To state the truth: I am a member of what is and what will be the last Christianized generation in American history. It was my generation that had the blessing of being soaked in a Christianized culture that permeated everything from education to entertainment. Such soaking was a blessing not appreciated appropriately at the time, but as time races on, I do appreciate it more each day.
TURNING THE TABLES
Now, let's turn the tables and look at a youth raised without the blessings I and my generation had and examine the life of a girl raised in culture rigorously soaked in atheism, a culture in which the Bible is blocked at every turn and the state is sovereign.
Here, in her own words, were her growing up years in North Korea.
"I was taught never to express my opinion, never to question anything. I was taught simply to follow what the government told me to do or say or think. I actually believed that our Dear Leader, Kim Jong Il, could read my mind, and I would be punished for my bad thoughts. And if he didn’t hear me, spies were everywhere, listening at the windows and watching in the school yard.
"We were ordered to inform on anyone who said the wrong thing. We lived in fear. In most countries, a mother encourages her children to ask about everything, but not in North Korea. As soon as I was old enough to understand, my mother warned me to be careful about what I was saying. ‘Remember, Yeonmi-ya,’ she said gently, ‘even when you think you’re alone, the birds and mice can hear you whisper.’
THE RADIO, THE TV
"Radios and televisions came sealed and permanently tuned to state-approved channels. If you tampered with them, you could be arrested and sent to a labor camp for re-education, but a lot of people did it anyway. In the border areas those of us with receivers could sometimes pick up Chinese broadcasts. I was mostly interested in the food commercials. My friends and I would watch these incredible things, but it never really occurred to us that our lives could be any different.
THAT MOVIE
"My uncle Park Jin had a VCR, and when I was very young, I would go to his house to watch tapes of Hollywood films. My aunt covered the windows and told us not to say anything about it. I loved Cinderella, Snow White and James Bond. But when I was seven or eight years old, the film that changed my life was "Titanic."
"I couldn’t believe how someone could make a film out of such a shameful love story. In North Korea the filmmakers would have been executed. No real human stories were allowed, nothing but propaganda about the Leader. The idea that people could choose their own destinies fascinated me. This pirated Hollywood film gave me my first small taste of freedom."
THE PHYSICAL, BUT NOT THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ESCAPE
She escaped when she was 15, but her mind was still captive to the Great Leader. One day in school, after her escape, the teacher asked her to tell the class what her hobby was. She couldn't answer because she didn't know what "hobby" meant. In North Korea, every thought and activity was to be occupied by the state and its leader. There was no such thing as a hobby and no word for it. When there is no word for something, you can't think about it.
THE BOOK
Later, she was asked to tell the class her favorite color; she couldn't answer because the thinking of the North Korean was brainwashed to be "We," the group, the state, not "I," the individual. "I" don't have anything; the state does. One of her most eye-opening moments was when she read Orwell's "Animal Farm" and it hit home.
There was no prolonged electricity in her home; it was on again, off again, mostly off. Running water was a sometime luxury and there was little or no food because of government-produced famines; most of the food went to the powerful leaders. A special day for her was noodle day, when her mother made noodles. But often there were not enough noodles to share with others.
From time to time, she would come across bodies in the streets, either frozen or starved to death, or both. The most horrific discovery for her occurred when she approached a lake and came upon a naked corpse whose face was twisted in a death agony. She knew he had died trying to get to the water, but failed.
That's the way it is, not was, in North Korea.
The last generation of Christianized Americans: we can remember back when, back then, and shed a tear for those who do not know and will never know.
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