Joe Rogan Experience #1691 - Yeonmi Park

Joe Rogan 0:00 (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music) Well, very nice to meet you, first of all.

Yeonmi Park 0:15 So nice to meet you too.

Joe Rogan 0:16 Thanks for coming here. Um, is this your first time in Texas?

Yeonmi Park 0:19 No, I've been here before.

Joe Rogan 0:20 You've been to Austin before?

Yeonmi Park 0:21 Yes.

Joe Rogan 0:23 So for people who don't know your story, I'm just gonna give them a primer, just to- just to sort of, uh, establish your history. You were born in North Korea and you escaped North Korea when you were 13. Is that how old you were?

Yeonmi Park 0:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 0:39 Um, I think we should start off with what it was like living in North Korea. Um, I saw your interview with Jordan Peterson and it was, uh, it was incredibly moving and it was incredibly disturbing and eye-opening and, um, it's ha- it's hard to believe for people that don't know what life is like in North Korea, the reality of you growing up in North Korea, but just talking about how you essentially had no food and you would-

Yeonmi Park 1:12 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:12 ... go looking for bugs to eat.

Yeonmi Park 1:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:15 This was the reality of your existence as a child, that there was no protein.

Yeonmi Park 1:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:22 What ... W- when you ... Now that you live here in America and you can kinda eat whatever you want, when you look back on that, what does it seem like to you? Does it seem like reality? Does it seem like a dream? What does your childhood seem like?

Yeonmi Park 1:39 It ... Sometimes this feels like dream.

Joe Rogan 1:42 This feels like a dream?

Yeonmi Park 1:43 Yeah, so I pinched myself a lot in the beginning, 'cause they say if it's not dream it hurts, right?

Joe Rogan 1:50 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:51 And you pinch yourself. So a lot of times I pinch myself, because sometimes I'm really horrified if I wake up from this that I'm gonna wake up in my living room in North Korea. So it's ... Sometimes that line is very blurry to me and ... Because it o- the one common thing that North Koreans all have is actually in our dreams when you sleep it's back in North Korea. So in our dream we somehow never able to escape it.

Joe Rogan 2:18 Hmm.

Yeonmi Park 2:19 So every day my mom wakes up, like, she tell- tells me about story how she was back in North Korea and I have the exact, the same thing. No matter what, how many years we left afterwards, in our dreams we are still in that country, tr-

Joe Rogan 2:32 So that's the nightmare?

Yeonmi Park 2:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:33 The nightmare is that you're still trapped in North Korea?

Yeonmi Park 2:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 2:36 When you lived there you didn't know that there was another way to live.

Yeonmi Park 2:41 No. It's, uh ... It's like here right now, we cannot imagine a life in a some different planet in the universe. Right? We just don't know what that life looks like. Exactly the same thing. I never knew the life in different planet could be like.

Joe Rogan 2:58 And, and where you lived in North Korea there was no internet.

Yeonmi Park 3:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:02 There's, uh, very little electricity, right?

Yeonmi Park 3:05 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 3:06 And how much education did you get?

Yeonmi Park 3:11 I never even seen the map of the world, so ... As even Asian I did not even know that I was Asian. So the regime told me I was a Kim Il Sung race.

Joe Rogan 3:22 Kim Il Sung race?

Yeonmi Park 3:23 Yeah. And then the North Korean calendar begins when Kim Il Sung was born. That's like Juche 1, that our history begins.

Joe Rogan 3:31 Hmm.

Yeonmi Park 3:31 So I don't even know what Jesus Christ is and I don't know anything before Kim. So there was ... Everything before Kim, the history was erased for us. And, but the t- the thing is that we are hungry, we are starving. If you eat breakfast you worry about lunch. If you make it to dinner you are not sure if you're gonna make it to tomorrow. So in that s- scenario who thinks about history? You know, nobody thinks about anything other than surviving and that is why precisely Kim Jong-un keeping us starving mode even though the UN, the international organizations begging to f- give food and formula to North Korean people, but Kim Jong-un is just saying no to this food aid 'cause he doesn't want us to be fed.

Joe Rogan 4:18 So he's purposely starving the people to keep them weak so that all they think about is surviving so they don't think about revolution.

Yeonmi Park 4:25 It's a Hunger Games. It's like when I was reading this book Hunger Games I literally like, oh my God, this person copied North Korea. There's a capital, you divide into 13 different districts. Capital people have everything they need and on other provinces they're on purpose there being starved. So only thing you can think of, your survivor. I mean, if we are full in our stomach, right, you're gonna start thinking about meaning of life, m- art, what's out there in the universe. You can do all of that higher thinking when you are full in your stomach, but when you're hungry the only thing that matters is your hunger.

