a spy and imprisoned. * I do not feel comfortable contributing to a totalitarian economy, even if the individual citizens (guides, translators, etc) benefit a lot from payment. And there are probably many other valid reasons not to go, but those are the most immediately obvious to me.
- mthoms 7y ago
  FWIW, a friend is a dual US-Canadian citizen and visited without problems using his Canadian passport. He was even allowed to take pictures, mostly unrestricted. Having said that, he went with an organized tour so the places he visited were highly curated. That was about 5 years ago though.
  - lisper 7y ago
    I would be very worried about going to NK if there was even the slightest possibility that they could think that you were trying to conceal your U.S. citizenship from them. That, it seems to me, would actually be a legitimate reason for them to suspect you of being a spy. Not that that really matters. The North Koreans are perfectly happy to detain U.S. citizens for non-legitimate reasons. Going there as a U.S. citizen seems to me like a crap shoot with terrifyingly high stakes. (Not that I ever really seriously considered going there before, but I am definitely not going now that I've posted this!)
- geomark 7y ago
  For some people it's not an adrenaline rush but a strong curiousity about what the US gov doesn't want you to know. Like all the warnings I received about travel to East Germany even after the wall came down (I was working for a defense contractor at the time). Project security warned us that there would be spies hiding behind every bush. When we got to Checkpoint Charlie there were just a few tourists milling about the small section of wall that remained, and an old German couple renting a hammer and chisel so you could chip off a piece of the wall yourself. When we spoke to the old couple they suddenly became alert and asked us, rather loudly, if we were Americans. Immediately, out of the corner of my eye I noticed a middle-aged woman sitting on a bench look up, and a young guy dart out of a doorway and start walking our way. We took the hammer and chisel and started chipping at the wall while keeping an eye on the locals nearby, who suddenly seemed very interested in us. An older man standing close to the wall reached into his pocket and pulled out a lighter but did not light the cigarette hanging from his mouth, an obvious signal to other members of his surveillance team. When a German couple posing as tourists came up and asked us where we were from we recognized that they were obviously trying to recruit us to spy for the Eastern Bloc. But we were too clever, pretending that we were drunk and did not speak English, and meandered back to the train station with our chunk of the wall.
  - papreclip 7y ago
    You sure they weren't all just thirsty for some free world dollars?
yabadabadoes 7y ago
A video call would be just as illegal. If he insisted on giving individual advice to NK instead of just publishing the same information then he needed to cease being a US person first.
- sfttty 7y ago
  Maybe I've become a very cynical person, but all the comments above seem very naive to me. He isn't a tourist and plays at the NK gov level. He doesn't care about the legal status of his actions. NK wants him to assist with money laundering on a very large scale and he probably wants something in return. Regular video calls with money transfers would be enough and way safer for him. So I'm asking the same question: what NK can possibly offer that can't be had in other countries and requires an in person visit?
  - mattigames 7y ago
    My guess would be "Joy Division"[0], meaning women brainwashed (or forced) by the state to sexually satisfy high-ranking officials as well as occasionally distinguished guests. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kippumjo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kippumjo
    - sfttty 7y ago
      He could get this in any amounts and with more variety in the US, again without any risk. He went there for something else.
      - mattigames 7y ago
        Is not the same at all, the ones there can be virgins at request, there is no pedophilia laws, and in general the power dynamics are extremely different when done for money than for your life.
  - nl 7y ago
    Ideology (in this case "crypto true-believer" ideology) is a very powerful motivator.

As you've said, a video call would suffice for that. What can NK offer that other countries can't and why this needed to travel there?

by sfttty 7y ago

As you've said, a video call would suffice for that. What can NK offer that other countries can't and why this needed to travel there?

whymauri 7y ago

There's an adrenaline rush from going to somewhere where travel is explicitly prohibited, and it's not that expensive to boot. I've seriously considered going on my non-American passport but have decided not to for two reasons: * Even though my birth country is on allied terms with NK, I'm unsure how my dual citizenship with the US would pan out. I do not want to be considered a spy and imprisoned. * I do not feel comfortable contributing to a totalitarian economy, even if the individual citizens (guides, translators, etc) benefit a lot from payment. And there are probably many other valid reasons not to go, but those are the most immediately obvious to me.

mthoms 7y ago
FWIW, a friend is a dual US-Canadian citizen and visited without problems using his Canadian passport. He was even allowed to take pictures, mostly unrestricted. Having said that, he went with an organized tour so the places he visited were highly curated. That was about 5 years ago though.
- lisper 7y ago
  I would be very worried about going to NK if there was even the slightest possibility that they could think that you were trying to conceal your U.S. citizenship from them. That, it seems to me, would actually be a legitimate reason for them to suspect you of being a spy. Not that that really matters. The North Koreans are perfectly happy to detain U.S. citizens for non-legitimate reasons. Going there as a U.S. citizen seems to me like a crap shoot with terrifyingly high stakes. (Not that I ever really seriously considered going there before, but I am definitely not going now that I've posted this!)
geomark 7y ago
For some people it's not an adrenaline rush but a strong curiousity about what the US gov doesn't want you to know. Like all the warnings I received about travel to East Germany even after the wall came down (I was working for a defense contractor at the time). Project security warned us that there would be spies hiding behind every bush. When we got to Checkpoint Charlie there were just a few tourists milling about the small section of wall that remained, and an old German couple renting a hammer and chisel so you could chip off a piece of the wall yourself. When we spoke to the old couple they suddenly became alert and asked us, rather loudly, if we were Americans. Immediately, out of the corner of my eye I noticed a middle-aged woman sitting on a bench look up, and a young guy dart out of a doorway and start walking our way. We took the hammer and chisel and started chipping at the wall while keeping an eye on the locals nearby, who suddenly seemed very interested in us. An older man standing close to the wall reached into his pocket and pulled out a lighter but did not light the cigarette hanging from his mouth, an obvious signal to other members of his surveillance team. When a German couple posing as tourists came up and asked us where we were from we recognized that they were obviously trying to recruit us to spy for the Eastern Bloc. But we were too clever, pretending that we were drunk and did not speak English, and meandered back to the train station with our chunk of the wall.
- papreclip 7y ago
  You sure they weren't all just thirsty for some free world dollars?

yabadabadoes 7y ago

A video call would be just as illegal. If he insisted on giving individual advice to NK instead of just publishing the same information then he needed to cease being a US person first.

sfttty 7y ago
Maybe I've become a very cynical person, but all the comments above seem very naive to me. He isn't a tourist and plays at the NK gov level. He doesn't care about the legal status of his actions. NK wants him to assist with money laundering on a very large scale and he probably wants something in return. Regular video calls with money transfers would be enough and way safer for him. So I'm asking the same question: what NK can possibly offer that can't be had in other countries and requires an in person visit?
- mattigames 7y ago
  My guess would be "Joy Division"[0], meaning women brainwashed (or forced) by the state to sexually satisfy high-ranking officials as well as occasionally distinguished guests. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kippumjo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kippumjo
  - sfttty 7y ago
    He could get this in any amounts and with more variety in the US, again without any risk. He went there for something else.
    - mattigames 7y ago
      Is not the same at all, the ones there can be virgins at request, there is no pedophilia laws, and in general the power dynamics are extremely different when done for money than for your life.
- nl 7y ago
  Ideology (in this case "crypto true-believer" ideology) is a very powerful motivator.