Last week, we shared with you the reality of life as a woman in North Korea. Daily routines rarely vary, and weeks blend into months and years. At the crack of dawn, mothers scrounge up what little resources they have – grain, herbs, cornmeal, and tofu dregs – to concoct a porridge breakfast that can barely sustain their lives and the lives of their families. After some general housekeeping and sending their husbands to work and children to school, women scramble to earn enough money to make it to the next day. Some go to the local jangmadang (illicit marketplace), where they sell raw goods and upcycled items. Meanwhile, they have to stealthily avoid the scrutiny of Party officials, lest they be forced to relinquish their earnings as bribes or provide sexual favors in exchange for officers’ lenience. Another portion of women face the unavoidable prospect of labor mobilization, where they may be transported to faraway work sites to perform work mandated by the state, such as weeding, hauling sand, building factories, and erecting dirt embankments. On the weekends, North Korean women enjoy no respite, as they attend mandatory ideological lessons and self-criticism sessions. It is no wonder, then, that North Korean women comprise the vast majority of defectors escaping the Hermit Kingdom, where the struggle for survival is not an anomaly, but an everyday monotony. This is the second installment of a three-part email series mapping the journey of North Korean women from tyranny to liberty, highlighting their impossible resilience at each perilous step in their voyage. We draw from our report, ‘Daring to Even Dream of
Excerpt via Jubilee Campaign. Read the full article at the source →
