ROK #2: At the border of surrealism: DMZ

The demilitarized zone (DMZ) on the border between North Korea (The Democratic Republic of North Korea) and South Korea or “ROK” among friends (The Republic of Korea) is one of the most surrealistic places we have ever experienced.

The initial briefing in the Joint Security Area (JSA), started of with us all signing a document (Click on the photo to enlarge).

The first line of the document says: "The visit to the Joint Security Area at Panmunjom will entail entry into a hostile area and possibility of injury or death as a direct result of enemy action". Yes, this is really serious business. The briefing also included the message that "get down" really does mean GET DOWN! The end slide supporting the briefing said "In front of them all" and we were kindly asked to give our applause to the presenter - an American lieutenant.

Our tour entertainer (another lieutenant) has allegedly used this plate the previous week to kill a poisonous and deadly tiger snake, which he convinced fellow soldiers not to grab with their bare hands…



Imagine two contradicting ideologies 'communism' and 'capitalism' facing each other with thousands of soldiers along the border. The North Korean soldiers are ordered to shoot any defectors who try to cross the border to the south. The opposite situation is not considered a risk in ROK. However, ROK and the Americans take the risk from the North extremely seriously, with good reason apparently. In 1984, a defector made it across the border to the south, resulting in four casualties when 20-30 North Korean soldiers crossed the border to chase down the defector. As a result of this, the Americans and ROK soldiers has a unit which is ready for battle at the border in less than 60 seconds if the alarms sounds.

All the above is only information and intangible facts. The tangible realities are much more wierd and visible. One of the visible symbols of the absurdness in this conflict is the flags on either side of the border. South Korea demonstrated their potency in the 1980s by building a 98.4-meter flagpole, only to be surpassed by North Korea with the tallest flagpole in the World, with 160-meter and a ½-ton flag, which by the way is usually too heavy to be carried by the wind.

Another fact is the attitude of the soldiers. Equally the North Koreans, the Americans and the ROK soldiers all act as if they were hired to do a Broadway tragicomic play or belong to another solar sytem. The North Koreans tries to intimidate you, by giving you the evil look or by focusing their binoculars at you (uuuh scary!). The attitude of the American In-front-of-them-all-soldiers one second give an impression that World War Three could happen at any moment just to perform as stand-up comedians a second later. The stone-cold, hard-core, taekwon-do black-belt, Ray-Ban wearing ROK soldiers ooze toughness enough to impress anybody, even though they wear rattles on the legs to sound as if they are ten people marching instead of just one.

American soldier performing with two ROK soldiers guarding in the background.

The toughest ROK soldier ever! A requirement for this post is the black belt in taekwon-do.

While the American is performing and the tough ROK soldiers are garding, the North Korean soldiers are standing on the other side of the border which is only separated by the building seen on the pictures above. One of these North Koreans has apparently found a big interest in Henrik and his 12X zoom camera.


Before going to Korea, we had an idea that North Korea was not one of the places were we would set our feet, but on the following picture, Henrik is in fact standing on the North Korean side of the border. The grim looking ROK soldier is there to protect Henrik, if the North Korean soldiers should decide to enter the building from the door behind, but he is also there to prevent Henrik or one of the other tourist to defect to the North...

To visit the border (JSA), ROK inhabitants must prove that they do not have any relations to North Korea for at least four generations and inhabitants from communist countries are not given access. These facts and our own observations gave us an impression that this conflict is still very tense and troublesome.
Next stop was the exhibition five kilometers from the border/JSA, where in contrast to the JSA area, everybody including ROK inhabitants, are allowed to enter. We were quite taken by surprise when we watched a video there, that showed a peaceful and almost paradise-like DMZ, which is a complete contrast to the impression left on us an hour earlier at the JSA.
From our point of view, the propaganda is equally extreme in the South as in the North. Where is the logic in this truly unique situation?

The ROK soldier is of cause only showing one eye and a small part of his body in case the enemy starts shooting.