Billy LTL
01-21-2003, 05:56 AM
Every visitor to the country has a tale to tell. This one is amusing and informative.
http://travel.independent.co.uk/mideastandasia/southeastasia/story.jsp?story=875
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Fancy a round, Dear Leader?
It's the most exclusive golf course in the world. It has an army to protect it and to ensure that the weekend rush never consists of more than half a dozen players. Pyongyang is also the site of North Korea's most astounding sporting miracle
10 June 2000
I don't know who was more surprised, the caddie, the minder or myself. It was a pretty average tee shot, but a ricochet of applause had startled the birds from the trees. We were not alone after all. Waiting for us over the hill were dozens of Young Pioneers, beaming, red-scarved children, neatly lined up beside the green.
After holing out to my gallery's delight, I reached for a camera. At last, some interaction with the locals. Then came the minder's reminder - no photos of "ordinary people" please, nor at the next tee, thank you. That's a military installation in the background.
The most exclusive golf club on the planet is not Pebble Beach, Augusta or St Andrews. Protected by a million-strong land army, 50 years of international isolation, and a nuclear threat that keeps Asia on edge, the Pyongyang Golf Course offers a golfing experience like no other in the world.
The course record is pretty otherworldly, too. During his maiden round at North Korea's only golf facility, over 10 years ago, "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il opened with a hole in one, and required just 18 further strokes to finish the par 72 course. He only missed the ultimate scorecard by taking two at the par five 18th.
In the not-so-democratic People's Republic of Korea, nothing can be taken at face value. Half the news that escapes the hermit kingdom is hearsay, the rest mostly rumour. As a fan of golf and the bizarre, I longed to visit the scene of Kim's miracle. Granted a business visa last month, I seized the chance just ahead of the border's closure due to summit security paranoia.
The Soviet Empire has long disintegrated, China has embraced capitalism, and even Castro goes to Davos, but North Korea clings desperately to the Cold War and a personality cult that would make Chairman Mao blush. To snatch a peek at this people's paradise, you must leave your cell phone behind at customs - your disbelief, too - and don't even dream of internet access, for you are entering a truly alternative society.
With obligatory government minder in tow, we drove 40km from downtown Pyongyang past "shock brigades" of teenagers breaking rocks to build a motorway. On reaching Lake Thaesong, rumours about the course proved well-founded. The world's most hardline Stalinist state, recovering from four years of famine, really does boast a manicured shrine to one of sport's most capitalist pastimes.
At the club entrance, a wall of propaganda reminded players that "Generalissimo Kim Il Sung is the Sun of the 21st Century", before a wall-painting of the late Great Leader himself. At least he was there to greet us. My minder and I spent the next 15 minutes assaulting locked doors until we roused a caddie from her nap. The land of morning calm is an appropriate home for Asia's emptiest golf course. Bar the Young Pioneers, making good use of empty fairways, we were alone, under an hour from a city of two million.
Then again, the caddie praised me for avoiding the weekend rush - four players on Saturdays, and up to eight on Sundays. The identity of this select membership remains a mystery: a few top brass, some Chinese, and the Japanese Koreans who financed and built the course for their regular trips home, suitcases laden with yen for poor relatives.
One hopes the caddies are more alert next week. Whether or not the two Kims - Jong Il and Dae-jung - lock putters at the first presidential talks between North and South, Pyongyang will also welcome 50 Korean-American professionals from 12 June to its first golf tournament featuring foreigners. Just as "ping-pong diplomacy" paved the way for Sino-US talks in the 1970s, perhaps golf may help to bridge the divisions of half a century.
The visitors will find the verdant course, rich in cherry trees and forsythia, a world away from monumentalist Pyongyang. Given the privations of the nation at large, course maintenance is remarkable. Those paths are not worn by golfers, but herds of goats, locals hunting firewood or edible roots, and the occasional wandering soldier. Compared to the revolutionary sites that fill most itineraries, a round here is as apolitical as North Korea gets - caddies actually conceal the ubiquitous Kim Il Sung badge that otherwise beams from every breast.
