Pyongyang Style
1 year ago
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5. Pyongyang Style
1 year ago
I was lucky enough to interact with a North Korean, and film it!
Spending time with the hairdresser, Kim Hye-Sun was unlike spending time with any of the usual North Koreans you get to meet. She was charming and quirky. For the first time, I felt like I was seeing something real, that wasn't shown to me.
stevegongphoto.com
stevegong.wordpress.com
stevegongphoto@gmail.com
Spending time with the hairdresser, Kim Hye-Sun was unlike spending time with any of the usual North Koreans you get to meet. She was charming and quirky. For the first time, I felt like I was seeing something real, that wasn't shown to me.
stevegongphoto.com
stevegong.wordpress.com
stevegongphoto@gmail.com
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It seems there like it was in '70-'80 former communists countries. Creepy....:( Really, poor, poor people.
And btw just imagine sudden opening of the borders, and those greedy capitalists/sex tourists flying there like flies to the s**t. I don´t know what is better.... There´s no real freedom in this world.
I certainly don't think anything was portrayed in a necessarily bad way, so I'm pretty sure she's okay.
Funny thing is, some people, especially in South Korea, are claiming that this was pro North Korea propaganda, even though I had no intention for it to be political in any way.
Very good video, shows us something different... what is better, their reality or ours?? Are we "free"?
I guess that you are a tourist from China or Japan, wouldn't you got search the hell out before getting the country for device like that?
Tags:Canon 5D Mark II
Nothing wrong to bring in SLRs as tourist I suppose.
Every moves are controlled by minders and tour guides so that tourists/internship people won't get to see the dark side of life.
Thus the confidence of regime to let cameras in.
@mirogster
hidden cameras cannot achieve depth of field in this video.
It looks exactly like my country used to look before the switch of regime....
Im from Albania,in case you are wondering....
It might help to add subtitles. Many Korean friends would happily add that for you.
"Bravo" from France.
Tobias Lepke writes: "Sad thing is, that lady will probably get harassed by the govt now." And it could be much worse than just "harrassed"...
I lived in Beijing for 6 Months and LOVED it! Can't even imagine what North Korea would be like though...
Apparently the Northern border to China is not always patrolled so Chinese can wander in and out of North Korea! Chinese friends wanted to go but I'm Half Chinese and Half American and a few other friends weren't Chinese either so that wouldn't have been a very safe thing to do...
I completely agree with you. Evil bastards from all over the world would come into the country and mess things up.
It was as though "at any moment things could go very bad real fast", for somebody.
Maybe I've seen too many movies?
Dan
Amazing video, takes guts to do what you did
and hope hairdresser doesnt get in any trouble
On 2.45 mark, she actually asked you why are you filming the video/what for.
Is this video "staged" video by North Korea government or something ? or 100% recorded by yourself?
If it's not too much trouble, could you list the songs used in this? The Pochonbo discography seems a bit overwhelming to start randomly searching and hearmatching :)
It's one of my favorite songs of all time.
Now, if I can just ask one more bit: what's the haunting song playing on the subway stairlift scene?
great use of stealth and practice :)
Btw, the girl at the end was singing a chinese song. Were you part of a chinese tourist group?
why did you do this?
from what I heard tour guides and the people watching over you are held accountable for things like secretly filming. It is their job to prevent this from happening. I don't think anyone else would be in trouble but I guess they will ask your guide one or two questions at least if they find out.
On the other hand your video does mainly show an intact country with normal happy people living in it. It would have been interesting to see a bit more of the rest of the country besides pyongyang. But I guess they did not let you out?
Everything I showed in the video was approved stuff.
I did see and photograph a lot more, but have chosen to not include it in this piece, because it's not what this piece is about.
It's very interesting for me who live in south korea.
I realized that peoples also live in Pyongyang.. and
they seems like ours. They also our korean people.
I really want to unify nation.
You're not afraid north korean soilders...
Im korean...so this video... so impressive to me.
spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/0,1518,751424,00.html
newsfeed.time.com/2011/03/17/watch-how-one-man-caught-secret-video-inside-north-korea-and-lived/?xid=rss-topstories
nice vid btw
Not only do you not obscure their faces but you use her name.. Yeah congrats on the video but come on man, you've been there, you should know that this sort of thing is dangerous for these people.
This has been up for a month so I guess it's too late now to change anything.
Sheesh..
This looks so pretty, I seriously think it functions as a promotional/propaganda video (whether that was the intent or not).
i.e. I've heard that there are electricity shortages in the city, so that there are few lights at night.
Pyongyang is by no means an ugly city, though you're right about the electricity shortages. There really isn't any street lighting at night, and people walk around with LED(!) flashlights.
The intent wasn't to glorify or vilify, but rather to humanize a place and its people. I had never seen a video of a North Korean just being themselves until I met our delightful hairdresser.
Did you get any footage of the city at night? That would be neat to see.
Then the station guards get fired, they put in cctv which no-one monitors, unless you get murdered.
When the Ukrainian's muggers get there those people wont know what hit them...
Oh hang on, thats London. :)
Thank you for good & meaningful work. I don't think SK people will misunderstand this as a North Korea propaganda.
beautiful beautiful beautiful,
theoretically and practically!
Hope to meet again soon,
there are thousand new things to be exchanged,
yes!
Did you know that your film became soooo famous in South Korea as most of media reported about it?
And one of the reason it's popular is the way that hairdresser talks is very attractive. for North Korean it might be normal though.
Btw are you Chinese passport holder? I was wondering if you can travel North Korea as American passport holder?