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Nothing To Envy
2016/11/09 12:01:33瀏覽199|回應0|推薦5

North Korea suffered two tragedies. The first one was the split of the Korean peninsula at the end of WWII. Stalin installing a like-minded dictator at its helm, Kim Il-sung. The latter eradicates religion and replaces it by his own cult of personality. In achieving a God status in his country, he bests Stalin, Hitler and Fidel Castro. Upon his death in the early nineties, many North Koreans will commit suicides. And, North Koreans will believe (through intense political propaganda) that if they cry enough Kim Il-sung will come back from the dead. The son of Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-il will succeed him as a son of God.

North Korea's second tragedy was the collapse of the Soviet Union. When the latter collapsed it interrupted its assistance in food and oil. North Korea did not have enough fuel on its own to maintain its electrical grid. On the first page of the first chapter you see a picture of the Korean peninsula at night. South Korea is full of bright spots (urban areas lit by electricity). But, North Korea is pitch dark! In the post Soviet Union era, North Korea suffers shortages of electricity, running water, and food. Millions have already died of starvation. People are not paid. 

Dr. Kim is a medical doctor, devoted to the Workers party; Mrs. Song is a wife forced to find any way she can to feed her family, including daughter Oak-Hee in increasingly dismal times; Kim Hyuck is a boy whose father gave him to a state orphanage rather than have a son he couldn't support; Jun-Sang and Mi-Ran are secretly boyfriend and girlfriend, each with private reservations about, and struggles with, North Korea that remain private for fear of governmental repurcussions. Through these tales, we are able to glimpse life in a nation gone horribly wrong, where selling anything privately or insulting the Workers Psrty can land you years of time in prison or a labor camp, where emaciated children sing songs extolling North Korea, and one's station in life is dictated by how loyal one's family has been to "the Party."

 

Liberty or death?  DPRK is pitch dark! In the post Soviet Union era, North Korea suffers shortages of electricity, running water, and food. Millions have already died of starvation. People are not paid. They are compensated by food rations. But, if you don't work you don't eat. The ones who don't receive food attempt to survive by milling bark, grasses, shrubs, leaves.

 

Wrong thought bring more tragedy. Follow Stalin, split Korea, lost the power of life and living. So many people have been snuffed out in the North Korean famine. All the defectors try to run away from North Korea and deal a new life in South Korea.

From the satellite photograph, North Korea is a black spot, fell out of the world. Seems nothing existence.

 

Nothing to envy is the icon of North Korea, nothing is impossible is the icon of South Korea. A chance to cherish what we own the liberty and freedom is a gift.

 

相關閱讀:

https://www.amazon.com/Nothing-Envy-Ordinary-Lives-North/dp/0385523912

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6178648-nothing-to-envy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJnHend_pLY

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