Defectors speak

There's an interesting post at NKZone today, in which a teacher working with North Korean defectors reports on his students' perceptions of the possibility of change in the DPRK.

The questions posed seem based on many unspoken assumptions - most seriously, a suggestion that everyone wants reform, and that armed uprising might be a good way of achieving it.

It seems a missed opportunity to ask more open questions about their perception of the political structure of DPRK and reform. For example, what is their attitude to inward investment? And how autonomous can regions be in practice?

I'd like to know more about what it's actually like living there - where do people live, what work do they do, what do they eat, are they able to form frank friendships or is everyone always suspicious? Are ordinary people cynical about the government, do they want reform? Do people readily spot the discrepancy between what's reported and what they know? What about Ryongchon -what if anything did they hear about that, and where from? How much do they know about the rest of their country? Does anyone really love Kim Jong Il? Does anyone believe that stuff about the star and the two rainbows?

And above all, why did they defect? These are all questions to which we may think we already know the answers, but it would be good to hear from people who really know.

I trust that these students (whose English isn't good enough to read NKZone) knew that the information they gave would be used in this way.