I Watched K-Dramas Inside North Korea. They Gave Me the Courage to Escape | Hannah’s Story
How many times have you checked your phone today? Fifty? A hundred? Every time we look at the screen we are connected to the world around us and an endless stream of information—news, research, entertainment.
Now imagine waking up tomorrow in a place without the internet. A place where people are executed for sharing foreign media, and where families risk their lives just to stay in touch across borders.
For 26 million people in North Korea, this is their reality. And 7 years ago, I was one of them.
I was born in Hoeryong, a city in the northernmost part of North Korea near the Tumen River. Winters were brutal and there were frequent shortages of fuel and electricity.
My father was a high school physics teacher. He was quiet, loyal and diligent. His days started at 7am in the classroom and went late into the night, even on weekends. But despite his dedication, the monthly rations he received were not enough for our family.
So in order to survive, my mother began selling goods at the market. She wanted a better life for us, and that led her to do the unthinkable—escape North Korea. Three times she tried. Three times she was caught. Each time she was imprisoned and sent to a labor camp.
The prison camp was a living hell. My mother saw women waste away from hunger and die from simple illnesses. She was one of the lucky ones; her family brought her food and medicine, an act that made her a witness to the suffering of others.
I was just 13 when I first visited her, carrying a bowl of rice. In North Korea, it falls to families to provide for their imprisoned relatives.
Seeing my mother stand there like a criminal, her head bowed before the guard, I knew this wasn't right. I should have been in school, but instead, I was sneaking food to her, hiding from the stares of strangers.
We were being punished, but I didn't understand why. I felt wronged, and in my anger, I blamed her.
My mother had made a choice to save her family, but North Korean society saw her as a criminal. My father, who had led a quiet life as a teacher, was denied opportunities at work. Our family was labeled as traitors.
In 2013, on her fourth attempt, my mother finally escaped and made it to South Korea. She worked tirelessly to send money back to North Korea to help our family. She also slowly opened a window into another world.
Using a smuggled Chinese cell phone I was able to speak to my mother from time to time. And on our secret calls she shared with me new South Korean expressions and words she was learning. As she settled into a new society, despite numerous differences, she also recognized similarities between North and South Korea and its people, and reminded me that despite decades of division, we are still one people.
I secretly began watching South Korean sitcoms. I’ll never forget one called “High Kick 3.” In one episode, there was a story about a man who fell into debt and was being chased by collectors. But what shocked me was that his family wasn’t punished for it. In North Korea, if one person “sins” the entire family is condemned. But this showed me that in South Korea, life could be different. That even within a family, you were free to make your own choices.
This realization changed me and offered a glimpse of the vast world beyond North Korea. Information, even in the form of a sitcom, was hope. And it was worth risking everything for.
Meanwhile, I continued to face obstacles in my day to day life. I had learned how to code and use software like photoshop, and I dreamed of going to university after graduation. But because my mother had defected, I was rejected. So I used my computer skills to find work as a photographer and photo editor.
Hoping to advance my career, I volunteered for the "shock brigade," a group sent to do manual labor at dangerous construction sites. While others prayed they wouldn't get picked for this kind of work, I went willingly, thinking it could be my way to a promotion.
I was sent to the Samjiyon district, a place known for its harsh winters. For over a month, I demolished buildings in minus 40-degree weather without protective gear. Dust filled my lungs, and sweat froze my clothes solid. My only relief was being able to sleep in a crumbling basement.
When I returned, expecting the promotion I had been promised, my supervisor simply said, "Let's wait a little longer."
That was the moment I understood my mother. She had risked her life to escape because she was after something more fundamental than a better life. She wanted to live like a human being.
In 2019, I made the same choice and escaped. With the help of Liberty in North Korea, I made it safely to South Korea and reunited with my mom.
Freedom wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be. In North Korea, my tech and computer skills had helped me survive. I had always thought that “no matter where I go, as long as I have a computer, I’ll be fine.” But in South Korea, I struggled with something as simple as a new keyboard layout. In school, subjects like social studies felt foreign because I had grown up in a completely different education system with distorted versions of history and philosophy. My dream of going to college suddenly felt impossible.
Eventually I found my place in science. The formulas and equations in math, chemistry, and physics were the constant, unchanging truths I could always count on.
I decided to major in electrical engineering. It was rare for North Korean defectors to pursue this field. But I was determined to stay ahead and not fall behind in our rapidly changing world. Now my goal is to become an engineer who can help bridge North and South Korea’s science and technology industries when the two countries are one again.
More than ever, I see that information isn’t just about knowledge and convenience—it’s a lifeline. Without access to information, you can’t see a way forward, let alone build a future.
And right now, the people I left behind are more cut off than ever before. During the pandemic, North Korea closed its borders to an unprecedented extent. Soldiers along the border had shoot-to-kill orders for anyone trying to escape. Around 90% of the markets were forced to shut down, leaving families with barely enough to eat. The UN reported that nearly half the population—12 million people—faced food insecurity, while the World Health Organization rated North Korea’s access to medical care as the lowest in the world.
A few years ago, when my father became very sick, I was able to send him money for medicine and hospital care. But most North Koreans don’t have that chance. Without someone on the outside, they are not only cut off from resources and information, but from hope itself. For many, their future depends on a lifeline from the outside world.
Supporting North Korean people and protecting human rights cannot be put off.
We have an opportunity to be a lifeline for people inside North Korea today. To remind them that they have not been forgotten. With your support, we can rescue and support more North Korean refugees, and get more outside information and technology to people inside the country. And that information can empower North Koreans to not only see a way forward, but to ultimately determine their own future.
Despite the risks, North Koreans are quietly accessing foreign media and learning about life in the outside world. Increasing their access to uncensored information is one of the most effective ways to increase change inside the country.
Liberty in North Korea partners with North Korean defectors and engineers, like Hannah, to develop technology, content, and tools tailor-made for the North Korea context. Our goal is to empower North Koreans with information about the outside world, increasing their aspirations for social and economic progress, and building pressure for change and opening.
Empower North Koreans with information access.
Give Today
A Little Story about How the Media Gets North Korea Wrong
The North Korean government did not tell the people to prepare for another famine, but you probably saw headlines like this in the last week.
Here's how a mere mention of the 'arduous march' in the North Korean state media blew up and was incorrectly reproduced by media around the world in the space of a couple of days:
On March 28th, an essay by two North Koreans, Park Ok-kyoung and Choi Yoo-il, was published in the Rodong Sinmun (North Korea’s main paper). It included a passage, which roughly translates to “The road of the revolution is long and tough. There may again be times that call for chewing grass roots during an arduous march, and times that call for fighting the enemy single-handedly on a far-flung island...but we have to keep our single-minded loyalty for our dear marshal to the very end even if it costs our lives...”
The reference to the 'arduous march', the same term used to label the North Korean famine of the 1990s, caused a lot of excitement. But the term predates the 1990s famine. The original ‘arduous march’ was actually in 1938-39. It was a supposedly tough period of time that Kim Il-sung's band of guerrilla fighters had to 'march' through to victory in their fight against the Japanese occupiers. This tale credits Kim Il-sung for the defeat and is a classic 'struggle through adversity to final victory' type of story. So when times got tough in the 1990s, the official propaganda machine kicked in and framed it as a national struggle through adversity on the way to a final victory.
It was also about maintaining autonomy in the face of external threats, which was the context for this piece. The piece was meant to build up to the Party Congress in May, which is a massive political event that requires 'ideological preparation of the masses'.
So did the North Korean government tell the North Korean people to prepare to chew grass to survive another famine? Or to prepare to fight the enemy all by themselves on a far-off island? Not particularly. They basically said that the North Korean people must stick with their leader, even if things get tough, and all shall be overcome. And it also wasn't written in the name of Kim Jong-un (that would make it more of a story), but in the name of two individuals writing for the paper.
So, why did this happen?
Far too few journalists can read Korean, let alone know how to read and interpret North Korean propaganda. But there's a lot of international appetite for stories about North Korea. So once a piece like this gets out that makes sense to journalists with a peripheral awareness of North Korea, it is easy for it to bounce around the global media echo chambers, getting picked up by many outlets without any accuracy check on the interpretation.
Furthermore, the North Korean government isn’t going to come out and correct it. Here's where there is some truth in the statement "when it comes to North Korea news, anything goes." At this point it becomes something that ‘happened’ without actually happening.
On a brighter note, thanks to the deeper economic and food security resilience built up by the bottom-up marketization, private-plot farming, and linkage to the Chinese economy, a recurrence of a famine on the scale of the 1990s is extremely unlikely in North Korea now.
[Post edited on 2016-04-11 for clarity and accuracy]
