Crazy beautiful: Understanding the Korean mind

(Editor's note: Journalist and photographer Anthony C. LoBaido has lived and worked in South Korea for five years. He has studied the Korean language, worked as a radio reporter for e-FM and trained South Korean army officers up to the rank of brigadier general. This is Part 2 of a special two-part series on North and South Korea by LoBaido. Read Part 1.)

SEOUL, South Korea – Most Americans cannot fathom that South Koreans don't hate North Koreans.

Keeping the Koreas apart (as a facet of America's interim strategic paradigm) is a matter of stopping North and South Korea from reunifying and attacking Japan as a payback for Japan's horrible actions in Korea a century ago. These acts included rape, pimping out comfort women, chopping down all the trees, as well as other environmental crimes while eating up all the kimchi.

Truth be known, North and South Koreans both hate Japan, and this hatred is still white hot in South Korea and might be even worse in the North. Postmodern Japanese cannot wish this away.

Many, if not most, Koreans hail from a handful of dynasties and share last names like Lee, Shin, Kim, Lim, Park and several others. They call one another (even total strangers) "Ajoshi," or "Uncle," or "Ajuma," meaning "Aunt." Koreans are kind, popular immigrants in America, family oriented, tough, smart, creative and capable. They are very adaptable. They were also considered some of the very best soldiers to fight alongside (and independent of) American troops in Vietnam. Just ask any Vietnam veteran you might encounter. (North Koreans, on the other hand, are the world's leading tunnel experts and helped the North Vietnamese.)

Yet this is where the puzzle that forms Korean norms, mores and social values becomes complicated almost beyond imagination. For what the Japanese did to Korea, South Koreans continue on some level to do to themselves and to foreigners. Korean self-hatred is a complex animal. Arab self-hatred, black self-hatred and white self-hatred almost pale in comparison. Everything in Korea is a show. There are white lies at every level of casual and strategic communication.

It must be noted that prostitution is rampant in South Korea and semi-openly marketed in certain areas. Additionally, Korean men are well known for their cheating/affairs, alcohol abuse, being terribly controlling, mentally unstable, greedy and breaking the spirit of their women – both Korean and foreigners alike.

For example, a drop-dead gorgeous foreign woman married to a Korean man might find herself hearing she's fat and has an ugly face. She won't be allowed to go to church alone if he is a non-believer. A divorced Korean woman is considered a "dead leaf" and will find her social status and work options curtailed. Divorce is frowned upon because South Koreans correctly understand its devastating effects on the stability of children, teens, families and the nation as a whole. It should come as no surprise that divorce is on the rise in South Korea. One day Korean grandparents might wind up directly raising their grandchildren. Sadly, children will have multiple "fathers" and Westernized family breakdown.

North Koreans seek a guiding light on their 6,000-mile trek to freedom. (Photo: Anthony LoBaido)

Traditionally speaking, women must carry the burden of holding bad marriages together. Life in South Korea is hard. It's a grind. But Koreans have "jung," or a tight bond of holistic and generic love. The women in South Korea remain strong and work to make society as wholesome as possible in the face of the latent cultural and sexist discrimination they face. Of course, there are good marriages anchored by excellent Korean men, fathers and husbands who adore their wives and children. "Jung"is the key. Again, there are godly Korean men. (As for white, male foreign teachers in South Korea, they are cruelly called "LBHs" or "Losers Back Home," meaning they can't find a "real" job or wife back in the U.S. They can be readily used by South Koreans as con men and front men for fraudulent academic programs featuring unqualified teachers, students driving drunk, falling off a four-story building while drunk, engaging in massive academic fraud and, in effect, stealing the hard-earned money of parents paying their children's college tuition. In South Korea, only outward appearances count. LBHs are desperate, useful lackeys and glorified globalization prostitutes.)

More important to understanding the Korean mind is the fact that Koreans value their racial purity and disdain the idea of obese, gluttonous and unattractive white/non-Korean men polluting their gene pool. Rare is the Korean daughter who can introduce her foreign boyfriend to her parents. When a white man marries a Korean woman and her parents pass away, it is not uncommon to hear the words "we got lucky" coming from the white man in a sad tone. This kind of "racism-lite" is a fact of life. Racism is deplorable, yet it is quite natural to preserve one's respective identity through family, nation, religion and race. However, more and more South Korean men are seeking brides in Southeast Asia, bringing them back home and enrolling mixed-race children in Korean schools. The birth of multiculturalism, depending on whom you listen to, will strengthen or weaken Korean society. The word "segehwa," or "globalization," is the new capstone.

How is South Korean society trending? Consider the Aug. 24, 2012, edition of the Korea Herald, which ran a shocking story summing up South Korea's cultural fallout: "An unemployed man carried out a stabbing spree on Wednesday in Seoul, marking the fourth knife attack to take place in Korea in less than a week. While public anxiety grows, experts say dissent against society … [is] to be blamed." South Koreans have fought off Japan and communism. Smoke-filled rooms and robber barons made South Korea prosper. Can they fight the effects of globalization, multiculturalism, prosperity and the loss of their cultural identity?

Will North Korean refugees fleeing an antichrist hell in Pyongyang make it to Seoul only to face a shallow, superficial consumer culture also at war with God?

Teddy Roosevelt's betrayal of South Korea

Many South Koreans lament that Russia, China and Japan have all in their own way kept the two Koreas apart. Yet it is the United States, via the betrayal of President Theodore Roosevelt, who gave away Korea to Japan for total annexation at his summer White House on Oyster Bay, Long Island, at the end of the Russo-Japanese War. Sadly it was the U.S. that first betrayed all Koreans (North/South) to the horrors of the emerging Japanese Empire. Helping South Korea during the Korean War and in all the years since was our payback for Teddy Roosevelt's turn of the 20^th century betrayal.

A typical North Korean propaganda poster depicting an attack on Washington, D.C.

It could be fairly said that South Korea has outgrown America. Like a teenager ready to go away to college, South Korea is ready to stand on her own two feet.

During the George W. Bush years, the U.S. ambassador to South Korea was told to "shut up." One shouldn't get too carried away with this notion, as not so long ago South Koreans asked America for a written guarantee to remain under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. After all, at the end of the day, America is the nation that taught us to fight for freedom. South Koreans understand this. South Koreans also understand mainland China and Russia can utterly destroy the U.S. in a nuclear war. South Koreans understand North Koreans still live in 1950s war conditions.

South Koreans admire the historical ideals of America but can see the handwriting on the wall concerning America's decline – with China acting as America's bank, open borders, more than 12 million illegal immigrants/wandering nomads lacking a unified purpose, the reduced value of citizenship just as in Ancient Rome, delusional leaders, lost wars, debt, filthy entertainment, divorce, Marxist-oriented universities, gangs, AIDS, broken schools, weakened families, teen rebellion and the decline of spiritual values.

Many South Koreans now fear a similar decline is already gripping their society. Yet of the 20 largest Christian congregations in the world, 10 of them are in Seoul. (Seo means "capital" and ul means "place.") There is still hope for South Korea – make no mistake. But only if righteous Korean men and women can stand up and fight off the globalist forces attacking their culture. (To be frank, it's probably too late to save South Korea's uniqueness and purity.) Many Korean businessmen use Christianity as a social networking tool purely to make money.

So when Koreans offer you the lamentation, "It's not Korea anymore," they're talking about things like the new wave of teen sex, teen suicide, famous actresses killing themselves after being forced to have sex with the wealthy Korean businessmen who sponsored their careers (imagine Bill Gates sponsoring the career of Megan Fox), children now being given courses on how to identify strangers and foreigners who might hurt them, pornography, a "sexed-up culture" and the dilution of their traditional mores through "segewah," the proliferation of the Internet and learning English. Sometimes it seems South Korea has gone mad all at once – as if a titanic tsunami of filth has washed over this 5,000-year-old civilization. The Korea you saw on M*A*S*H does not exist anymore, if it ever did.

By first understanding South Korea, readers can finally begin to understand the Wizard of Oz or "the man behind the curtain" in North Korea known as Kim Jong Un. One might liken this to how World War II helped white Americans to better understand American Indians, and how the Vietnam War helped black and white American soldiers to better understand each other in a clearer context.

An elderly man in North Korea tries to scratch out a living

It's not the 'North' in North Korea that's the problem: It's the 'Korea'

In terms of cognition dissonance, Koreans (both North and South) are well known for their manipulation of events to create a stir that brings their own private agenda to the forefront. They are also well known as frauds in the business world, for misleading foreigners, secretive behavior, stubbornness, continually evaluating their personal position of age and status in comparison to others, putting up a false front, preying upon the weakness of others, leaving no time for negotiation, last-minute details, propaganda and bravado aimed at internal consumption, bad tempers, overworking to the point of losing productivity, as well as an over-reliance and trust in large numbers. (For example, student groups, abortions and economic output/GDP.) Koreans tend to be very negative and tear you down when they first meet you. They keep you off balance by limiting email contact, passive-aggressive behavior, rope-a-dope and organizational bullying.

