Two North Korean defectors spoke to students about preconceptions about North Korea, their experiences escaping and how they accustomed to life in South Korea as university students at a Tuesday event sponsored by Liberty in North Korea (LiNK) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Center for East Asian Studies.
LiNK is an international nonprofit organization that helps resettle North Koreans and empower those who have left to become advocates on the issue. They also help refugees escape North Korea “through a 3,000 mile secret rescue route,” according to their website.
LiNK fellow Rose Jang defected in 2008 with her mother. She was in elementary school at the time, and reminisced on how she had resented her mother for taking her away from her grandparents, whom she will never see again.
“It felt like a cruel trick,” Jang said. “I couldn’t accept my new reality of never seeing my grandparents again at such a young age.”
As Jang slowly grew accustomed to her new life in South Korea, she came to resent her North Korean heritage and tried to hide it from her new friends.
“I was proud of not looking or sounding like a North Korean. I had been living my life avoiding who I was,” Jang said.
She says that it took her a long time to accept herself and her identity. Part of that journey was becoming an activist for LiNK and educating others about North Korea.
“Survelliance, chaos and oppression face North Koreans,” Jang said. “I dream of returning home one day when all North Koreans can live free and full lives.”
Hannah Oh, the other LiNK fellow, defected from North Korea in 2019, far more recently. She was born in Hysean, the northernmost city in North Korea and one of the coldest cities in the country. While growing up, she said, they regularly didn’t have electricity or enough food to eat.
“My father was a high school physics teacher,” Oh said. “Despite his long hours, the monthly rations he received were not enough for our family. In order to survive, my mother began selling goods at the market. She wanted a better life for us, and that hope led to her trying to escape North Korea three times.”
Oh’s mother tried to leave North Korea three times, and was imprisoned in a labor camp. She recounted that it was “a living hell”, alongside memories of bringing her mother rice at age 13 and wondering why her mother and family were being treated like prisoners.
Oh’s mother was able to successfully escape on her fourth attempt and resettled in South Korea.
“My mother had made the choice to leave to save her family, but North Korean society saw her as a criminal,” Oh said.
She recalled her mother sending her money for a computer and smartphone from her new home in South Korea. She used these to secretly learn about the outside world, and became inspired to one day join her mother in South Korea.
When Oh applied to university in North Korea, she was denied admission because of her mother’s defection.
“I volunteered for the shop brigade that did manual labor at dangerous construction sites,” she said. “When I returned, expecting a promotion, my supervisor simply said, ‘let’s wait.’ That was the moment I understood my mother. She wanted to live like a human being.”
Life after defecting
Jang recently graduated from Hongik University in Seoul, South Korea and utilized her architectural degree to create a memorial that symbolizes the struggles of the North Koreans and commemorates the sorrow of separation.
“The names of loved ones are carved into stone, representing those we missed dearly from before politics and ideology."
Oh is now a 4th year electrical engineering student at Hongik University in Seoul, South Korea. Her family, as well as Jang’s, is safe, she said. They look forward to working more with LiNK to share their stories.
