“In the West, I guess you’d call it corruption. In North Korea, it was just standard operating procedure.” — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“Kim Jong-il’s hold on power was tenuous at best. After the death of Kim Il-sung, the leading members of the party changed… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“Oddly enough, I never heard him complain about or blame the political system of North Korea. I finally realized that he’d never… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“The Yalu River separates China and North Korea. A lot of people cross over it, and even more try to. Bizarrely, some… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“Ever since setting foot in North Korea more than thirty years before, I’d known nothing but hunger. Everyone had been halfway to… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“Those grotesque displays of schoolgirls—automata wheeled out in Pyongyang to celebrate the birthday of the Dear Leader or some other such dismal… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“Oddly enough, I never heard him complain about or blame the political system of North Korea. I finally realized that he’d never… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“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… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“My father, however, seemed quite content with our new life. He never hit my mother. He started working as an agricultural laborer… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“This is the year of agriculture,” he announced in 1992. “The nation must realize the people’s century-long dream to eat white rice… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“People came to our house from far and wide. Party and military bigwigs, some guy known as the “combat commander,” the village headman, and… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“This was laughable, of course, but that’s always the way with totalitarian regimes. Language gets turned on its head. Serfdom is freedom. Repression is… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“I was amazed we’d got through the checkpoint so easily. I couldn’t help asking about it. “Well, these soldiers, you see . . .… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“My family was poor, but my childhood days in Mizonokuchi were the happiest of my life. Even now, when I think about my hometown,… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“People ridiculed me. “What on earth are you doing?” they asked. “Why are you working so hard?” They didn’t understand that driving that tractor… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“I mean, this was the second half of the twentieth century, for pity’s sake, and they still saw communism as the road to utopia.” — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“But the reality hit home late that night. I had a wife. And now two children. And however hard I worked, I would always… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“So we became masters at faking it. Everyone did. To do anything else could have gotten us killed.” — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“I still hope to rescue my remaining children. It is a terrible curse to not even know if they are still alive. But I… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“But that’s the trouble with propaganda. It constantly contradicts itself.” — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“The consul was at a loss for words the first time he set eyes on me. “My God! How could they treat you like… — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
“We were nothing but a bunch of ravenous ghosts. The barely living dead.” — Masaji Ishikawa Copy Share Image