There is no such restraint on the streets of Pyongyang. The elder Kim may have died in 1994, but the personality cults of father and son are going strong. All foreign visitors are expected to bow before gargantuan Kim statues. Instead of advertising, billboards shout their slogans. Their solemn portraits adorn every home, office, and metro car. Graffiti is an unknown art. The media gushes news of Kimilsungia and Kimjongilia flower festivals, celebrating the orchid and begonia, blooms which are honoured above all others.
This is not the year 2000. It is Juche 89. The Georgian calendar has been replaced by the Juche Era, which began in 1912, the year of Kim Senior's birth, and is deemed to be the era of ideological self-reliance. In recent years, self-reliance has been a virtue born more of necessity, after "Judas" Gorbachev sold out the socialist cause and with it most of North Korea's trading partners.
Perhaps only Bhutan can rival Pyongyang's determined isolation. Yet where Bhutan has the Himalayas to keep foreign influence at bay, North Korea has developed a regime of fear of the outside world, more effective than any embargo.
"This should be a rich country," an exasperated Chinese visitor told me. "If it only reformed the economy like we did, North Korea could overtake the South in 10 years. But the leaders are terrified of change."
They now appear to accept that revolutionary enthusiasm alone will not resolve the frequent blackouts and restock empty shops. Peasants are permitted sideline incomes from private farming, and investment from the South is rising. Furthermore, biscuit stalls are flourishing on street corners.
"They are run by neighbourhood collectives," insisted my guide, but it's business basics at work here, in the form of cash, and not the government coupons that buy most commodities in this rent-free, tax-free land.
By North Korean standards, Juche 89 has witnessed a flurry of activity. Italy and Australia have established diplomatic relations, South Korea secured the summit, and Kim Jong Il stole into Peking last week on his first trip abroad for 17 years. Even golf is playing its part - if the tournament is a success, more facilities may be built, and travel restrictions eased, to attract foreign wallets. A nine-hole pitch and putt will soon open at Pyongyang's top hotel, to complement an excellent driving range. Again, I was alone on the range, in perhaps the only Asian capital bereft of executives honing their swings.
The changes underway raise intriguing questions for the day the barbed-wire finally comes down.
What will become of Korea Pictorial's pin-up Myong Kum Sun, world record-holding grenade-thrower, when baseball moguls chase her lethal arm? How will a people raised on anti-imperialism and paranoia react to Japanese and Americans firing off Nikons at will?
While the American military presence in the south remains the key obstacle to reunification, one is tempted to suggest Clinton withdraws his troops, and relies solely on "culture" to show his strength. Forget the marines - let Mickey Mouse tear down half a century of propaganda, while McDonalds and Starbucks bring litter and latte to pristine Pyongyang.
North Korea might well be golf's frontline. But it shouldn't be confused with the real thing: the Demilitarised Zone to the south of Pyongyang. Two million North and South Korean soldiers - not to mention 37,000 Americans - face-off across the world's most infamous map reference. It remains the Cold War's most disturbing relic.
The Panmunjom exhibition here details how the US and South Korea precipitated the Korean War by invading the North. "Do you believe me?" smiled my affable soldier-guide. "This must be different from what you have been taught."
The local proverb "seeing is believing" goes some way to explaining why the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) bothers granting any of its meagre 1,500 tourist visas issued annually to Western travellers - you join an unusual club when you've got Pyongyang on your scorecard of world courses. English-speaking guides, friendly even when prohibiting photography, stuff visitors with kimchi (a potent fermented cabbage drink) and statistics. Proud of their land's survival against the odds, they want you too to believe.
I did my best until I discovered Casino Pyongyang and refused to believe my eyes. If golf is deemed to be decadent, gambling is downright immoral. And yet Asian card-sharps were risking hundreds of dollars inside the capital's top hotel. Finally, a Chinese croupier allayed my anxiety. He and fellow graduates from Dandong were imported across the Yalu river last October to serve rising numbers of Chinese tourists. Kim Jong Il still keeps his citizens on the straight and narrow. North Koreans are forbidden entry.
After five days in the people's paradise, I had found no witnesses to corroborate the Dear Leader's golfing miracle. But just the thought of it inspired my own record score: only 72 more strokes than Kim needed to get round the course. The seven million family members separated in the two Koreas are praying for another, more meaningful miracle next week. Pyongyang may not remain Asia's emptiest golf course for long.
http://travel.independent.co.uk/mideastandasia/southeastasia/story.jsp?story=875
-------------------------------------------------
Fancy a round, Dear Leader?
