voyage et en Coree du Nord link to the photo album ->
here Friday, September 4, 2010 Program:
- Singapore flight - Beijing
- Output in Beijing Sunrise 6:30 am. I switch off mobile phones, computers .. instructions are clear. There or we will:
- no mobile phone
- no laptop
-
no radio - no book or magazine
policy - if you take a picture of a statue, it should be taken as a whole.
- no photos of military
- Etc. ..
No I do not spend my vacation in jail, but in North Korea.
The reasons for this choice:
- I already know most countries around Singapore
- experience the atmosphere, the feeling of doing something unusual and very rewarding in the formal dinner.
short, it is turning off all the devices we already feel like a leap in the past. Singapore, Yohan and I take first flight for Beijing. After more than 40 minutes of duty, we ask for a little wait Alexander and we take a taxi to the hotel Hanting Express in Chaoyang District. After a deposit of 800 RMB, we are allowed to go take a shower and find Mark, who came to Shanghai for dinner.
the Directorate building The Village and its streets filled with bars. It begins with a long island on a terrace, take our dinner at a Chinese restaurant, let along two islands in a bar with live music, then this will Xiu (sort of Loof Singapore), LAN (which will prove completely vacuum) and finally the Suzie Wong (nightclub not too bad).
Sunday, September 5, 2010 Program:
- Forbidden City
- Tiananmen Square
-
Lama Temple - Behai
park - Entertainment in Beijing Despite the release of the day is at 9am as we attack the quick tour of Beijing. Branch Forbidden City (the Forbidden City) and his little half hour queuing regulatory weekend. You walk a good 1 hour & ½ before going to Tiananmen Square. We will arrive too late at the mausoleum of Mao (8h-12h).
Walking in search of a restaurant worthy of trust, we stumble upon the restaurant Grandma's kitchen, paradise burgers and steak fries.
Then it will visit the Lama Temple, the purchase of propaganda posters and ponds to fish, before eventually around the lake park Behai.
We then joined Mark and Angela al'Emperor Hotel for a drink on the roof with a rather nice view of Forbidden City before going to the restaurant Dadong, Beijing duck specialist. Angela and Mark was allowed to order.
At the end of dinner, Angela and Marc explains that we ate without knowing the heart of duck, duck tongue in jelly and duck flippers. I probably would not touch the food if I had known this before. But anyway, we leave then take Vic's, a nightclub where we would surely of spend our Saturday evening, and the Power House.
is recovered our tickets and visas that North Korean tourism agency has left for us at the hotel reception.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Program:
- Temple of Heaven Park
- Vol Beijing - Pyongyang
- Arc de Triomphe
- the Mass Games Sunrise 8am we leave for the Temple of Heaven Park (Park or the Temple of Heaven). The setting is rather nice, a big park where people gather to play sports together. The temples are common, but the magnitude paisibilité and the location make it an enjoyable visit.
We return at the hotel, let us put our best shirt and tie and leave for the airport. 2 hour flight on Air China and we arrive at the airport in Pyongyang. As indicated on the form of customs, customs attach great importance to the contents of our suitcase. No particular problem for my book Maxime Chattam, my little ipod shuffle and my camera. Mark leaves his phone in the set and recovered upon our departure. Having little confidence, I decided to leave Singapore.
Our guide, Lee Seung Gun, we expect at the airport. It is one of four tour guides to North Korea. Not that we do have the application, but North Korea is committed to providing a guide speaking the native language of the tourists. It comes with a second guide, Mr Lim, who speaks English poorly and therefore we assimilate immediately to a North Korean government spy, and the driver. Indeed we travel in our private bus minutes away from some other tourists.
Road to downtown, Lee gives us some information on Korea:
- 70 million (20 north, 40 and 10 living in South ABROAD)
- 210.000 km square (120,000 and 90,000 in the North to South)
- North Korea live export of rice, Chinese investments in the numerous iron mines as well as humanitarian aid.
We stop first at the triumphal arch, building constructed in 1982 to celebrate the 70th birthday of former President Kim-Il Sung. Slightly larger than that of Paris, he symbolizes resistance against the Japanese Korea from 1925 to 1945.
