On the border: The DMZ

I've got a checklist of certain tourist things I need to do before I leave the Land of Morning Calm and one of them was visiting the DMZ. My flatmate's gf was visiting from Turkey so Dan asked if I wanted to join them so early (really really early) Saturday morning, the three of us trudged down to the USO and caught a bus to Paju.

The first part of the tour was the best. Since we went through the USO, we got to go on a tour of the Joint Security Action fort/camp thingie. We got to go into these little guard houses that literally straddled the border between North and South Korea so I've now technically been to North Korea! I got to take a photo with a South Korean guard...



After that, we got a lot on the history of the base and of the post-armistice conflicts that have arisen. The camp itself is named after an officer named Bonifas who was killed by North Korean soldiers when he was supervising his men chopping down a tree that was blocking a view of a guard house. From one check point, we were able to see the propaganda town in NK that flies one of the largest flags in the world.

The second part was lame and not worth writing about. Sorry.

Overall, I'm glad I went. I can now say that I've been to North Korea! Here are some more photos: