Arriving to Pyongyang - First Impressions of North Korea

uh North Korea the breaking news a secret society on diplomatic talks between the u.s. and North Korea already standstill good morning and welcome back to Pyongyang we just came out this morning and we couldn't see this last night because we got here in the dark but we actually have a balcony looks out [Music] oh I say not bad edible it's the first day in Pyongyang we arrived here late last night and just about to go exploring for a full day around the city I'm gonna just basically show you everything we see today and try and document as much as possible and then at the end of it I'm going to give my first impressions of Pyongyang and first impressions of North Korea so first up this morning we're going for a walk around Pyongyang and I think this is what most of us are interested in just seeing what the real North Korean people do here and how they live their normal lives what's this hard to get a real accurate impression because we can't really talk there many people here [Music] one thing that's very interesting so far is that everyone is pretty much dressed the same and apparently is a rule here there's like fashion pieces that go around and make sure the guys are dressed for my and the women also dressed formally we've discussed and it's quite noticeable that everyone is just very formal around young [Music] we're just going to see with me English and foreign language bookstore this is where you can get a lot of texts about of it Korea perspective and a problem can you know from here translated into foreign languages [Music] [Music] [Music] so this next part is apparently what we need to be the most respectful of the whole trip we're going up here to see the Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il's statues which are quite famous to Pyongyang and North Korea you might have seen them before when we go there you have to bow if you don't bow then you can't go see it that's just one of the rules here and it's a respect thing same as any other religious monument around the world it has its own rules so if you want to go there then you have to go and pay respects and bow you also can't take any shots of the statues without them being in full frame so I can't crop it at all I have to have the whole statue in the show and those are basically the two rules I'm going to go in and see it now well sorry on one last thing I just forgot is that I needed to change into trousers okay I actually don't have any of I borrowed some of the other guys here and yeah you have to wear trousers as well no shorts or flip-flops or anything [Music] so these are the statues and you can go up in the lay flowers there if you want to our guy did the rest of us didn't again I saw respecting and yeah you can you can come here I just found out that groups of Chinese tourists aren't allowed here because we are allowed here because with it quite respectful but the North Koreans haven't allowed large groups of Chinese tourists to come to this spot even though there's a lot of Chinese tourism in North Korea I just know what you guys are have any issues when you're buying cool but I just got a lot of Korean money this is five thousand so we're now at Mount Daesung Park and this was one of the highlights of the itinerary because it's made a festival right now which apparently this only ever gets this busy on one day and there's lots of sort of attractions and food stores and things we can take a part in and kind of interact with more local people as well [Music] ya know different warrior I have a chest they got the way of it almost three one bite [Music] let's see if I can get boy yeah yeah I have to work for it I just played football for about 10 minutes and the whole time it was every kid keeping it away from the white guys if you get the ball a couple times but as you can see I'm completely out of breath now [Music] we're now getting involved you know tug of war so you know this goes [Music] [Music] which is that one pretty intense game of tug-of-war and we won it's the best of three and we want to yes I should break ooh it was like high-fiving the North Koreans playing here like doing it together I was good experience [Music] okay next up is lunch we have Korean pop pop we shared food and okay so here you get a personal hotpot this is my pork and this is my hope as demonstrated right here [Music] we're at Hill now and again there's loads of locals out because it's the May Day holiday so apparently we can walk through for about half an hour now and free to interact with whoever we want as long as you stay as part of this big group we're in ok actually I realize this video is now getting quite long because we're doing a lot and I want to show you as much of Pyongyang as I possibly can so I'm going to cut this video here and go to my first impressions next and then if you want to see what we get up to further in Pyongyang that'll be in the next video but for now first impressions so I'm back in Beijing now I'm out of the country and I wanted to give my real first impressions of North Korea once I was outside the country so I feel like I can say whatever I want and so you guys know that I'm also saying exactly what I want to I'm not limited by being inside the country and the first thing I want to say is that so the first thing I want to say is the my expectations with beforehand were that I wouldn't be able to really say say much at all to the camera whatsoever and I'd have to be really careful kind of photos and videos I was taking while they're asking permission all the time and trying to find out what I can and can't film what I can and can't say but although I was only there for in total you'll see in the next videos I was there in total for about about two and a half days so I can't fully comment on the whole of North Korea but from what I can say about Pyongyang is that I was pretty much able to film and say whatever I wanted as long as it wasn't derogatory to the Supreme Leader's and Kim Jong un camión bill and Kim il-sung as long as I didn't say anything really like bad about them then I could say whatever I want and like I've seen videos before saying that they didn't feel comfortable with what they could say to the camera like I felt like we were looking over their shoulders to see like if people were listening to them I don't really feel that that's whoever I felt like quite able to say what I wanted and be able to film anything really like the only things you can't film while you're there military and construction the military thing is the same in a lot of countries it's not just North Korea and saying things about leaders and kings and stuff is also the same in other countries as well for example Thailand is a country similar to that so I felt like I had lost more ability to say in film and take photos then I'd previously thought beforehand that being said it is still a place where you're only shown exactly what they want you to see so we're on a strict itinerary while we're there we are taken to all places that we have been given permission to go to beforehand and you can't explore it without local guides and you can't explore it just independently on your own you're not allowed for example just to walk around the street so I'll leave like the hotel we're staying and we're not allowed to leave the compound and that's just like one of the rules of travel this but you do only see what they want me to see and I can't say that I'm able to comment on real local life and have many interactions with real local people primarily because of the language barrier like not really able to interact with them that much anyway so I really can't comment on that side of it and I can only just say what ice and I want to be really clear in this that I'm not defending or like advocating North Korea in any way really I'm just saying what it's like to be a tourist there and what my first impressions were a bit of after a couple days spent there the next thing I want to say is that I also heard beforehand that people don't really look at you and if you get eye contact they'll look away or if you try and smile a wave then like the shy away and not want to interact with you and again in Pyongyang that wasn't my experience each time I would wave to a kid or like smile at someone occasionally they'd look away and get shy or whatever but for the most part that the kid would wave back or smile back I love their head or whatever like I said still didn't really get that solid one-to-one interaction but just from trying that something in the streets I didn't feel like we were he's I don't know I didn't feel like we were these untouchable foreign objects I felt like you could smile and generate smile back now this is just my personal experience of having been there for a couple days and like I say take it all with a pinch of salt because we are only showing what we are allowed to see well I can only comment on what I've seen and there's there's plenty of other resources out there that you can go and listen to read or watch or whatever about North Korea as a country but I can only comment on why sore and what my first impressions were after being there for a couple days so I hope you enjoyed this video or I hope like it gave you an insight into North Korea or anyway and there's still a couple more to come I have filmed the rest of this day and then the next day and check back for those because there's some more information in those two but if now I just want to say thank you for watching and yeah I I'm interested to see what the reaction will be to this and what you think about traveling to North Korea whoever you would and let me know all of that in the comments below because I want to get a good conversation going about traveling to North Korea for now I'll see you again in the next video [Music]

Channel: TheLifeOfJord

Views: 1,476,545

Keywords: thelifeofjord, the life of jord, jordan simons, travel vlog, south korea, kim jong un, north korea, first impressions, flying into, arriving to, arriving to pyongyang, first impressions of north korea, impressions of north korean, north korea travel, north korea vlog, pyongyang vlog, pyongyang travel, young piooners, young pioneers north korea, north korean, dmz, north korea vs south korea, north korea documentary, north korea 2019

Id: q3H_1zxmOpM

Length: 14min 51sec (891 seconds)

Published: Sat May 11 2019