With the death of Kim Jong-Il, North Korea and China watchers have been engaged in some pretty intense Kremlinology, trying to make sense of elite politics in Pyongyang. But what do ordinary people living along the North Korean border think of the changes taking place inside their communist neighbor?
I took a trip to Dandong, a small Chinese port town on the North Korean border, to try a get a more bottom-up perspective on the hermit kingdom.
What struck me most was the sympathetic view many in Dandong took towards their neighbor. In Beijing, the standard reaction to questions about North Korea is pretty similar to the West: “They’re crazy” (tamen feng le), it’s hard to imagine life there.”
These kinds of responses are far less common in Dandong, whose residents can clearly see North Korea across the Yalu River and many of whom have been across the river to do business. Far more people told me things like “they’re really poor” and “they’re less developed than us.”
For many of the older residents of Dandong, looking across the river was like looking back into China’s past. One old man pointed to the desolate North Korean skyline in front of us, punctuated by only a few disheveled factory chimneys, and contrasted it with the high-rise buildings behind us in Dandong. “China was like that 30 years ago. Without reform and opening we’d still be like that now: poor and backwards.” For him, like most of China’s residents, China’s economic transformation over the past three decades has brought huge improvements to his standard of living, and China’s Maoist past is something he's glad the country has moved on from.
Not all of Dandong’s residents shared this positive perspective, however. Dandong has its share of losers from the reform process and, for them, looking over at North Korea provides a chance to reminisce about better times. One elderly woman who makes her living peddling North Korean cigarettes and postage stamps brought back by Chinese doing business across the border told me: “In North Korea, everyone’s poor, but everyone is equal. Here, the rich are too rich and the poor are too poor.” The woman, who used to work in a state-owned textiles factory looks back at China’s Maoist years with both longing and affection. In those days, she enjoyed a stable income and a guaranteed job. After being laid off in the economic reforms of the 1990s, however, she’s been struggling to live, unable to find a full-time job with her limited education. I asked her whether she thinks the North’s system is better than China’s. After a long pause, she told me “that’s right.”
For those with the ability to take advantage of it, however, North Korea presents an economic opportunity. Quite separate from government aid and trade across the North Korean border, there's a roaring trade across the border that has nothing to do with the governments. “We do all kinds of business with them,” one man told me; “anything they need, we can get it to them.” A woman who owns a shop selling TV satellite dishes in Dandong told me: “Wholesalers come here and buy dishes to sell across the border. They’ve got lots of customers. Some of them are for foreigners doing business there, and some of them are for North Koreans who have money” Business hasn’t been interrupted so far, she told me. “It’s too early to tell. We’ll know over the next year if Kim Jong-Il’s death with make any difference. For now, it’s business as usual.”
Nor did Kim Jong-il’s death or the freezing cold weather seem to have made any difference to the informal tourism business conducted on the border. There are numerous boats offering tours of the riverbank and many who offer travel services to North Korea. One woman approached me at the bank of the Yalu river and offered to take me across for 1,000 Yuan: “We take you across to the other bank, you can look round for a while, and then we’ll bring you back. No problem.” I politely declined the offer.
Young people in Dandong take an altogether different perspective. For many of them, interacting with North Korea is a way of escaping the boredom of small-town life. One 27-year-old taxi driver told me that in the summer, he and his friends visit a part of the border where the two countries are separated only by a small stream. “We take lumps of North Korean money or loaves of bread and throw them across the steam. Then we wait for the North Korean guards to come along, hop across and take photos with them. They don’t mind because they want the money, but it’s really exciting because – you know – their guns are real!”
One 22-year-old student and part-time tour guide told me that she and her friends think it’s fun to rent one of the numerous small boats that offer to take people of river tours of the border and throw pens or even paper cups for North Koreans living across the border: “It’s so funny, they’re so happy with the stuff we throw to them.”
As life goes on in Dandong, however, people aren't oblivious to the geo-political implications of China’s relationship with North Korea. I asked one shopkeeper in Dandong who sells trinkets from North Korea if there had been any change to his business after Kim Jong-il’s death. “There’s been no change yet, and there won’t be any change because China won’t allow any change.” He then asked me where I was from and I told him I’m from the United Kingdon. “There, you see,” he replied. “If we let them collapse, the Americans, you, and the Japanese will be on our border trying to interfere in our politics. They’re our friend and they’re a good friend. There won’t be any change for now.”
