English 100 Spring 2019 Blogs

Right away, I noticed that the views of the North Koreans are largely (if not completely ) driven by their respective government. The North Korean population is perverted through propaganda, such as movies as posters. Fear has led them like cattle to a slaughterhouse to suppress their own values and beliefs. The worst part of this whole dismal situation is that the North Koreans believe that there is nothing better out there than the lives they have done. No dreams equals no hope, and even for the few who do dare to dream, their expectations are likely crushed by their past and social status.

I think what was most noticeable was that they lived in fear from being killed and from speaking there mind. And that there only sense of freedom was during the night when they would walk around in darkness due to no electricity. Another thing that was noticeable was that if they were planning on escaping they would have to keep it a secret especially from our spouses like boyfriends.

Back in the 90s North Korea was sitting in total darkness while their “Pro-American Cousins”(Demick) in South Korea were living with electricity. This may have created a bitterness between the North Koreans and Americans. The benefit of not having electricity was that they could share their secret love affairs . For example, just like our Hawaiian caste systems it is similar to those of the North Koreans culture.

“the food on the table went uneaten as she described watching her five- and six year-old pupils die of starvation. as her student were dying, she was supposed to teach them that they were blessed to be North Korean.” Page 9 Nothing to envy

“I left North Korea, I was twenty-six years old and a school teacher, but i didn’t know how babies were conceived.” Page 10 Nothing to envy

Two lines in the first chapter that have already captured my attention.

It perplexes me that the somewhat basic knowledge of how children are conceived could not already be understood at the age of 26. Its Mind boggling to think that Mi-ran had no idea how the process of creating life was foreign, almost alien to her.

/In reading, Nothing To Envy. I thought to when I was growing up, and there was no internet, texting, just line telephone and my parents would put a time limit on use. Couples had conversations looked each other in the eyes. It is said the eyes are the mirror of the soul. Don’t get me wrong I respect the advances, we have made in technology. But we also lost the art of speech, and writing. You meet someone in todays social arena, and the first thing. “Are you on Instagram, Facebook, email, or text me.”

I wonder what, if we had to put down our cells, laptops, TV’s, and for two nights out of a week. Your choices would be to talk or write letters. Growing up in Louisiana I can relate to Mi-ran, and her wanting to escape the repressive regime. There are people here, just look around!

Based on the reading from chapters one and two from the book “Nothing To Envy” by Barbara Demick, I’ve noticed that this was a hardship time of era that depended highly on social classes of an individual, based on their family’s line of history and current lifestyle. In a time like this, your social class and family’s line of history completely depended on your own chance for survival. One of the main characters (Mi-Ran) was born into a poor class with her family due to the backstory of her father’s origins. Having her father born from enemy territory, they were forced to be in silent due to the serious consequences that could come about the family. The only way to show forgiveness for the family is if the male showed high recognition in his exceeds for greatness. Which is another reason why Jung-Sang came into play, because he was a prime example of how good grades and an acceptance to further his schooling in Pyongyang would give all forgiveness for his family’s past (like the verse stated below).

“The family’s hopes rested on Jun-sang. If only he could get himself to university of Pyongyang, perhaps he would be eventually be permitted to join the Workers Party and then the family might be forgiven their bourgeois Japanese past. “

(35 Demick, Barbara)

This left no time for puberty or love for Jung-sang and I assure for everyone else. In such a time were reputation is highly expected, there could really be no time for “love” because people were just trying to make it through each day.

They were so accustomed to laws of social classes and gender separation, it resulted in social disconnections and not being able to survive the next day. I believe that if you are not of middle class and came from a “disappointing” family line it would be impossible to survive. I feel like I would not even be able to survive in such a heartfelt era like this.

Based on the reading from chapters one and two from the book “Nothing To Envy” by Barbara Demick, I’ve noticed that this was a hardship time of era that depended highly on social classes of an individual, based on their family’s line of history and current lifestyle. In a time like this, your social class and family’s line of history completely depended on your own chance for survival. One of the main characters (Mi-Ran) was born into a poor class with her family due to the backstory of her father’s origins. Having her father born from enemy territory, they were forced to be in silent due to the serious consequences that could come about the family. The only way to show forgiveness for the family is if the male showed high recognition in his exceeds for greatness. Which is another reason why Jung-Sang came into play, because he was a prime example of how good grades and an acceptance to further his schooling in Pyongyang would give all forgiveness for his family’s past (like the verse stated below).

“The family’s hopes rested on Jun-sang. If only he could get himself to university of Pyongyang, perhaps he would be eventually be permitted to join the Workers Party and then the family might be forgiven their bourgeois Japanese past. “

(35 Demick, Barbara)

This left no time for puberty or love for Jung-sang and I assure for everyone else. In such a time were reputation is highly expected, there could really be no time for “love” because people were just trying to make it through each day.

