Status Updates From Under the Loving Care of th...

Elke keer als ik de bronnen bekijk kom ik boeken tegen die ik kopen wil maar een Gods vermogen kosten :(

I'm amazed by the blatant elitism exhibited by Kim Il-sung and the high officials of his regime. Not only because they aspire live in a socialist state, but because everyone else with the same ideological leanings willingly accepts it. The sheer number of women Kim had children with is also staggering, but that's not nearly as startling as the details surrounding the relations he had with teenage girls.

At this point in the book, Martin is describing his first entries into North Korea and taking note of how much the state cares about their perception to outsiders. He's in constant company by guides and reserved only to inspect things they want him to. Meanwhile, it is in this late 1970s, early 1980s that South Korea has begun to pull away in terms of economic success.

Approaching this book with little knowledge on North Korea, I've already learned much when it comes to the DPRK's origin story, their fight against Japanese imperialists, internal squabbles with differing communist groups, and the Korean War. Now that the story has moved along to DPRK's early decades of establishing themselves, I find some of the decisions Kim Il-sung to be faulty, and odd that he's still praised.

So much info in these pages already. I can only read so much at a time before my brain is like too much info overload. But what've read so far has been interesting.