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Video: The Vice Guide to North Korea

I know, I know, you’ve seen a thousand permutations of this same tour circuit, but this one is so much edgier and funner than the rest of them. We take for granted that we can satize anything (well, except for Ohmmad-May and the Oran-Kay) without consequences, and occasionally describe ourselves as brave for it. You want brave? These guys smuggled videocameras into North Korea for the express purpose of making a satirical documentary. Now that’s brave:


The culture shock is only funnier because you get the feeling that this might be the first time in a loooong time the filmmaker, Shane Smith, was not stoned.

It’s so surreal. There’s nothing normal that happens — ever — in this whole country.

The result is well worth watching and very funny. Start at part one; their excellent video player will spool you through the rest of the five available episodes. I’m definitely looking forward to the rest of them, particularly the part after Shane shares his cigarette with his minders and fails a surprise urine test shortly afterward. A big hat tip to GI Korea for this one.

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12 Responses

  1. The videos are hilarious, but what else can you expect from the people behind Vice Magazine. But I’m pretty skeptic of his reasons for seeming so scared; are there any actual examples of tourists being prosecuted under DPRK law for f.x bringing video cameras in unauthorized, cursing the government or the leaders, etc? I haven’t heard of a single one through my five or so years as a hobby NK watcher…

  2. The videos are hilarious, but what else can you expect from the people behind Vice Magazine. But I have to question his reasons for being (or at least appearing) so scared; are there any actual examples of tourists being prosecuted under DPRK law for f.x bringing video cameras in unauthorized, cursing the government or the leaders, etc? I haven’t heard of a single one through my five or so years as a hobby NK watcher…

  3. To answer a more general question, you can in fact get in deep trouble as a tourist or visitor to North Korea, though I’m unaware of any cases with similar circumstances.

    The North Koreans arrested an interrogated at least one South Korean woman at Kumgang and held her for several days for attempting to propogate christianity.

    You should also google for the name “Ali Lameda.”

    There was also the strange case of Evan Hunziker, an American who was caught by the North Koreans while attempting to swim the Tumen River back in the 90’s and accused of being a spy (it’s more likely he was just drunk). I believe it was “Kim Jong Bill” Richardson who brought him back after three months in a North Korean dungeon. Shortly after he returned home to Seattle, they found him in a hotel room with a bullet in his head.

    Japan also claims that some of its abductees were actually lured to North Korea of their own free will, then denied permission to return home.

    So yes, I think these guys took a risk. I sure as hell wouldn’t have taken it.

  4. Although the videos are fun, I dont think they were ever in any real danger, and this is just one aspect of their marketing campaign. I am convinced that the North Koreans knew they were journalists. Why? Their visas were sponsored by the Committee for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries, who accepts many journaists as “tourists”. Plus, I know who their guide was…

  5. It the guide knew that they had cameras then why did he allow them to take the film of the banquet hall and the tea girl? Both those scenes really made North Korea look extremely strange to put it mildly.

    The tour of the Pueblo I can understand the guide allowing them to film because I have seen film of tours of the Pueblo before. I’m pretty sure the guide knew they were journalists but maybe he didn’t know they had a secret camera on them.

  6. I didn’t know about the woman att Geumgansan, but I’ll try finding out more. As for Ali Lameda, I believe he was imprisoned in 1974, as a result of the venezuelan communist party’s opposition to Fidel Castro’s rule (or a similar issue, not really sure) and not for anything that the average tourist could possibly make him/herself guilty of.

    My core reason for doubting what risks foreigners actually run when breaking rules in North Korea is what happens with f x the christian woman in Michael Harrold’s book, who according to the author worked as an interpreter with FLPH and tried spreading the gospel by simply locking herself in her room in her guest house, opening her window and just flat out cursing the authorities until the police managed to break into her room. She was fired and sent home, but nothing else happened, which was also the case of the other rule-breaking foreigners that Harrold tells of in his book.

    Sure, some of the names and situations have been altered in order to protect the privacy of the people involved, but if a foreign language translator would have been caught and executed, I’m sure that Harrold wouldn’t want to leave that out of the book.

    What seems most likely is that there have been substantial policy changes on foreigners in North Korea since the late 80’s, as they have become more frequent (except for communist delegations from other workers paradises’). I find it very unlikely for another Ali Lameda to happen today.

  7. Takashi Sugishima, a former reporter for the Nihon Keizai Shimbun was arrested and confined for over two years (12/ 1999 ~ 2/ 2002) in North Korea for an alleged espionage charge.
    Oddly enough, North Korea neither put Sugishima on trial nor convicted him during the confinement.
    Instead, the Labor Party of North Korea demanded ransom money to Sugishima’s wife, Chiba, Japan for the release of her husband. The ransom letter was conveyed to her through the hand of a pro-North Korean TV Station, TBS(Tokyo Broadcasting System) Overseas News Department executive producer, Takaharu Okamoto(岡元隆治）. Yes, there exists a pro-North Korean media in Japan. As a matter of fact the majority of Japanese journalists are lopsided to the left.
    The existence of the ransom letter was revealed when Sugshima testified at the Security Committee of the Diet in Tokyo on July 25th 2002.
    Prior to conveying that ransom letter to Sugishima’s wife, TBS made a breaking news that Sugishima was convicted of espionage in North Korea. That was a false news. North Korea did not formally indicted or convicted Sugishima to this time. However, that news devastated his wife. To add salt to her wounds she received the ransom demanding message through the hand of the TBS executive producer, Takaharu Okamoto. He acted as a mediator between the Labor Party of North Korea and Sugishima’s wife on behalf of the “humanitarian” ground.
    The Japanese government worked behind the scene. They achieved a release of Sugishima in Beijing, China in 2002. The Japan Foreign Ministry has not disclosed wether or how much they paid to North Korea.

  8. That’s of interest to the question of whether North Korea is a sponsor of terrorism. So does actually demanding ransom count? D’ya think?

    Do you have a link in English, please?

  10. I watched a BBC travel documentary, two years ago, “Holidays in the Axis of Evil” it was called, or something similar.

    The reporter meets an Aid worker from the US who was imprisoned for two weeks and then deported on the same flight, when he was leaving North Korea.

    His crime was asking if the great leader was so fantastic, why was he so fat and everyone else so thin?

    I think filming anything or anyone in that state without first getting permission from someone to do so, is far more stupid than most people would be willing to do. It just isn’t worth the risk. Posting suppositions that tourists have some kind of immunity is both extremely naive, and very dangerous. North Korea is in such a position, that they don’t care what the western world thinks.

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