In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom

by Yeonmi Park

I turned to take a quick glance back at the place where I was born. The electric power grid was down, as usual, and all I could see was a black, lifeless horizon.

In most countries, a mother encourages her children to ask about everything, but not in North Korea.

Sometimes during recess from school we lined up to take turns beating or stabbing dummies dressed up like American soldiers.

It was normal to see bodies in the trash heaps, bodies floating in the river, normal to just walk by and do nothing when a stranger cried for help.

There were so many desperate people on the streets crying for help that you had to shut off your heart or the pain would be too much. After a while you can’t care anymore. And that is what hell is like.

Just about every morning we woke up to the sound of the national anthem blaring on the government-supplied radio. Every household in North Korea had to have one, and you could never turn it off. It was tuned to only one station, and that’s how the government could control you even when you were in your own home.

If she had succeeded in running away, Hongwei would have had to refund the farmer’s money; his women came with a limited one-year warranty, just like a car.

I thought I had seen modern toilets in China, but this was incomprehensible. The bowls were so shiny and clean, I thought that was where you washed your hands.

I read to fill my mind and to block out the bad memories. But I found that as I read more, my thoughts were getting deeper, my vision wider, and my emotions less shallow. The vocabulary in South Korea was so much richer than the one I had known, and when you have more words to describe the world, you increase your ability to think complex thoughts.

we all have our own deserts. They may not be the same as my desert, but we all have to cross them to find a purpose in life and be free.

Thank you for believing in me. There were times when I had lost my faith in humanity, but you have heard me. You have cared. And this is how, together, we begin to change the world.