President Trump says that he and Kim Jong-un « fell in love. » What might this mean to North Koreans?
President Trump had another rally in West Virginia last night (Wheeling). He made some shocking statements about North Korea — or statements that would be shocking but for the “new normal” that has set in. For instance, Trump said this about his relationship with Kim Jong-un: “We were going back and forth, and then we fell in love, okay? No, really. He wrote me beautiful letters, and they’re great letters. We fell in love.”
Trump made me think of Yeonmi Park, a young woman I met and interviewed in 2014. A North Korean, she made an escape with her family in 2007 and is unfathomably brave. She told me something about love — love in the context of North Korea. First, let me provide a little background. Indeed, I will quote from my piece about her:
To survive, Yeonmi and her sister ate dragonflies, frogs, tree bark, and grass. You could eat grass only before June, because, afterward, it was poisonous. When Yeonmi was nine, she and her classmates were made to witness public executions. I will quote again from my piece:
Fleeing, Yeonmi faced rape and every other manner of hell. Her father died a terrible death, “like an animal,” she told me. She helped bury him in the mountains, at 3 in the morning. It was extremely cold. “I was afraid to cry” and be discovered.
All right, what about love? Well, I asked her when she first realized that she lived in an abnormal country — North Korea. That other people had different and better lives. It was when she was in her early teens.
When I write about President Trump and “Chairman Kim,” as Kim now is, from the president’s mouth, many people say, “What’s the big deal? Lighten up.
