This Girl Escaped North Korea in order to live

I read this book when I was a little worried about the increasing intolerance in India (Especially, in recent times). Although I won’t consider it is directly related, but, this book will help you if you are worried about (or affected by) social imbalance/ injustice. Her story will teach you that whatever we are suffering, be it related to our own personal life or the whole as a society, is way easier to solve than we might think. She is Yeonmi Park who escaped North Korea in order to live.

It’s hard for me to get impressed by people, but this story made a impact on my life. It might help you too…

You can leave this site now if you are already motivated to read about her.

Read the book (affiliated):

Here are three things which I learned from her story,

1. There’s always hope

In the first part, she describes her childhood in North Korea. How she and her family suffered from a great famine, which happened in North Korea in the late 90s, killing more than 3 million people. She describes how people dying on streets, out of huger, was normal. A wall of bodies was the actual reality. Although they were from an upper-middle-class family in North Korea, they didn’t have any amenities like we have in our homes. Electricity was a rare phenomenon. Having two meals a day was considered rich!

The Great Famine

She, her sister and her mother were left alone when her father got arrested for running an illegal business. Although when you read about it, you will realise that it was necessary to run such things. Otherwise, survival was impossible. After her father’s arrest, her family was a true victim of hunger. She describes how she used to catch rats, dragonflies and eat them with awe. How her school used to force children to collect human waste so that they could sell it to make fertilisers in factories. And I am not describing a story of a woman. All this happened when she was just under 10 years old! For any child, it is nerve-breaking.

The realisation

This part of the story is about the realisation. North Koreans don’t have access to the external world in any form. They don’t even know the world outside their own country and don’t have internet access, or any other type of external information. The regime has brainwashed these people for generations. To make them believe, that their leaders are gods, their country is a heaven and that their suffering is valid. Little kids of her age are heavily brainwashed. She was too!

But as a young mind, as a good observer, she started realising her problems at a young age. A phenomenon which happens with each one of us. When we grow up, we get told by people what life is, and why it is the way it is and how it functions the way it is. The only difference for her is that she was in her early teens when she started looking for answers. That must have been very intense.

Even if it’s hard, there’s always hope

Even though she had one of the hardest life one can imagine as a child, she still managed to keep that flame of hope alive, that alone is a great thing to hone. From her being acute observant, thinking beyond the radicalised thoughts, building her own opinions in a country where individuality doesn’t exist, to the determination of leaving the place! It is a nerve-racking experience on its own. Even if it’s hard, there’s always hope.

2. Life is a gift

She leaves for China with her mother (in search of her lost sister, I won’t write those details here). You can imagine what can happen to a woman and a little girl, alone in a foreign land. Her mother gets raped in front of her on the street on the first day of moving to China, that’s not even the worst part, her mother gave herself to protect her from the rapist. Her age, early teens. She didn’t even have an idea of what was happening. She and her mother get sold for less than a few hundred dollars, to two different families. As she stays with her seller (reseller) she becomes her maid. I won’t spill those details here.

Worse is better than worst

Shocking enough, she says it was still a better life than North Korea. As she was at least getting a proper meal every day! In China, although her personal life was dire, she was experiencing freedom for the first time. She describes how she learns to use bathroom soup and shampoo for the first time. Having a shower was a luxury in North Korea. She gets shocked to see restaurants full of food. Using all the electronics, and seeing cars on the street was a first-time experience. This is a bittersweet part. Although we listen to her mental and physical harassments, we rejoice in her freedom somewhere.

As she grows up in China, she embraces this freedom and starts to control life for the first time. She starts to make some money. She fights back to rejoin her mother. We see a young Yeonmi fighting to make a living. If the first part was about realising their surroundings, this part is about realising her being a human! An independent thinker, who wants to take charge of her own life.

Cost of freedom

She left Korea for that freedom, but that came with mental and severe physical harassment. I want to repeat this again; she was just 13 when all this happened. Even then, she never lost her hope. Taking control of your own life, that too at such young age, it is inspiring. We live in a protected society and don’t let our kids take anything into their hands until they are mature. Life is not all sunshine and rainbows. We learn that only when we are just enter the world in our late teens or early twenties, by then it might be too late. Life is a gift, no matter how hard it is, you have to fight for it.

3. Learn for freedom

In a search of freedom, she and her mother walked the entire desert to reach Mongolia. Where they were brought up by christen missionaries. They found a way to get into South Korean refugee camps. This part of her story is about achieving stability.

As they arrive at refugee camps, they had to learn basic skills from scratch. Reading, writing or being educated etc. things which makes use brain juice. She found herself lacking education. 

While in North Korea, with their education policies, kids don’t learn science, maths or other subjects but only history, with over-glorification of their country’s past. So kids don’t have any real education. She had to learn, how to learn. (Alright, that made me excited). She must have been a clever kid in that camp but that didn’t mean she was good in real-world schools. She had to catch up with the world yet. We see her suffering from discrimination by South Koreans, from being illiterate to being physically weak.

Gaining the ability to think

Similar to any other story, the only way out is by getting an education. So she aspires to get into university. It’s a Pandora’s box when you suddenly learn how to read. She reads many historical books, classic novels, philosophies and a lot more. She learns about autocracies in North Korea and how she was brainwashed by the regime. Many dogmas get broken, and many beliefs get changed. She learns the language of thinking and we can see her describing that as it happens.

When you have more words to describe the world, you increase your ability to think complex thoughts.

After years of suffering, she unites with her mother and sister again. She gets into a prestigious university. There we see an end of life long struggle, age: still under 20.

Inspiration from In Order to Live

Obviously, there are a ton more details left to read in this book. We blame ourselves, our surroundings, our parents, teachers, and support for having this hard life. Our problems are only about us, they don’t affect others much. Most of us live in a bubble as kids, and then that bubble suddenly pops up when we start making money for the first time. In the rush of settling down, making a living, and understanding the world around us we forget about others who are suffering an even harder life.

This story inspires us to look beyond, forces us to think about our freedom, and makes us believe in our curiosity! I would recommend this to anyone who can read this sentence.

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Thanks for reading!