We then dined at a traditional restaurant Korean (meat, vegetables, rice) before heading to the Stadium from May 1 (Rŭngrado May First Stadium) which, as its name suggests was inaugurated on 1 May 1989. 150.000 with these places, this stadium is the largest in the world. Since 2007 it conducted the Mass Games (or Arirang), a great show with performances from August to October. Between
children hold placards which reflect white images, to those who dance in the middle of the arena, they are tens of thousands of people who chain the choreography to perfection for an hour and a half.
We then took our quarters at the hotel Yonggakdo, the only hotel in Pyongyang, where tourists are accommodated. Two suites await us.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Program:
- Great Library
- instead of Kim-Il Sung
- Foreign Languages Bookstore
- the USS Pueblo
-
movie studio - Museum of victory and the liberation of the Fatherland
- the music school
- Amusement Park Sunrise 8am, we get up to the sound of Korean songs. The music coming out of loudspeakers surrounding a plant are supposed to give courage to the laborers who work there. We start
our day with the Great Library (or Palace of the People's Study), which looks more like a great university that to a library. Reading rooms, rooms for playing records in foreign languages .. facilities are a bit old but the education system looks good. It will even be free for students, probably for privileged families in Pyongyang. The view from the roof of the Great Library gives the square of Kim-Il Sung.
is also on site of Kim Il Sung, as we go. We buy some propaganda posters in a small shop and take some pictures of buildings surrounding sickle & hammer, and portraits of Marx, Lenin and Stalin.
Then came the foreign language bookstore, a library that is accumulating all the books in foreign languages or translated into Korean.
We then went near the river to visit the USS Pueblo, the American warship captured by North Koreans January 23, 1968. He entered North Korean territorial waters to study the position of coastal radars. The crew was American custody 11 months before the United States did publicly apologize through a letter.
Lee takes us to a movie studio where they built the streets representing Japan in the 1930s, South Korea, Europe, etc. .. where they turn their films. That's probably the least interesting visit we aillions do during your stay.
Then we go to the Museum of victory and liberation of the Fatherland. Dedicated to the Korean War (1950-53), we see a video about the rout of the Americans whose basement of the building is proof. Indeed it is full of carcasses of airplanes, helicopters, helmets hole, machine guns, etc. ..
Finally, visits the day will end with the music school where we see a musical with children. As for the Mass Games, the show is great, but we can not help thinking about the hours of intense training that these children had to endure from an early age.
They dine in a Korean restaurant before taking a ride in the amusement park in Pyongyang. Initially cautious about possible breaches of security, we finally chained coaster and other attractions.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010 Program :
- DMZ (demilitarized zone)
- Museum Koryŏ
- The tomb of King Kongmin
- Statue of reunification meeting of the party forces (the replacement for Kim Jong Il by his son is in the air) is at 8am we are asked to leave the hotel, towards the city of Kaesong, near the border with North Korea.
Between North Korea and South Korea, is the DMZ (demilitarized zone). This area of 238 km long and 4 miles wide was created when the armistice of the Korean War, March 23, 1953. We begin
also visit the negotiating room followed by the room or was the armistice signed. A table, a book and two flags .. the decor is sleek. We then went to the village of Panmunjeom. Some barracks with blue North Korean military, and therefore a good opportunity to take photos. Most of the military rank up in our minibus. He speaks perfect English. He asks us what you think of the expulsion of Romanians outside France. Or is it really knowledgeable or France is truly the center of attention at the moment ...
We go to the city of Kaesong for lunch and to visit the museum of Koryo Dynasty, which occupied Korea early tenth century to the late fourteenth century. I must admit that after so many years I have a little trouble rave in front of a temple. One is no exception to the rule. Note some nice paintings.
Nearby, you take some pictures of the Dzanam hill where a statue of Kim-Il Sung, before going to the tomb of King Kongmin (1374). Monumental statues of civil and military officials led to the grave, representative of the style of the Koryo Kingdom. Similar tombs are also visible in South Korea. We end
with a statue symbolizing the desire to reunify the two Koreas.
