Most of us were not only tired but restless. “Okay, I’ve had enough. I like the students and all, but I need to breathe,” Rachel said. At times, Katie said, she felt desperate to go home. An American teacher from the Midwest said, “I just want to get in my car and drive to a store when I want to. That seems like such a luxury.” They had come to PUST because of their deep faith in God and their desire to spread his gospel, but even they were being worn down by this place. We found a bit of relief in talk of a teachers’ field trip to Myohyangsan (Mount Myohyang), a common tourist destination outside Pyongyang. Mount Myohyang was one of only a few mountains open to foreigners. All others were said to be denuded and barren, due to the economic crisis and famine of the mid-1990s, during which people collected everything for food and fuel and left nothing for the soil, and perhaps also to Kim Il-sung’s Find New Land Campaign of the late 1970s, which led to widespread deforestation.
What do You think about Without You, There Is No Us?