Just as South Koreans are adept at using Christianity as a pseudo-pious means to expand business and social influence, so too has Christianity in North Korea been perverted by "juche" or "self-reliance," in which the Holy Trinity is comprised of the "father" and "son" from the ruling Kim family while the "Holy Spirit" is juche itself. (This was the "spiritual model" from 1950 to Jung Un, who might now be jokingly referred to as "The Fourth Member of the Holy Trinity.")

As such, it is vital to remember that when the late Kim Jong Il (the father of Jung Un as popularized by Bobby Lee on MADtv) was "acting out" in terms of threats to "turn Seoul into a lake of fire," or actually his launching missiles, exporting weapons and tunnel digging expertise to the Burmese junta, or showing off his budding nuclear arsenal, he was/is merely acting on a level consistent with the basest elements of the total Korean cognitive profile.

He is saying, in effect, "Look at me! Pay attention to me!" And he is also saying, "Put me at the very top of your list of worries and/or concerns." Thus Koreans, North and South, are social drama queens jostling for attention, promotion and just about any type of social ladder climbing imaginable.

And treachery is not just a North Korean virtue. Recall and contemplate that while South African and Rhodesian pilots fought and died in the Korean War, South Korea still betrayed those countries at the United Nations through "pro" votes on sanctions. This even while North Korean mercenaries trained the 5th Brigade in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, which killed between 20,000 to 30,000 Matabele tribesmen who opposed the wicked rule of Robert Mugabe.

While South Korea has battled North Korean terrorism (the 2010 naval attack, the downing of the Korean Airliner and the bombing at the South Korean Embassy in Burma), South Korea had no problem throwing Rhodesia's and South Africa's anti-communist governments over to the terrorism and Marxism of the ANC and South African Communist Party. (Mugabe's ZANU-PF is more Maoist than Marxist.) North Korea also began digging for uranium in the Congo but was expelled after the CIA applied various forms of pressure. Got milk? No. Got uranium? Maybe.

More sobering is the fact that South Korea had no trouble torturing and murdering her own citizens as recently as 1980 during the infamous Gwangju Massacre. This massacre is well known to both historians and the Korean public and is deserving of a book or series of articles all its own. The Gwangju Biennale art show was a positive step in creating a new image for the city. (Gwangju used to be known as "Kwangju.")

The ongoing (though reduced) abortion holocaust in South Korea, aimed at adorable female children, is beyond the pale and demonstrates an inhumanity North Korea can only emulate, if not surpass. South Korea, once ruled by autocratic generals, now has no problem doing business with the Burmese junta.

This is a criticism that many Westerners have of South Koreans – their businessman's brand of Christianity that seems at times to be almost beyond comprehension. For example, in one of journalism's all-time great ironic moments, the well-respected Irrawaddy Magazine, the Bible of Burma-watchers around the world, ran on Page 6 of the July 2009 edition a picture of Kim Dae-jung, the former South Korean president, and his quote, "Aung San Suu Kyi's continued detention shames Asia." The same page also featured a sidebar reading, "US$ 10 Billion is the expected profit for South Korean industrial giant Daewoo from its investment in Burma's offshore gas field over the next 25 years."

South Koreans have revisited Rhodesia through their relations with Myanmar's junta and their self-involved generals. Not surprisingly, South Korean men relate well to patriarchal societies. On a related note, South Koreans seem terrified to ever mention China's horrible human rights record, lest their profits be lessened.

(For example, when this writer asked to bring Harry Wu to a university to speak to the students, the administration was aghast that he might criticize China.)

At the border of the Mekong River between Laos and Thailand, near the town of Chiang Saen, North Korean refugees look to cross at the landmark of the giant golden Buddha (Photo: Anthony LoBaido)

Alternative futures

In light of this, one must ask what the future will bring to the Korean peninsula: war or peaceful economic integration. One possible future for the entire region would involve a "soft landing" for North Korea, reunification with South Korea and a satellite-controlled high speed rail, or KTX, that would ostensibly run from Pusan to Seoul to Pyongyang to Vladivostok/Siberia, Beijing and Ulan Bator. That is the best possible outcome, but it seems a page out of a fantasy world.

