Never Pictured North Korea to Look Like This..

[BayCityProgressive]

http://www.michaeljennings.de/images/citylr/index.htm

I was a little surprised. I thought it would be much more grungy looking. I wonder what is really going on this country. We hear so much about it..but few people have ever been there. I have heard people from the country say they like it and others that hate it. Is this like Cuba..there are two sides to the story? It just seems like there is something way out of wack with this country. I wonder what that huge explosion was a few months back. That dropped completely off the news radar. I personally think it was an assasination attempt. I do feel for the peopel in a historical sense considering the US bombed every building more than 1 story high in that country.

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. Notice that there are no trees....

Sad place from what I've read.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

2. It has massive problems with famine in the countryside

It makes Cuba look far more favorable in comparison.

[billbuckhead]

5. All totalitarian communist countries starve their rural populations

at some points. * would have done it if he was dear leader during our depression.

[951]

3. Wow those buildings look so dirty and abandoned

[Don Claybrook]

4. Stark, Spartan, Martial

Those are the descriptions that came to mind as I flipped through the 8 pages of photos. They were fascinating, to be sure--thanks for the link.

The main difference I see with respect to Cuba is that all I need to do for a different perspective of Cuba is to read something that wasn't originated by the US government. By most other accounts, Cuba isn't such a bad place, though they have their problems too.

North Korea, on the other hand, is described as insular and having paranoid leadership, and this description seems to hold no matter where it comes from.

[billbuckhead]

7. Albert Speer looking architecture comes to mind.

Cuba's great if you have dollars-euros-etc.

[pretzel4gore]

9. what would america be like w/out dollars or euros etc?

dirt poor and desperate maybe, like in great depression

[in_cog_ni_to]

Notice the smog/pollution?

That is what the chimp wants this country to be like. That country looks very depressing. Old and gray. :(

[alexisfree]

6. Wow !

[Sterling]

8. Does not "look" so bad to me?

But I am not a fan of American Mall style building. I am sure it sucks to live there since they they have so little money and food but I won't buy into the RW propaganda about it either.

[Selatius]

10. A government ministry?

Weren't the ministries in Orwell's 1984 pyramidal shaped or something like that?

[Aidoneus]

11. Nice pics, thanks

Kudos to the Led Zeppelin 4 tribute on the 2nd page.

[LastDemocratInSC]

12. A silent city

About 2 years ago I read an article (cannot recall the source, will try to find) by a reporter who asked for and, surprisingly, received permission to travel to Pyongyang. His official minder was a lady who, whenever the reporter asked an undesirable question, would respond by saying "We'll discuss that issue with you later".

The reporter said he was taken, at midday, to a tall building overlooking the core of the capital city. His host's intention was for the reporter to photograph the city and note its scale. From that height he was struck, instead, by the silence. He didn't hear a thing - none of the sounds one would expect from a city of that size. He then realized that he also saw no movement at all - no cars or trucks or pedestrians.

This was in a major magazine a year or so ago ... perhaps someone else remembers?

[tlcandie]

13. In one picture I noticed what looked like children

and adults working on the exterior of a building with like a courtyard of degraded buildings.

I noticed there were few cars with LOTS of people walking.

One picture showed balconies that had NO plants on them like in the US! You see TONS of plants on balconies, but then it could have been winter as well. Some of the photos showed coats on the people.

A number of buildings were squares with courtyards which had really degraded buildings inside them.

The smog looked like the haze you see in Seattle some days. The closer you get to downtown the worse. Sometimes it's just a higher level haze all white.

In the picture with all the people walking to work(?), there were no women dressed to the nines in heels and dresses with hosiery, jewelry, etc. There could have been, but it was hard to see from what few women were there. Most looked like what people refer to as dowdy.

EDIT: Oh, and no groups of people standing around talking, drinking coffees, chatting, etc.

OH and where are the children playing, skate boarding, etc?!?! I saw no children except in the one picture I referred to above.

[kwyjibo]

14. it looks very boring and uninspiring

It must be hard for creative people to live there.. although maybe not, you work with what you have. I'd like to see some art from that city.

[troubleinwinter]

15. Here is a picture from a satellite at night.

It is very telling. Compare the city lights of South Korea and North Korea.

The city photos you see are not showing the starvation and poverty in the countryside.

I was in Beijing, China a year ago, when South Korea closed their Beijing Embassy, due to hoards of refugees from No. Korea that they simply couldn't handle.

[bobbyboucher]

16. Where are all the people? The place is a ghost town.

There were literally no poeple in those pictures. The city looks quite big but where the hell is everybody? Sure there were a few here and there, but not nearly enough. Were these pictures taken at dawn or something?

That was weird. Things might be worse over there than ever imagined.