“It does exist, and it is just as you saw it. It has enough food for everyone, and medicine if you get ill. It has houses and apartments with bathrooms where you wash and go to the toilet. It has heating where you flick a switch and the room gets warmer.” He lowered his voice further. “And it has shops where you can buy things.”
I stared at him, and suddenly everything felt very serious.
“Clothes. And music, all different sorts. And they have televisions with programmes and channels you can choose. And books with stories, or about different countries and their leaders, who are voted for.”
“We have a leader that we vote for too,” I whispered.
He nodded. “But in other countries,” he said slowly and carefully, “there is more than one name on the slip. They have a choice.” His eyes bored into mine. “One day I’ll take you there. I hope you can live there. Have a future there. Be happy… but…” His voice drifted off and I watched as he lifted up the lamp and scanned the darkness around us, as he wiped his hand across his face and took a step towards me.
“Do you understand what I’m saying to you, Yoora?”
I nodded, although I wasn’t sure. I thought I did, but I didn’t know if I wanted to hear this, didn’t understand how anywhere like that could exist. Didn’t know whether to believe him. Or to trust him.
He sighed, moving closer to me, looking at me so intently. “What do you think to things here, Yoora? Our country? What do you think to our Dear Leader?”
I felt my body stiffen and my back straighten.
“You think he’s fair? Looks after us?”
“Of course,” I replied without thinking.
“You think we should feel this hungry? Or this cold?”
“Why are you asking me that? We’ve got everything we need here. He provides everything. There’s nowhere any better than here, He tells us that… He tells us…” My blank eyes stared into Father’s and I quoted lines I’d known for ever:
“We grow up in the land of freedom
All the little comrades march in rows
Singing in this paradise of peace
Tell me, of what can the world envy us?”
I focused back on him.
“Freedom?” he asked. “Paradise? You think so? Really, Yoora? After what I’ve just told you? After seeing that place in your dream?” He shook his head. “Open your eyes, look around you. If this is truly how you imagine freedom and paradise, then you have no imagination.” His voice was alive with passion and anger. “Are you hungry, Yoora? He’s not, our Dear Leader. He eats Chinese dolphins and French poodles, caviar and sea urchins.”
My mouth fell open at the hatred I could hear in his voice. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. I just stood there, hearing words coming from Father’s mouth that I never thought he would say.
I could believe that place was real. I could believe it was in North Korea. I could believe it was somewhere only the most hardworking and loyal citizens were allowed to go. But I could not believe any more than that. Father’s words about the city had made me question him, but these… these made me worry about his sanity.
“Are you cold?” Father continued. “He’s not. He lives in his palace with fires in every room and people to make them for him. Look how thin you are. Think of what he looks like. Has he ever missed a meal? Eaten only corn for a whole week? Gone to bed hungry? No. Is that how it should be? Is that right? Should he live like that while his people are starving?”
My hands flew over my mouth then over my ears. I strode away and then back. I couldn’t believe he dared even think the words coming out of his mouth. I didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want those thoughts and words in my head, corrupting me with reactionary lies, challenging my faith in my country, our Fatherland. What he was saying was a crime against the state, an insult to the authority of the leadership that he could be arrested for. That it was my duty to report him for. That I could be arrested for if I didn’t.
“I’ve wanted to share this with you for so long, what I think, really I have. For years your grandfather’s been telling your mother that you’re old enough to understand and to know not to say anything. But how could I? You had to believe it all, as if it was all true, every word. If you repeated anything I told you at school, we could all have been killed, the whole family, you too.”
I put my hands over my ears again. “No,” I hissed. “No, I don’t want to hear it. Don’t say it. Don’t. Don’t.”
He pulled my hands away. “Think of that place from your dream, think how different it was from here. It’s real, Yoora, it’s real.”
I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see him, but still he had hold of my wrists and I couldn’t stop his words. So I sang, I recited, over and over –
“Our future and hope depend on you
The People’s fate depends on you
Comrade Kim Jong Il!
We are unable to survive without you!”
“Yoora, stop it! Listen to me!” Father hissed.
I kept on chanting, but still I could hear his lies.
“There are places better than this in the world – people aren’t starving everywhere, people are happier. Feel that ache of hunger in your stomach, and the cold pulling at your face, and remember the last time you saw Kim Jong Il on television, a big, fat, round man, with clothes that look new, and a warm furry hat on his head.”
He put a hand gently over my mouth, and I stopped singing.
“You are my daughter, and I can feel the bones in your arms and legs. I can count your ribs, reach my hands round your waist. But I have no more food to give you. In the mornings while you sleep, I stare at your pale skin and your blue lips, and I rest my hand on your face and feel the cold of it, but I don’t have enough fuel to keep you warm. And I can’t get you a new coat or an extra blanket, or even a pair of socks with no holes. And it makes me want to cry. And it’s all because of that man.”
I stared at Father. At his eyes glistening as they filled with tears, at the love I could see in his face as moonlight filtered through the trees and dappled his skin.
So deluded.
“No,” I said, taking his hand away from my mouth and wriggling from his grip. “You’re wrong. It’s because of you. If you worked harder, were a better citizen, then He’d provide us with more food and vouchers to exchange for clothes. It’s not His fault the floods came and washed away so many crops.” I turned and marched towards home, the lamp swinging in my hand.
“What floods?” Father demanded, following me out of the trees.
“The floods in other parts of the country. And He told us about the American capitalists and the Japanese imperialists, how it’s their fault too that we’re hungry and cold and tired. All we need to do is what He tells us – eat two meals a day instead of three; work harder, longer hours; be better citizens.”
“What do you know about the Americans or Japanese apart from the lies you’ve been told at school? Do as He says, do as He tells you, believe what He speaks – it’s all you’ve ever lived by. It’s not your fault. But I’m trying to tell you it’s not right, it’s not true.”
I stopped again and turned to him. “If that place is real, then how did it get in my head?”
He stared at me for too long. Then, without a word, he shook his head.
“I should report you,” I hissed, and I stormed away from him and didn’t look back.