It's the most exclusive golf course in the world. It has an army to protect it and to ensure that the weekend rush never consists of more than half a dozen players. Pyongyang is also the site of North Korea's most astounding sporting miracle
10 June 2000
I don't know who was more surprised, the caddie, the minder or myself. It was a pretty average tee shot, but a ricochet of applause had startled the birds from the trees. We were not alone after all. Waiting for us over the hill were dozens of Young Pioneers, beaming, red-scarved children, neatly lined up beside the green.
After holing out to my gallery's delight, I reached for a camera. At last, some interaction with the locals. Then came the minder's reminder - no photos of "ordinary people" please, nor at the next tee, thank you. That's a military installation in the background.
The most exclusive golf club on the planet is not Pebble Beach, Augusta or St Andrews. Protected by a million-strong land army, 50 years of international isolation, and a nuclear threat that keeps Asia on edge, the Pyongyang Golf Course offers a golfing experience like no other in the world.
The course record is pretty otherworldly, too. During his maiden round at North Korea's only golf facility, over 10 years ago, "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il opened with a hole in one, and required just 18 further strokes to finish the par 72 course. He only missed the ultimate scorecard by taking two at the par five 18th.
In the not-so-democratic People's Republic of Korea, nothing can be taken at face value. Half the news that escapes the hermit kingdom is hearsay, the rest mostly rumour. As a fan of golf and the bizarre, I longed to visit the scene of Kim's miracle. Granted a business visa last month, I seized the chance just ahead of the border's closure due to summit security paranoia.
The Soviet Empire has long disintegrated, China has embraced capitalism, and even Castro goes to Davos, but North Korea clings desperately to the Cold War and a personality cult that would make Chairman Mao blush. To snatch a peek at this people's paradise, you must leave your cell phone behind at customs - your disbelief, too - and don't even dream of internet access, for you are entering a truly alternative society.
With obligatory government minder in tow, we drove 40km from downtown Pyongyang past "shock brigades" of teenagers breaking rocks to build a motorway. On reaching Lake Thaesong, rumours about the course proved well-founded. The world's most hardline Stalinist state, recovering from four years of famine, really does boast a manicured shrine to one of sport's most capitalist pastimes.
At the club entrance, a wall of propaganda reminded players that "Generalissimo Kim Il Sung is the Sun of the 21st Century", before a wall-painting of the late Great Leader himself. At least he was there to greet us. My minder and I spent the next 15 minutes assaulting locked doors until we roused a caddie from her nap. The land of morning calm is an appropriate home for Asia's emptiest golf course. Bar the Young Pioneers, making good use of empty fairways, we were alone, under an hour from a city of two million.
Then again, the caddie praised me for avoiding the weekend rush - four players on Saturdays, and up to eight on Sundays. The identity of this select membership remains a mystery: a few top brass, some Chinese, and the Japanese Koreans who financed and built the course for their regular trips home, suitcases laden with yen for poor relatives.
One hopes the caddies are more alert next week. Whether or not the two Kims - Jong Il and Dae-jung - lock putters at the first presidential talks between North and South, Pyongyang will also welcome 50 Korean-American professionals from 12 June to its first golf tournament featuring foreigners. Just as "ping-pong diplomacy" paved the way for Sino-US talks in the 1970s, perhaps golf may help to bridge the divisions of half a century.
The visitors will find the verdant course, rich in cherry trees and forsythia, a world away from monumentalist Pyongyang. Given the privations of the nation at large, course maintenance is remarkable. Those paths are not worn by golfers, but herds of goats, locals hunting firewood or edible roots, and the occasional wandering soldier. Compared to the revolutionary sites that fill most itineraries, a round here is as apolitical as North Korea gets - caddies actually conceal the ubiquitous Kim Il Sung badge that otherwise beams from every breast.
