the tourism to North Korea has
reportedly increased dramatically in the
last few years and I feel really really
guilty for that and I'm very sorry let
me give you a bit of my background I
come from this tiny European country
called Lithuania which is occupied by
the Soviet Union for almost 50 years the
regime collapsed in 1994 years before I
was born but growing up I was really
curious about the lives of my parents
and grandparents had to lead in the
Union and I really wanted to see it
firsthand so at the young age of 21 I
decided to pay over $2,000 for a
week-long trip to North Korea with the
hopes of getting a glimpse of life in a
similar surrounding however all I ended
up seeing as any other tourist was a
very well orchestrated show of the
cherry-pick destinations in the country
alongside my well twin local guides
without any freedom to explore anything
on my own after the trip I made two
videos about my life in North Korea both
of which went completely viral and got
over 10 million views each my goal was
never to encourage North Korean tourism
but since those two videos became some
of the most popular that it was about
North Korea on the Internet
I feel like they actually played my part
in encouraging more people to go there
and I really hope I can fix that you see
when I first went to North Korea as a 21
year old I never really thought about
the implications of that trip however
after my first video went live a lot of
people began asking me whether you know
I felt bad about having gone to North
Korea and at first as most Duras I guess
I was very defensive of that topic and
and I kept saying well you know there's
so many countries with whose governments
I also don't agree with but that does
not mean you know I shouldn't travel
there right and so I said yes of course
the North Korean government is certainly
not the best but should that mean I
shouldn't go there and I was sort of
happy with that answer as once again
most tourists seemed to be these days
however as time went by I understood
that my comparison was was totally wrong
because traveling to North Korea is a
fundamentally
different thing I'll give you an example
let's see there is a country with whose
government you do not really agree with
and you go there as a test so traveling
around that country obviously spend
money in a lot of different places and
obviously a tiny portion of that
probably makes its way to the government
but most of the money ends up in the
pockets of the local people but the
difference here is that North Korea has
such a tight grip on literally the whole
society that it's absolutely uncompelled
to any country in the world
my one week-long tour to North Korea
cost me two thousand US dollars and that
did not include you know the souvenirs
that I bought and some of the some of
the attractions that weren't included in
my packets and stuff so as a result I
ended up staying quite a bit more than
two thousand dollars for one week you
know how much of that money ended up in
the pockets of the local people probably
none some of it went to the agencies
that are organising tours to North Korea
and probably most of it ended up
directly in the government and then the
question of course is so what does you
know the government do with the money
the United Nations says that the North
Korean citizens live under systematic
widespread and gross human rights
violations here are just a few of them
one the state controls everything in
actively spies on its citizens using a
vast surveillance and informer network
to North Korea's media is arguably the
most tightly controlled in the world
North Korean citizens get all their news
entertainment and information from state
media and citizens can be sent to prison
for viewing reading or listening to
content provided by international media
outlets 3 there is no freedom of
religion everyone is indoctrinated to
treat the Kim family almost as something
to worship for according to a report by
the US State Department there are
between 80,000 and 120,000 people in
prison in the North people can be jailed
for almost anything with crimes ranging
from watching a South Korean DVD to
trying to defect 5 a significant
majority of North Koreans undertake
unpaid labor at some point in their
lives according to a report by the Human
Rights Watch despite these issues
there's still a lot of people that
end up going to North Korea as I did as
well because North Korea's is probably
the most secretive country in the world
the exact tourist data is impossible to
get but the estimates range from tens of
thousands to even hundreds of thousands
of tourists visiting North Korea every
single year I know it's very ironic for
me to say this because I've been there
myself but please before going to North
Korea think twice if you still do not
think there's there's something
fundamentally wrong with the North
Korean regime and you know you're
considering going there I want to show
you a very short excerpt from my from my
last North Korea video where I'm
comparing my life in in the North and
the South about the differences of those
two countries
take a look every single day that I
spent in South Korea I couldn't stop
thinking about how weird it was that
even though just a few dozen years ago
the Korean people lived in the same
country under the same conditions these
days they were leading such dramatically
different lifestyles I kept asking
myself why the people in the North
needed special permits to travel in
their own country and going abroad was
completely impossible while people in
the South could freely go to any place
they wished both inside and outside
their country
why was the whole power in the North
concentrated in one person's hands was
considered to be a God
whereas in the South people had the
power to elect their own leaders and
dismiss them if they didn't do a good
job and why were the people in the North
not allowed to freely interact and share
their thoughts with me while the people
in the South could do whatever the heck
they wanted
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seeing these differences firsthand broke
my heart why has life become so
different for the Korean people in just
a few generations
if this excerpt or all the things I've
said in this video with us first still
do not convince you that maybe going to
North Korea isn't really the best idea
ever I want to tell you a one man's
story that had a very very very big
impact on me as you probably know there
are literally thousands of people that
have actually escaped North Korea and
created you know new lives for
themselves in either South Korea or
quite a few other countries around the
world and obviously some of them have
written these absolutely incredible
books that are just absolute eyeopener's
and you know very very hard to believe a
link to my three favorite books about
North Korea in the description box down
below but right now I want to very
briefly tell you about the best book
about a North Korean refugee I've read
in my entire life that is called escape
from camp 14 dong-hyuk shin is the only
known person to have been born and
raised in a North Korean labor camp
because his family was imprisoned there
for three generations free supposed
political crime by someone in his family
that was then many years ago as you can
imagine shins childhood in the labor
camp was incredibly hard he had to work
day in and day out in ruthless
conditions and food was so scarce that
he was basically starving all the time
many years later he risked his life to
scheme from the camp having faced many
dangers on the way he ultimately managed
to run away to China where he had to
work on various farms in the countryside
years later he was lucky enough to
finally make his way to South Korea
where he lived to tell his story to
millions of people around the world
now you know reading a book that's a New
York Times bestseller about this you
know really famous person is obviously
one thing it you might think it's true
or not true and it might impact you or
not but you know it's it's a pretty
different thing but actually meeting
that person in real life and getting to
talk to him you know one-on-one and and
actually hear his stories is a
completely different thing I really wish
a lot more people actually you know
managed to have these experiences where
they could actually meet one of the
North Korean refugees whether shin or
you know the thousands of other people
and could actually hear their stories
you know in in real life and then you
know a question of whether you should go
to North Korea and spend money
supporting that regime becomes so much
more real that's that's pretty much all
I wanted to say today and and I know
that I'm probably putting myself at risk
for doing this video but I really do
think that is the right thing to do if
you're thinking of visiting North Korea
yourself please think about the
potential negative implications of your
trip
because traveling in North Korea is is a
fundamentally different thing from any
country in the world because most of the
money you pay there goes directly to the
government with which apparently they
can do pretty much anything they desire
thank you very much for watching the
whole video it really means so much to
me that you also care about this topic
let me know what you thought about this
video in the comment section down below
and if you want to help me spread the
word share this video with a hashtag why
North Korea and and tell your friends
about it thank you have a wonderful day
and hopefully we can make the world a
bit of a better place together thank you
so much see you later
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