It was a North Korean who met on a trans-Siberian train heading for Vladivostok, Russia. The people in the same room first said, “Are you Korean?” in a crude North Korean dialect. “Are you married? Your parents are worried.”
This is a scene from a video uploaded by travel YouTuber Kim Se-eun (28) last year. The content was so popular that it exceeded 10 million views, and Kim received attention from foreign media enough to be reported on the BBC.
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Kim, who is about to have 100,000 subscribers, held a non-face-to-face interview with Yonhap News on the 31st and said, “I wanted to convey that most of the ties we encounter in the world we live in are ordinary people like me.”
Although Mr. Kim had a lot of travel experience, there were more than 20 countries with backpacks, such as Spain, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, England, and Switzerland, but the situation still remains a special moment.
It came unexpectedly. As an office worker, he took a week’s vacation and went to Russia to find a nearby destination without much worries, and went on a trans-Siberian train alone. Soon there were several North Koreans in the room.
He said, “I haven’t even met North Korean refugees until now, and I haven’t been interested in North Korea at all,” he said. “If you don’t know, aren’t there any fears and prejudices?”
“I was scared, but it was nice to know that I could speak Korean abroad,” he said. “I thought it would be different from us because of the long time apart, but it was similar to the local adults.”
The meeting between North and South Koreans by chance was more common than expected. Kim recommended the cup ramen he had brought, and the North Korean passengers presented raw garlic, saying it was good for colds.
The video containing this image soon received great attention, so it became a hot topic on YouTube and social network service (SNS).
“I thought it was a special memory only for me, but I was surprised that the reaction was hotter than I thought. Looking at the number of views, there were a lot of clicks from my teenage subscribers. It was amazing that generations far from the division showed interest.”
“When it comes to North Korea, most of the issues are political or diplomatic issues, or North Korean defectors, but it’s an income to realize that ordinary daily life can be a concern for younger generations. “It’s diverse,” he laughed.
He confessed, “It was a long aftertaste to say goodbye to each other and say,’Let’s see again, even though we know each other that we cannot meet.
However, since the material is the material, I approached it much more carefully in the process of editing the video. Previously, it contained a narration that contained feelings and thoughts at the time, but this time, we tried to remove it and make only the phenomenon dry. I wanted to convey that they were also ordinary people I encountered while traveling.
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He believes that the charm of travel lies in’knowing others and discovering new facts’.
“Before the trip, Russians thought that they were blunt and blunt, but the people I met were kind and reaching out first. Now I’m trying to avoid prejudice when meeting someone with a different skin color. I promised to meet in person and communicate a lot.”
He pointed out, “I learned this time that I am obligated to report when I accidentally contact North Koreans while traveling abroad.”
“I left the company driven by the charm of such a trip, but the sky road was cut off due to the new coronavirus infection (Corona 19). I do not regret it.”
“When I arrive in a strange place, I have an opportunity to discover a new person and I can look at others from a different perspective. I want to create meaningful travel content that is fun and brings a change of thoughts.”
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