Ask a North Korean: Do average North Koreans hate Japanese people?
North Koreans are taught that Japan is the sworn enemy of the Korean people.
In-hua Kim June 7, 2021
“Ask a North Korean” is an NK News column penned by North Korean defectors, most of whom left the DPRK within the last few years.
Readers may submit their questions to defectors by emailing ask@nknews.org and including their first name and city of residence.
Today’s question is from Jimmy in Warsaw, who asks what North Koreans think about Japanese people.
The Korean Peninsula was a Japanese colony from 1910 to 1945, and both Seoul and Pyongyang have difficult relations with Tokyo even today as a result of issues dating back to that period.
But South Koreans generally separate their dislike of the Japanese government from Japanese people. Is this also the case for North Koreans?
In-hua Kim – who lived in North Korea for decades before defecting in 2018 – has the answer.
Got a question for In-hua? Email it to ask@nknews.org with your name and city. We’ll be publishing the best ones.
North Koreans are taught that Japan is the sworn enemy of the Korean people.
At school, we learn that it was Kim Il Sung, North Korea’s first leader, that liberated Korea from Japan — or, as they are more commonly referred to in North Korean propaganda, the “Japanese bastards.”
North Koreans feel that Japan stole their country from them, and that Korean people suffered greatly as a result of Japanese occupation.
North Koreans probably hate Japan even more than America. Sure, North Korea is still technically at war with the U.S. But the actual conflict lasted for three years, between 1950 and 1953, whereas Japan occupied Korea for over three decades.
North Koreans do regard Japanese products as high quality, though. Japanese TVs, bicycles and electronics were highly sought after when I was in North Korea.
But these days, people tend to consider South Korean products as even better.
As for Japanese culture, North Koreans have no interest in things like anime, manga and J-pop. This is unlike much of the rest of the world, including South Korea.
In the jangmadang, North Korea’s underground private markets, you can find copies of South Korean and Chinese dramas. But I’ve never seen anything Japanese there.
“North Koreans feel that Japan stole their country from them.” | Image: NK News (file photo)
North Koreans don’t even like the ethnic Koreans, known as “zainichi,” that moved to the DPRK from Japan.
Large numbers of Koreans moved to Japan during the colonial period. After World War II, some stayed in Japan, but many in the 1960s decided to move to North Korea.
However, they didn’t live the prosperous lives that North Korean propaganda had promised.
When I lived in North Korea, the zainichi were discriminated against. North Koreans didn’t want to marry them and it is more difficult for them to gain membership in the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea.
A zainichi family used to run a vegetable store in my neighborhood, in Hyesan, near the border with China.
Their youngest daughter worked at the local beer factory. The factory’s boss was a zainichi returnee, and the factory itself was set up with money from relatives in Japan.
The daughter married the boss’s son, and they all lived quite well with the money coming in from Japan until the 1990s.
However, once ships coming in from Japan stopped coming, they had to sell all their belongings in order to survive.
The father, who managed the family vegetable store, died from illness. The son took the family car and used it as a taxi.
They couldn’t afford anything to eat. As the father lay on his deathbed, he said that all he wanted was to satiate his hunger.
I knew a Japanese wife that followed her zainichi husband to North Korea, too.
After living in Ryanggang province for a while, she wanted to return to Japan. Life in North Korea was hard, especially after her husband died. Also, one of her two sons was disabled. She really suffered after the money from Japan dried up.
However, the North Korean authorities would not allow her to leave, no matter how many letters she wrote asking for their permission.
Eventually, she moved to a farm in the countryside, where she passed away before realizing her dream of seeing her hometown once again.
Interviews and translations provided by Alek Sigley. Edited by James Fretwell
In-hua Kim is a pseudonym for a North Korean defector writer. She left the DPRK in 2018, and now resides in South Korea.
VIEW MORE ARTICLES BY IN-HUA KIM
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