But what would happen if and when North and South Korea undergo their long-awaited reunification? China would then be witness to a unified, highly patriotic, nominally Christian, capitalist society right at its doorstep. A reunified Korea would boast a well-trained, two million-man army complete with almost a quarter million Special Forces (North Korea also trains Burma's Special Forces as attested to an agreement signed by North Korean Gen. Kim Kyok Sik on Nov. 27, 2008), as well as nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.

While China and North Korea are both communistic, have spilled blood together, live/lived in varying kinds of police states, use slave labor and see America and Japan as enemies, there are probably unimaginable aspects to their relationship. It is doubtful China wants to be single-handedly responsible for fixing an imploded North Korea. China could welcome South Korea as a partner in rebuilding the North. South Korean "chaebols," or "mega-corporations," would be able to expand and grow in the North. Again, there's money to be made.

China doesn't want the North Korean regime to totally collapse and, thus, hand over a plethora of problems for the People's Liberation Army, or PLA, and Politburo to fix – especially after China's successful hosting of the Olympic Games in 2008, the achievements of her maverick space program and other 21st century advances. Mishandling North Korea would be a black eye for China. These facts have not, and will not be, lost on the rulers in Beijing.

Reunification would also fix South Korea's abortion issue, with females mostly being the victims, hospitals charging higher fees for abortion according to how far along in the pregnancy a woman is and abortion having been encouraged in the past – while still illegal – by the government in an effort to raise the GDP.

(Again, this demonstrates the South Korean spirituality and mindset for so many.) Reunification would allow South Korean boys to marry North Korean girls and strengthen (and or save) the Korean race.

Korean men want sons to carry on their family name. The fact that sons are favored has transformed South Korea's (and China's) social fabric. Many South Korean boys are unable to take criticism, are effeminate, infantilized, metrosexual in manner and dress, crave attention, spoiled and prone to emotional outbursts like punching walls. Luckily for South Korea, the army is the great leveler of manhood, as all able-bodied males must serve in the armed forces.

South Koreans can export racy, popular K-pop, and they can develop, change, mutate and reinvent themselves 100 times over, but they cannot undo certain aspects of their culture; thus abortion remains a vital battleground for the soul of Seoul. Along with Guatemala, South Korea is one of the leading providers of adopted children on Earth. Abortion will remain a key issue in Korean society for the foreseeable future. If China is seen by the Western transnational elite as the perfect autocratic model of the emerging world super state, then South Korea's abortion craze is seen as a "positive" in the minds of the world's population- reduction nihilists. Korean girls are especially adorable, and their murder is sickening. To her credit, Hillary Clinton has spoken out against Asian gendercide.

Would China allow really allow North and South Korea to reunite – maybe if the U.S. were to relinquish protected status over Taiwan? Perhaps as an olive branch, on the 60th anniversary of the Korean War, China officially rewrote the history of that conflict, no longer calling it an American war of imperialism but actually blaming North Korea. This is akin to Carmela Soprano blaming herself for Tony's never-ending sexual misadventures.

One must also consider the fact that South Korea has invested billions of dollars in China. A reunited Korea would mean Seoul, like Germany, would have to recalculate its foreign investments to rebuild the house of its immediate neighbor.

China is already heavily invested in the most lucrative North Korean mining operations and would hesitate to give that up. A reunification of the Koreas would have to continue to allow China to profit from those mining ventures.

Plan 5029: Securing WMDs if North Korea implodes

Korean War monument on Bomunsan (Photo: Anthony LoBaido)

What is going to happen if North Korea implodes before peaceful reunification can take place? Issues such as famine, starvation, crime and refugees would spill across China's borders. North Korea is also well known as the finest counterfeiter of U.S. currency and as a drug trafficker in league with arms and drug merchants based in Burma. Thus, a total collapse of North Korea would unleash those smart, well-trained, well-funded and unscrupulous elements to run wild on China's eastern border. Yet the weapons of mass destruction are paramount to all concerned. Again, as noted, North Korea sports nuclear, biological and biochemical weapons.

