jooyang

I think that people believe it kind of like people believe in the bible. Well, that's the case for children.

But when you grow up, you realise those stories do not make sense, but you still have to memorize it well for the school tests in order to graduate from school well.

More recently, amongst close friends, people will complain that this kind of ideological education will not actually help you in your life. I felt like that too.

In North Korea, it's very hard to know the weather forecast because of frequent power cuts, unlike in South Korea.

So we made a cover story that my father had died at sea and my mother and other family members had left our house to try to find any remains of my father.

So I was in our house my myself, but the secret police came to ask me questions. I stuck to the story and told them that my family had become separated, and stonewalled their questions.

I knew that the secret police used people in the neighborhood to monitor my behavior, but I just pretended not to notice and carried on living my life.

First it was kind of like arriving in the modern world in a time machine.

There were so many things I didn't know, but as I learnt one thing after another by trying them, that was really fun.

Even typing on a computer was really novel and fun at first.

It's been three years, but even now there's still a lot of new things.

I am learning English now, but actually I am doing this with a LiNK staffer, Sokeel Park, who is helping me communicate in English. Are you disappointed? haha - JY

[I grew up in the UK. That's why my English is better than most Americans. Zing! haha - SP]

South Korean people can be quite discriminating, for instance against Korean-Chinese people living in South Korea.

When I speak, I have a dialect and to many South Koreans it sounds like how Korean-Chinese people from Northeast China speak. Sometimes people have asked if I'm from there, and I felt negativity in their tone.

Also, one time my auntie was riding in a taxi when the driver asked where she was from. When she replied "North Korea", he stopped the car and asked her to get out!

Even so, for me personally, I think that being open with where I am from helps me to adapt to life here in the long run.