Peter Martin works for a political consulting firm in Beijing.
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applesauce
its quite sad really, throwing money across he boarder then taking pictures with the guards who show up, its like going to a petting zoo. its like the author says their government is crazy but the ordinary folks are just sad to look at. well, in the end, their bad government and the realities of the world when your stuck between the biggest powers on earth takes precedence.
PeterDownUnder
Very good article, good journalism.
The real life stories of how Dandong residents throw trinkets and money across the border for cheap thrills was really insightful for what the realities are for the majority of people living in North Korea.
And even the Chinese know that it is their government that is not allowing change in the North.
gngottawa
What would have really elevated this article would have been interviews with North Korean refugees in Dandong–what their life is like, what prospects they face, what they feel. They, not these Chinese spectators, are the real stakeholders in these geopolitics.
Godknows
If U.S. is willing to building a peaceful and progressive Korea Peninsula, instead of pursuing absolute military dominance, N.K. problem will be solved comparatively easy.
However, with over pressure over the area, it seems quite impossible to make any change to be happened in N.K. It’s really necessary to urge American government to draw their military back from S.K.
China may not have the decisive power to change N.K., it’s U.S.’ decision, just draw back the military like what has done in Iraq.
PeterDownUnder
Through studying history and international relations. It is just mind blowing to realise
how much of our current world problems, the fate of so many smaller nations are dictated and due to the ‘interests’ of great powers.
For example the little country of Korea was colonised, divided and remains divided to this day due to the interests of other great powers.
Kim Il Sung for example just happened to be the right guy and the right time. He couldn’t even speak Korean properly and needed training from Soviet speech writers, he only had 8 years of formal education and all of it in Chinese. But he did learn from the best in being a dictator from Stalin. He learnt how to strengthen his power in his country and how to blackmail and bluff his way on the international stage.
Stories like these can be found in every country especially the smaller ones.
Clarence
What the U.S. is really doing on the peninsula is hard to tell. Perhaps the U.S. looks upon the Korean Peninsula and sees one of the divided sides as a potential friendly place for the U.S. and the other side as a potential antagonistic place and part of the intentions of the U.S. is to eventually balance things out. You see, if the anit-U.S. movement in the South grows, the U.S. can increase its friendly approach to the North. For its part, the North can say let us unify the peninsula and once that is done, we’re all yours with we (the North) at the top of the peneninsula’s politics, which is far from unified in the south right now.
John
Wow, the lady thinks that everyone being equally desolate and poverty stricken with no hope of relief is better than being poor with the opportunity to improve your situation. Talk about being self-centered and out of touch with reality.
Great article, from a viewpoint rarely seen.
jasonline
Yeah but remember it was an old lady with limited education. She’s at the end of her life with little hope of ever improving her situation.
The massive amount of elderly china has are the real losers. No pension for them, no kids to take care of them in old age.
shen liang
@John
Yes, I do think one can see more than a bit of selfishness in that comment. And I think it is a peculiar kind of selfishness that is widespread in China. I’m not sure if it’s a result of communism and/or just a special form of callousness towards the lives of others. One thing is for sure: Communism certainly benefited from this attitude.
John Chan
@John,
China turned to capitalism to benefit the greedy Westpac nations at the expenses of large amount of Chinese. The greedy Westpac not only does not appreciate the scarifies the Chinese made like that old lady for them, they hate China not supporting their undeserving living standard for free.
A roof over the head and some square meals everyday are the basic needs for all human beings, that old lady has lost those basic guarantees due to the capitalism and the subsiding the ungrateful Wesstpac nations; you not only didn’t show sympathy for her misfortune, you also lashed out at her demise, where is your humanity and decency?
The comments from you, jasonline and shen liang reflect the people form the Westpac are heartless and compassionless, it is a sad joke for the Westpac claiming they are democratic, and care human rights.
shen liang
@John Chan
Wait…I though China turned to capitalism to pull hundreds of millions out of poverty!
And I thought China was free and independent, as opposed to “Westpac’s lackeys”!