There is no such restraint on the streets of Pyongyang. The elder Kim may have died in 1994, but the personality cults of father and son are going strong. All foreign visitors are expected to bow before gargantuan Kim statues. Instead of advertising, billboards shout their slogans. Their solemn portraits adorn every home, office, and metro car. Graffiti is an unknown art. The media gushes news of Kimilsungia and Kimjongilia flower festivals, celebrating the orchid and begonia, blooms which are honoured above all others.
This is not the year 2000. It is Juche 89. The Georgian calendar has been replaced by the Juche Era, which began in 1912, the year of Kim Senior's birth, and is deemed to be the era of ideological self-reliance. In recent years, self-reliance has been a virtue born more of necessity, after "Judas" Gorbachev sold out the socialist cause and with it most of North Korea's trading partners.
Perhaps only Bhutan can rival Pyongyang's determined isolation. Yet where Bhutan has the Himalayas to keep foreign influence at bay, North Korea has developed a regime of fear of the outside world, more effective than any embargo.
"This should be a rich country," an exasperated Chinese visitor told me. "If it only reformed the economy like we did, North Korea could overtake the South in 10 years. But the leaders are terrified of change."
They now appear to accept that revolutionary enthusiasm alone will not resolve the frequent blackouts and restock empty shops. Peasants are permitted sideline incomes from private farming, and investment from the South is rising. Furthermore, biscuit stalls are flourishing on street corners.
"They are run by neighbourhood collectives," insisted my guide, but it's business basics at work here, in the form of cash, and not the government coupons that buy most commodities in this rent-free, tax-free land.
By North Korean standards, Juche 89 has witnessed a flurry of activity. Italy and Australia have established diplomatic relations, South Korea secured the summit, and Kim Jong Il stole into Peking last week on his first trip abroad for 17 years. Even golf is playing its part - if the tournament is a success, more facilities may be built, and travel restrictions eased, to attract foreign wallets. A nine-hole pitch and putt will soon open at Pyongyang's top hotel, to complement an excellent driving range. Again, I was alone on the range, in perhaps the only Asian capital bereft of executives honing their swings.
The changes underway raise intriguing questions for the day the barbed-wire finally comes down.
What will become of Korea Pictorial's pin-up Myong Kum Sun, world record-holding grenade-thrower, when baseball moguls chase her lethal arm? How will a people raised on anti-imperialism and paranoia react to Japanese and Americans firing off Nikons at will?
While the American military presence in the south remains the key obstacle to reunification, one is tempted to suggest Clinton withdraws his troops, and relies solely on "culture" to show his strength. Forget the marines - let Mickey Mouse tear down half a century of propaganda, while McDonalds and Starbucks bring litter and latte to pristine Pyongyang.
North Korea might well be golf's frontline. But it shouldn't be confused with the real thing: the Demilitarised Zone to the south of Pyongyang. Two million North and South Korean soldiers - not to mention 37,000 Americans - face-off across the world's most infamous map reference. It remains the Cold War's most disturbing relic.
The Panmunjom exhibition here details how the US and South Korea precipitated the Korean War by invading the North. "Do you believe me?" smiled my affable soldier-guide. "This must be different from what you have been taught."
The local proverb "seeing is believing" goes some way to explaining why the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) bothers granting any of its meagre 1,500 tourist visas issued annually to Western travellers - you join an unusual club when you've got Pyongyang on your scorecard of world courses. English-speaking guides, friendly even when prohibiting photography, stuff visitors with kimchi (a potent fermented cabbage drink) and statistics. Proud of their land's survival against the odds, they want you too to believe.
I did my best until I discovered Casino Pyongyang and refused to believe my eyes. If golf is deemed to be decadent, gambling is downright immoral. And yet Asian card-sharps were risking hundreds of dollars inside the capital's top hotel. Finally, a Chinese croupier allayed my anxiety. He and fellow graduates from Dandong were imported across the Yalu river last October to serve rising numbers of Chinese tourists. Kim Jong Il still keeps his citizens on the straight and narrow. North Koreans are forbidden entry.
After five days in the people's paradise, I had found no witnesses to corroborate the Dear Leader's golfing miracle. But just the thought of it inspired my own record score: only 72 more strokes than Kim needed to get round the course. The seven million family members separated in the two Koreas are praying for another, more meaningful miracle next week. Pyongyang may not remain Asia's emptiest golf course for long.