Toward that end, Gen. Walter Sharp, while acting as commander of U.S. forces in South Korea, organized drills for a joint Republic of South Korea and U.S. team (believed to be the 20th Support Command and known under its working name, "Plan 5029") to train for removing North Korea's weapons of mass destruction in the event that nation completely falls apart. Plan 5029 seeks to address issues such as civil war in North Korea, a North Korean coup, a revolt by the North Korean army and untold refugees fleeing North Korea into South Korea and perhaps China.

Why would North Koreans come in droves to South Korea? North Korean defectors living in South Korea are not exactly welcomed with open arms. They struggle to fit in and are viewed as outsiders. That is one of the reasons why the refugee WND interviewed chose to live her life in New York City.

Of course, one must remember North Koreans are the world's best tunnel diggers, and their WMDs are heavily guarded by elite troops. It should be noted that one North Korean Special Forces soldier stranded in South Korea during a failed black op killed several South Korean troops attempting to capture him. He made it back across the border into North Korea with the relative ease of a Korean Rambo or 007.

Securing North Korea's WMDs might be easier said than done. Would those guarding the WMDs in North Korea simply give them up? Would they be tempted to sell them to various Central Asian, Middle Eastern or North African state and/or non-state actors? Would they smuggle at least some of them to Iran, Syria, Burma or Zimbabwe? Would they give them to Russia's FSB or China's PLA?

The training to remove North Korea's WMDs was held during Operation Key Resolve. If and when the U.S. fully turns over operational wartime control to South Korea's armed forces (OPCON was slated for April 17, 2012) it has been agreed that U.S. troops would still spearhead "WMD removal operations elimination and site exploitation," according to the March 12, 2010, edition of the Korea Herald.

Keep in mind this whole scenario comes from the same American establishment that gave you the disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina, BP, Af-Pak, the "cakewalk" of Iraq, fun times at Abu Ghraib, random rendition, GE/GM foods, the search for patents on the human genome, the Wall Street meltdown, epic and unpayable debt, errant predator drone strikes and open borders. Can America's politically correct, feminized and sexually experimental military that celebrated the craven sniper assassination of a Somali teenage pirate, or lied about the events surrounding the death of Arizona State alum Pat Tillman, even begin to take on patriotic, hardened North Koreans guarding their WMDs? Americans invaded North Korea in the 1950s and when counter-attacked had to withdraw, if not run for their lives back to Seoul.

The previous regime in South Korea, under President Roh Moo-hyun, had wanted South Korea to lead such operations. It opposed the development of a contingency plan on North Korea, arguing it "could infringe on the country's sovereignty and cause a full-scale war on the Korean Peninsula should the U.S. military take unilateral action against North Korea."

Perhaps most interesting is the fact that the U.S. has approached mainland China about working together to secure North Korea's WMDs in the event North Korea implodes. This was done not long ago by acting U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg during a visit to China. That notion has been flatly rejected by Beijing as "estate planning for Grandpa while he's still living." The U.S. has also asked China about setting up rules of engagement and other various ground rules to prevent the PLA and U.S. forces from shooting at one another as they did during the Korean War. Can America, which had to pay off the militias in Iraq not to fight and can't seem to defeat the Taliban in 11 years of conflict, take on the PLA and/or North Korean army on North Korean soil and win? Korea is more than 80 percent mountains, so flat land is precious and expensive. Ice, freezing snow, bio-weapons, tunnels and more than 100 years of war privation make invading North Korea risky. North Korea is not Grenada, Panama, Iraq or Libya.

According to the AP, in an article by Charles Hutzler published on Aug. 4, 2009, "PLA researchers told a group of U.S. scholars in 2007 that contingency plans were in place for the Chinese military to handle North Korean refugees and even go in to secure nuclear weapons and clean up nuclear contamination."

China has its own version of Plan 5029 but won't share it with U.S. military or diplomatic officials. So much for "The Big Two" – America and China's allegedly blooming friendship. The number of troops the U.S. built up in Afghanistan, in addition to forces already in South Korea (about 28,000) and Okinawa, would probably be needed to conquer, clear and hold the land area of North Korea. The 600,000-plus South Korean troops fighting along with the U.S. wouldn't hurt.

Even then, nothing is certain. North Korea, for all intents and purposes, is still caught in the war-like scenario that gripped Korea during the Japanese colonization and Korean War. It can be fairly said that Brazilian kids play soccer, Dominican kids love baseball, Afghan children learn to fight wars and North Korean children are bred to live without bread. Icy, mountainous North Korea could conceivably win/survive an all-out ground war. Or it could wither and die.