They were so accustomed to laws of social classes and gender separation, it resulted in social disconnections and not being able to survive the next day. I believe that if you are not of middle class and came from a “disappointing” family line it would be impossible to survive. I feel like I would not even be able to survive in such a heartfelt era like this.

Kim Il-sung took the least humane elements of Confucianism and combined them with Stalinism. At the top of the pyramid, instead of an emperor, resided Kim Il-sung and his family. From there began a downward progression of fifty-one categories that were lumped into three broad classes-the core class, the wavering class, and the hostile class.

page. 27

As I read chapter two, I couldn’t help but re-read sentences multiple times to try and fully grasp the ranking system. It amazes me how countries outside of Korea can come in and dictate how land was to be separated, and just handed over to other countries as what appeared to be a bargaining chip.

Reading Tae-woos’ story about how his way of life was simply taken from him and he was left to start a new life in a country that once was one nation. How he went from being a out-spoken child that others looked up to, to a quiet man afraid to be denounced for his thoughts. I admire his tenacity in evolving into a man who wanted to simply survive. I can understand his need for silence, for fear of the inminban – a “people’s group” whose job it is to keep tabs on one another and run the neighborhood. Mi-ran couldn’t see that her fathers passivity was simply a survival mechanism.

They were placed in the one of the lower of the 51 groups, sub categorized in the “hostile class”. Once here, there was no improving ones rank. It became your families legacy. The ranking system was hereditary. If your grandfather was a part of the hostile class, you were then born into it as well.

The strength of the regime came from it’s ability to isolate its own citizens completely.

pg. 34

I couldn’t imagine knowing that no matter how hard you worked, kept your head down and never spoke ill of the leader or the countries ways, you never could improve your social class.

1/11/19
What do you think is noticeable in the assigned reading? Why?

There is no telephone service between North and South Korea, no postal service, no email.

Pg. 10

The most noticeable thing to me as the reader, is how a once developed country turned into what appears as a poverty stricken country. A country that has “fallen out of development”. Once a thriving tourist destination, residents of North Korea have seem to be merely forgotten. No electricity, no sense of urgency to have help getting it restored and no rush to become “developed” once again.

As her students were dying, she was supposed to teach them that they were blessed to be North Korean.

Pg. 9

When night falls, it is simply black. No power to read, watch television or have restaurants or simple pleasures. Things simply worn out and malfunctioning. I can understand just in the first 10 pages of why people would want to become defectors.

“Nothing to Envy” is a novel written by Barbara Demick in which the author interviews real people who had defected from North Korea and shares their personal stories and experiences. In the first two chapters, Demick shares the story of two young teenagers who lived in the strict country of North Korea during the late 1980’s. I learned that during this time in North Korea, love and relationships were not romanticized or even talked about. While reading these first two chapters of “Nothing to Envy”, I also quickly realized that I actually never really knew much about North Korea. I knew they were very strict to their people and quite tucked away from the rest of the world, but to read about a real life story about someone who actually lived and escaped from North Korea was very interesting. I noticed that this novel was not just going to be a basic educational novel about a distant country, but a novel that shares deep emotion from real people.

“If I wanted answers to my questions, it was clear I wasn’t going to get them inside North Korea. I had to talk to people who had left- defectors.” (Nothing to Envy, Pg. 8)

There is also some background information about the history of North Korea provided in the first two chapters. The author shares important information about North Korea’s political history when there was a war that was occurring at the time. This helps us to understand what the setting was at the time and the events that occurred, leading to why the defectors left and what the people of North Korea experienced many decades ago.

“Mi-ran’s father never discussed what happened to him in captivity. One would expect that conditions for him were no better than for other POW’s held by the communists. Huh Jae-suk, a fellow POW who later escaped, wrote in his memoir that the men were housed in squalid camps where they were not permitted to bathe or brush their teeth. Their hair became infested with lice; untreated wounds swarmed with maggots. They were fed one meal of rice and saltwater a day” (Nothing to Envy, Pg. 24)

To learn about just the outside layer of what went down during this war is not enough. To read and learn about the real life experiences and torture that these people had to suffer through is tragic. I can not even imagine having to live like this. Later on in chapter two, the author continues to provide background history about North Korea speaking of the time social rankings began to be put into place by North Korea’s leader at the time, Kim Il-sung. It is quite shocking to read about how North Korea’s leader began to classify every single person living there.

“Kim Il-sung then turned his attention to ordinary people. In 1958, he ordered up an elaborate project to classify all North Koreans by their political reliability, ambitiously seeking to reorganize an entire human population.” (Nothing to Envy, Pg. 26)

Just in these first two chapters of this novel, the author reels the reader in by providing a dark introduction of how the people of North Korea lived and the unspeakable experienced they went through. It was a very informational yet sentimental beginning of the novel by sharing the story of two young teenagers and how they experienced love during in a very strict and chaotic country.