When Dennis Doran entered North Korea on vacation last summer, he was told to give up his cell phone.
Doran, who lives in the city’s Bergen Hill area outside Journal Square, visited one of the most secretive and isolated countries in the world in August.
He witnessed people bowing to statues of Kim-Il Sung; he listened to loudspeakers blasting propaganda, stayed in a hotel on an island within the city, and was instructed on how to take a photo.
“Coming from Jersey City, I have some experience with a dictatorship.” – Dennis Doran
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Traveling with his son Andrew and longtime friend Al Podell, Doran made North Korea the first stop on a two-month journey through several Asian countries.
Now, Doran will share his recollections of eight days spent inside the totalitarian dictatorship at a meeting of the University Club of Hudson County this Wednesday at the Lincoln Inn, 13 Lincoln St., in Jersey City from 6 to 9 p.m. The presentation will include a talk and pictures taken “surreptitiously,” as Doran put it.
Doran said looking back on the trip reminded him in some ways of how Jersey City once existed during his childhood when the legendary Mayor Frank Hague was finishing his 30-year reign in the late 1940s.
“Coming from Jersey City, I have some experience with a dictatorship,” said Doran laughing. “There’s the Great Leader, and you bow to him and you don’t say a bad word about him or the police will take you away.”
Stranger in a strange land
Doran remembered the common reaction from friends and family when they found he was going to North Korea.
“They were like ‘why on earth are you going there?’ ” Doran said. “My attitude was, I wouldn’t get this opportunity very often, so why not take it.”
In fact, about 1,500 Western tourists visit North Korea each year as well as thousands of Asian tourists.
North Korea, officially known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, was formed in 1948 after World War II when the Korean Peninsula was split in two, with the northern part controlled by the Soviet Union and the southern part controlled by the United States. The country earned its reputation through the iron-fisted rule and “cult of personality” formed by its founder, Kim Il-Sung for over four decades until his death in 1994.
His son, Kim Il-Jong, has run North Korea since his father’s death and continues his policies of maintaining tense relations with neighboring South Korea as well as Western countries, including the United States.
Doran saw firsthand how difficult the North Korean government makes it for tourists to enter into their country.
The first step to enter is to apply for an entry visa months in advance, which Doran, his son, and his friend Podell did. Doran said North Korea has certain onerous restrictions for entry.
“You have to swear you are not a journalist, a travel writer, or a photographer,” Doran said.
To know if his application was approved, he and his son had to travel to Beijing, China to find out from the Chinese Embassy. After a three-day wait, they were given the go-ahead.
Memorable excursion
Doran, his son, and Podell joined up with a tour company from Spain, one of the tourist groups that travels into the country annually. As soon as they entered, Doran and his party had to give up their cell phones.
Then they were assigned a “minder” and two guides who kept close company with the trio wherever they went.
“You cannot do anything without them being with you,” Doran said. “You can’t go visit a museum because you wouldn’t be allowed to enter. You were also not allowed to walk around on your own.”
Still, they managed to snap photos, which he’ll reveal in his presentation this week.
Ricardo Kaulessar can be reached at rkaulessar@hudsonreporter.com.