The DMZ

So yesterday I went on a tour of the DMZ.

Now before anyone freaks out on me, I just want to assure you that most tours of the DMZ don't actually go inside. They stay just outside the DMZ in the area called the Civilian Control Zone, which is comprised of little towns and stations where the South Koreans have opened to tourists. The closest I got to North Korea was a whole whopping 3 kilometers (1.86 miles) away and there was still a river, several barbed wire fences, and approximately 10 hidden landmines in between us.

We started our tour in a place called Imjingak, a little national park that is dedicated to war shrines and memorials of the Korean war. This was the first thing I saw when I got there....
I kid you not. There is also an amusement park a little down the road. Yay for tourism. Anyway, Imjingak is as far north as you can go in the country without permission. Tourists have to hand over their passports or alien registration cards when they want to do a tour. There are many things to see at Imjingak though. The most famous of these is Mangbaedan, a giant memorial altar. People whose families and relatives are still in North Korea worship at this altar for New Years and Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving). For many of them, it is the closest they will ever get to their families. You can also see the Freedom Bridge from here--a train bridge that was used to exchange prisoners after the Korean war. It is no longer in use, but they are hopeful that when reunification occurs it will become one of the main lines into the North.

We left Imjingak and went inside the Civilian Control Zone (still outside the DMZ remember). In the South Korean "peace town" of Daeseong-dong, there are around 400 people who reside there full time. They are exempt from paying taxes, and the young men are also exempt from the mandatory military service. People are no longer allowed to move in on their own; you have to marry into a family that resides there in order to live there. They have one elementary school there, but since foreigners can't reside inside the CCZ, they have a foreign teacher shipped in once a week to provide English lessons. After a quick traditional Korean lunch here, we headed out again towards the Third Tunnel.

The Third Tunnel is one of four discovered tunnels dug by the North Koreans in an attempt to infiltrate South Korea. Discovered in 1978, 10,000 armed soldiers could cross through the tunnel and be in Seoul in an hour. South Korea has opened the Tunnel for tourists, but after the 3oo meter descent into the tunnel and then the 435 meter trek through the tunnel (followed by 435 meters back the other way and then another 300 meters back to the surface), they should really start charging a gym membership fee or something.

Our next stop was the Dora Observatory. From here, you could look out over the North Korean side of the DMZ, including their own "peace village" Kijong-dong, which is really nothing more than a propaganda village pretending to be a representative of life in the North. The houses in Kijong-dong are painted once a year to make them look new and prosperous. The only people allowed to live there are North Korean soldiers and their families, and the people are even instructed not to go outside during certain times of day so they won't be seen. While we were there, we learned that the factories that we could see on the other side of the Demarcation Line were actually owned by South Koreans who had special permission to open factories in the north. All of the 40,000 workers are from North Korea, but since the owners are from the South, they can ship the goods back down to Seoul where people can actually afford to buy them. While we were there, we actually saw a convoy of trucks crossing on the road between the North and South side of the DMZ. The helpful national service soldier who was policing our photography told us that in order to build the road (which is 250 m wide and 4km long), they had to remove over 1700 landmines from the area. Yikes....

Our final stop was the Dorasan Station, the last train station between North and South Korea. Currently there is only one train that runs through the station--a freight train that brings manufactured goods from the factories in the North to Seoul and then brings raw materials and equipment for the factories to the North. It definitely has more of a ghost station feel than anything, given the distinct lack of people utilizing it. The hope is that someday when North and South Korea are reunified, Dorasan will be ready to serve as a station on the Trans Eurasian Line, connecting the Korean Peninsula with Russia and the rest of Europe.

All in all, the trip was definitely a good one. I might even do another one some time...when it isn't so disgustingly hot out. You should all definitely check out the photo dump site for a full view of the tour.

A note to American tourist traps: you fail. As cheesy as the DMZ tours are, I could still manage to get some decent souvenirs and 4 water bottles for under $10. Stop charging $3 for a bottle of water when its 95 degrees outside!