On the border between North Korea and China

For now, North Korea teeters along like Frankenstein – powerful yet fragile, a product of the mad doctors who engineered a Stalinist, hereditary cult. North Korea is propped up by trade with China. Without help from China, North Korea would probably collapse in short order. North Korea gets almost all of its petroleum from China ($300 million per year) and much of its food stuffs (around $150 million).

About 250,000 North Koreans continue move back and forth across the border between China and North Korea. Cross-border trade along the 1,400 kilometer/840-mile border between the two states is about $1.6 billion, according to rough estimates. The route between Dandong – the cornerstone of the Great Wall's eastern flank – in China and Sinuiju in North Korea across the Yalu River (where Gen. MacArthur had wanted to place nuclear waste in an effort to stop Chinese troops from reinforcing North Korean forces during the Korean War) being the most heavily trafficked path.

China has its own issues with which to contend, including keeping the ruling Communist Party together, elites versus populists and the urban versus rural dwellers conundrum. As noted, North Korea remains a headache for China on many levels, but in an all-out war scenario against America and the West, North Korea can play a vital role.

As for South Korea, it has the lowest birthrate in the industrialized world. This is due to its aforementioned abortion Holocaust, the high cost of living and other social factors. South Korea recently deployed robot soldiers along the DMZ (as reported in the U.K. media). Because of the falling birthrate in South Korea, robots and other forms of automation will probably be on the rise in the future. As noted, reunification with North Korea might be the key to securing the future of the Korean race. This fact cannot be denied. Abortion in South Korea, like abortion in mainland China and in Cuba, is a demographic time bomb.

In the final analysis, bringing Burma and a reunited Korea into the orbit of the U.S. seems to be a vital geopolitical endgame. For, along with her increasingly good relations with Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Burma (and with troops and nuclear missiles in "occupied" Tibet), China is encircling India, expanding her "String of Pearls" and cementing her status as the leader of the Kings of the East. As Napoleon said, "Let China sleep, for when she awakes let the nations tremble."

Americans should never forget that China actually invaded Vietnam in 1979 because Vietnam had, in turn, invaded Cambodia in an effort to save the Cambodian people from Pol Pot's genocidal "Year Zero" of the Killing Fields. China lost that war against Vietnam. What kind of nation, leaders and people would fight a war in defense of the Khmer Rouge who had systematically killed off 25 percent of Cambodia's population in just four years? Mao and Pol Pot are the true face of communism – and they are still emulated by North Korea.

China aims to overcome America's "Pacific Pivot." Can America prevail? Millions of South Koreans, North Koreans and the Burmese will help shape the outcome. The future awaits, unknown to all except the supreme architect of all things macro and micro in the universe. For now, we can rest in the assurance that the X-Band radar, Burma's ability to send ethnic tribes across China's border at will, and thus sew havoc, and Burma's trump card of allowing China to build a naval air station complete with submarines in its archipelago and thus interdict the Western-protected Middle Eastern oil flow, are trump cards that can and will be played.

And while you sleep soundly tonight, North Korea, under Kim Jong Un, the "Fourth Member of the Holy Trinity," after the late "Father" Kim Il Sung, the Jesus-like late "son" Kim Jong Il and their "Holy Spirit" of the "self-reliant" juche, will probably remain one of the hair triggers of Armageddon.

To help North Korean refugees:

Life Funds for North Korean Refugees
Representative: Kato Hiroshi
A-101 Nishi Kata Hyteru
2-2-8 Nishi Kata, Bunkyo-ku
Tokyo, Japan 113-0024
Tel / Fax +81-3-3815-8127
NorthKoreanRefugees.com/donate

Related articles by Anthony LoBaido:

Harry Wu talks about China

North Korea made easy

Korea rising

Soldiers who care: Aki Ra land mine story in Cambodia

Leper Nation: Myanmar's Sisters of Charity care for 400 lepers

Elephant nation: Meet Lek Chailert, Time magazine's 'Hero of Asia'

Thousands of Hmong exiles deported from Thailand

(Editor's note: Journalist and photographer Anthony C. LoBaido has lived and worked in South Korea for five years. He has studied the Korean language, worked as a radio reporter for e-FM and trained South Korean army officers up to the rank of brigadier general. This is Part 2 of a special two-part series on North and South Korea by LoBaido. Read Part 1.)