Thursday, September 9, 2010 Program:
- Kumsusan Memorial Palace
- Revolutionary Martyrs Cemetery
- Tower of Juche
- concert at the Opera
Philharmonic - Pyongyang Metro
- dance
- Pyongyang trip - Mount Myohyang The day begins with a visit to the palace Kumsusan memorial containing the embalmed body of the "eternal president." So it is with our most beautiful shirts and ties that we go to the mausoleum. We'll have 15 minutes passage, treadmills and lift the former presidential palace to access the body of Kim-Il Sung. Curving around the body in homage to him, then we leave for the cemetery of revolutionary martyrs.
This cemetery honors the memory of all the young Koreans who fought against the Japanese, with statues depicting each of the dead. The wife of President Kim Il Sung is buried there too.
Then we climb atop the Juche Tower for a 360 degree view over the city. Juche is an ideology created by Kim-Il Sung in 1955 and based on the principle that every man is master of his destiny and decides everything about it. Then we go to the monument founder of the Workers Party of Korea with his sickle, a hammer and paintbrush giant.
At our request, a concert at the philharmonic opera was added to the program (20 euros). No return to Chopin or Mozart, but North Korean music including a piece created by Kim-Il Sung himself.
Lee takes us to the subway in Pyongyang. The escalator takes us more than 100 meters underground to a wharf beautifully decorated with paintings of propaganda. Access onto the train for a trip of a station.
Today is National Day, and hundreds people gathered to dance in the street. Spectators at the outset, we are then pushed by Lim in the round. Each with its partner, it tries to dance with North Korean problem. Small steps aside, gesturing with his hands, turn around his partner, we're back in the 40s. Dozens of eyes trained on us, I do not think we represented well the Western world but we had fun and that's the main thing.
We then take the minibus. 2h bumpy road and we arrive at Mount Myohyang. I managed to convince everyone to do 3 hours of trekking the next morning with the sole condition that it does not rain. Indeed it is raining since early afternoon.
Friday, September 10, 2010 Program:
- trekking
- Mangyandai
- Temple Pohyon
- the International Friendship Exhibition
- Mount Myohyang trip - Pyongyang
- Vol Pyongyang - Beijing
- Flight Beijing - Singapore Sunrise 5:30, it rains .. it still decides to join the start trekking hoping the weather improves soon. We walk up to the first cascade, then until the first of the three shelters. The weather is deteriorating. It rains more, the mountain is covered in mist and clouds, we turn back. We are all in small baskets and therefore not equipped for a slippery floor.
We return to have breakfast at the hotel before going to Mangyandai, the birthplace of President Kim-Il Sung. The house reflects the poverty of the family is not Kim-Il Sung. According to legend, the Korean President spoke and wrote to 3 years. And we continue the visit by the Pohyon temple, Buddhist temple founded by the Koryo dynasty. Only pictures of monk interest me.
Then this is the International Friendship Exhibition. This museum was created to accommodate all the gifts received What Kim-Il Sung and Kim Jung Il. The museum has over 150 rooms and 250,000 gifts. It is interesting to note that even European countries and North America are sending gifts. Most French gifts (small Eiffel towers, painted plates, ..) are a little stain face gifts sent by the African countries (spears, furniture, cat skin, ..).
We leave for Pyongyang to take a plane to Beijing. 5h transit and we take a plane to Singapore.
Comments
- North Korea offers no opportunity to pay by credit card or withdraw money. Therefore provide the cash.
- You can pay in Euros, U.S. dollars and Chinese RMB.L agency had advised us to take about 300 euros in small denominations. Cuts of 10-20 euros enough, the stores with enough cuts to get foreign currency.
- North Korea is a shopper's paradise. The wooden objects are a bit kitschy. Only Korean dolls (3 euros) and propaganda posters (usually 30 euros, 10 euros at the airport only) caught our attention.
Expenditures Beijing - Chaoyang taxi to airport (30-40 minutes): 73 RMB
- Hanting Express room: 290 RMB / night
- visit Forbidden City: 60 RMB
- visit the Lama Temple: 25 RMB
- visit Behai Park: 10 RMB
North Korea
- 5 days tour with Country Holidays: 3.360 SGD /
person (inclusive of 2 guides, 1 driver, hotel, meals, tickets Mass Games, ..)
link to the photo album ->
here