Amanda Moore had only left the United States once before traveling by herself to North Korea this past June. Moore said, “I was really nervous, but I wanted to experience it first-hand.”
Moore, a senior from New Mexico majoring in political science, flew to North Korea alone, but continued her travels with a tour group through a company called Young Pioneer Tours. She said, “A lot of people say, ‘I didn’t know that you could go [to North Korea]’ and I didn’t used to either.”
Moore spent two weeks in North Korea, and interacted with the North Korean people. “We went and stayed in a local village for a night and had a bonfire. [We] sang songs around a campfire with the local people and played with their kids.”
Moore said she and her fellow tourists hiked in a national park, went to an amusement park in the city, experienced a local flee market and traded money in one of the banks. According to Moore, their trip focused on giving those on the tour “a very dimensional view [of the society].”
Moore recalled an interesting aspect of the trip concerning the boarder between China and North Korea. She said, “We crossed over the boarder back into China and then spent a little over a week basically road-tripping along the Chinese-Korean border on the Chinese side. There was a river that separates it, and we’re right on the river the entire week.”
Moore continued, “It’s funny because on the China side they build up a lot of big buildings right on the river and have a lot of flashy lights, like they’re really trying to show off in a way. Yet, on the North Korean side it just looks like it would any other rural area.”
Not a lot is known about North Korea. After asking BYUH students what they knew about the country, many responses echoed that of music major Sadie Belnap, a freshman from Idaho. She said, “I really don’t know anything about North Korea. I know that they have a very strict border, heavily guarded. I’ve heard that they mainly don’t let anyone out. I think it’s completely blocked off.”
Moore said the experience overall was “really humanizing,” referencing banishing stereotypes and having experiences with the local people. She said, “I felt similarly coming here and learn[ing] to adapt to a multicultural environment. In those ways, I think my time here at BYUH helped prepare me for it a lot.”
Moore was first exposed to the possibility of traveling to North Korea when she saw someone she knew post pictures of their trip to North Korea. “I thought, that sounds really cool, no one does that, and I like doing things that other people don’t do.”
As of June 2010, passport-holding U.S. citizens have been allowed to travel to North Korea. According to Koryo Tours’ general manager Simon Cockerell, “There have been about 6,000 Western tourists this year–that’s a tenfold increase on a decade ago.”Though tourism is increasing, there are concerns about the safety of such a trip.
According to Young Pioneer Tours, “Despite what you may hear, North Korea is probably one of the safest places on Earth to visit.”
It continued, “Tourism is very welcomed. North Koreans are super friendly and accommodating if you let them into your world.”