Someone is flipping a little too rapidly through the book of apologia.
shen liang
Thanks for this article. I know people who have been on these condescension tours (think about it: there aren’t enough cultural differences, considering the Maoist impact, or historical/natural sites to make the trip really good for anything else)of North Korea, and I have to say I find them rather sick, both the tours and the tourists. I fully agree with the man at the end of your article, but I don’t think he is representative of Chinese attitudes toward the government’s North Korea policy, let alone the idea that China is largely responsible for the nuclearization of the Korean peninsula and the ongoing despotism of North Korea’s rulers. For the most part, Chinese people remain willfully ignorant of our role in oppressing the North Korean people. And we would desperately avoid facing the brutal fact that China gives North Korean refugees back to the North Korean government to be tortured. This is just an unimaginable level of injustice.
But what tops it all off are these damn tours. In fact, it is not unlike British people traveling to Ireland in the 19th Century just to see how everyone is starving, and then expressing with amazement but little sympathy: “They are just like we were 50 years ago!” Shame.
John Chan
@shen liang,
You let your diehard ideology mislead your humanity that is to help people in need regardless where they are. Those tourists are at least helping some North Koreans no matter how meagre and the format are. North Korean might be a lot more approachable if the Westpac is not so hostile to them by full of mindless ideological bigots who get their stomachs filled and no other meaningful things to do.
Japan just sent 3 North Koreans back to North Korea on the 9th January 2012.
PeterDownUnder
Japan just sent back those North Koreans found off a Japanese island due to an agreement with the Chinese government…Look it up…
shen liang
@John Chan
Unfortunately, John Chan, you always try to accuse people who show basic humanity of practicing “ideology”. I suppose because this term is commonly used in Chinese government clap-trap in its positive support of “ideological education”.
Yes, those tourists are paying some North Koreans (with government connections) to look down on all North Koreans. That’s very humane. Horrible North Korean living conditions are the main attractions in this sordid and perverse engagement.
And “Westpac” isn’t hostile. The Americans gave North Korea $600 million in food during the 90s to alleviate the famine.
As to Japan, do you have a source to share with us? If Japan actually sent back 3 North Korean refugees, as opposed to North Korean generals and connected money launderers, I’d certainly be disgusted with Japan. But that would only serve to underscore just how morally wretched China sending back hundreds of innocent victims to the North Korean torturers has been.
Ray
I go to North Korea each year on tours and I never thought of it as “looking down” on the people. I am trying to understand the plight of the people and the nature of changes in the society. I do not see it as a zoo at all. This is a major point of political tension in the world and a fascinating isolated society.
Want a zoo? Go to WalMart in the states. That is a zoo.
shen liang
@Ray
I’m glad at least one of the tourists is doing research, but your strange transition of Walmart makes me suspect you are simply being mischievous here. So what have you learned about the plight, as you say, of the North Koreans? Did you tell your handlers you were investigating their plight?
Spectator
What an interesting article. And Peter Martin is such a handsome man!
Jazz Bellow
Best view of Dandong from bottom up. Old cigarette sales woman made very perspicacious remark to persnickety political question by reporter who ask her if she thought North better living standard better than China… she say “That’s right.” Woman not so dumb to fall for tricky question. Practical reality is the best education.
Kerry Ballard
I am a westerner who lived in Korea in the 1970s. I learned to speak Korean and lived with normal families – not in some expat or military community. I continued to do business in Asia and have worked with Chinese factories since the late 1980s. I have not been to North Korea but have done business in Chinese provinces with large Korean minorities.
Most Chinese have better lives under the system initiated by Deng Xiaoping. The changes to Chinese society have been massive. When I first went to China, it was like dropping into pre-1970s Korea but without ANY wealth. In the past few decades, China has pulled a significant portion of its society out of poverty while the North Koreans have not. China has opened to allow development and cooperation with the western world and North Korea has not. North Korea has locked itself in a 1950s mindset and the world has moved on. The truth of what the outside world is really like would be society altering to North Koreans if they were suddenly allowed to see beyond their borders.
The greatest threat to the present leaders in North Korea is not South Koreans or the US; it is the wealthy and well-fed Chinese across the border. The North Koreans may not be able to see over the horizon to see the success and prosperity of Japan or America and they cannot cross the DMZ to see the success of South Korea. The North Korean leadership cannot forever hide the fact that China is becoming successful and when the North Korean people finally understand the lies and corruption that have caused them to suffer and starve they will finally eliminate their leaders. China (and Japan and Russia and the US) needs North Korea to make the transition from a cold war relic to whatever is next without an explosion.
PatrickT
Yes! Excellent journalism. Thanks for avoiding rehashing what little everyone already knows, or speculating idly. I want to go to dandong, smoke nk cigs and toss bread to those in a real rough place.