Joe Rogan 5:03 When did North Korea become what it is now? When did it shift to this totalitarium regime that's starving its people and puts people in these classifications? Like, for one, for one example, one of the classifications is if your grandfather or great-grandth- grandfather committed some sort of a sin-

Yeonmi Park 5:23 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 5:24 ... you are perpetually punished for that.

Yeonmi Park 5:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:26 Everyone in your generation, your next generation, all of them are guilty.

Yeonmi Park 5:31 Yeah. Forever. There is no redemption. If the one person commits a crime in that family clan, three to eight generations gotta be punished.

Joe Rogan 5:40 How many generations?

Yeonmi Park 5:41 Three to eight generations.

Joe Rogan 5:42 Three to eight?

Yeonmi Park 5:43 Yes. Mostly, commonly three, but the people, like, who challenge the regime or challenge the leader, then eight generations get punished.

Joe Rogan 5:51 Eight generations?

Yeonmi Park 5:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:52 And then after the eighth generation are they absolved?

Yeonmi Park 5:55 No, they are gone.

Joe Rogan 5:56 They're all gone?

Yeonmi Park 5:57 Like, by eighth generation you even kill the in-laws of somebody you know.So not even the blood you get purged. If your cousin, somebody marrying the in-law of somebody, so there was one official who escaped, 35,000 people were purged. A lot of them, 80% of them did not even know that they were related to this person.

Joe Rogan 6:18 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 6:19 Yeah. Cousins of cousins, somebody, somebody, that's how they find... They get rid of the root of entire, this clan.

Joe Rogan 6:27 When did this all start?

Yeonmi Park 6:29 When Kim Il-sung came into power. So he was a big Marxist and Leninist, and he was a communist. So in the... Before the Korean War in 1948, that's when he began this, uh, in the name of equality, right?

Joe Rogan 6:44 Right.

Yeonmi Park 6:44 "Let's take everything back from the capitalists, let's nationalize the land, get rid of private property." But he made North Korea into very unequal society, dividing people into 50 different classes.

Joe Rogan 6:59 50?

Yeonmi Park 6:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:00 And the way the classes worked, you couldn't marry up.

Yeonmi Park 7:04 No.

Joe Rogan 7:04 Say like if you were a higher class-

Yeonmi Park 7:06 Mm.

Joe Rogan 7:07 ... and a man wanted to marry you-

Yeonmi Park 7:09 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 7:09 ... if he was lower class, you would then become a lower class as well.

Yeonmi Park 7:13 Yeah. That's how they prevent the mixing with the class. So there is no marrying up, you only go down.

Joe Rogan 7:19 So no matter what happens, if you are at a lower class, you stay there forever.

Yeonmi Park 7:23 Forever. No, no chance of moving out of that zone.

Joe Rogan 7:27 And it has n- uh, no... It's not based on merit, it's not based on your performance-

Yeonmi Park 7:33 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 7:33 ... it's not based on anything other than the way you were born.

Yeonmi Park 7:36 Mm-hmm. No. This is when I was confused when I went to South Korea, people say, "If you work hard in South Korea, you are going to be... Get rewarded." And that's when I thought, "Wow, that is justice." Because in North Korea, doesn't matter what you do, what you want to do, what your dreams are, it's already determined by what your ancestors did. But the thing is, how do you choose your ancestor? Right? Like-

Joe Rogan 8:02 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 8:02 ... you can never (laughs) choose your parents.

Joe Rogan 8:05 And you had no idea that there was any other way to live when you're growing up like this?

Yeonmi Park 8:09 Because I'd never seen the map of the world. I didn't even know like the Americans, how they looked like, because we don't have internet, first of all. We have only one channel. The government, you know, controls every single contents. We don't even have any... We don't even have a cookbook. That's the thing, as a Korean, I don't even know what cookbook is. I mean, first of all, we don't have ingredients. Like how do you find the half pounds of pork, scallion, blah, blah, right? So a cookbook is like pointless. And not only that, there's no fashion, because, I mean, we don't have freedom to what we wear. So even when I heard the job called modeling, I was like, "What, what is that?" So everything that I learned here is like all new concept to me as a North Korean.

Joe Rogan 8:53 So when y- when you would eat, where would you get your food from?

Yeonmi Park 8:57 So, uh, we... So, uh, the land is government's, right? The house is a... There is no private property and... But those farmers and the working the collective farm, they smuggle it out and sell in the black market secretly. So those food, we... If we have money, we go to black market, buy, you know, corn starch, those things. But mostly, we just go to mountain to pick up plants, flowers, and like grasshoppers is the biggest protein source for North Koreans.

Joe Rogan 9:28 But the government doesn't provide any food for the people?

Yeonmi Park 9:32 I heard they did in the '60s, '70s, but I was born in 1993, in October, and that is right after Soviet Union collapsed. So until then, Soviet Union was subsidizing North Korea's economy heavily, and China did the same. But when they collapsed, they stopped helping North Korean regime. So the regime policy was, if we... As long as keep the 10% alive who are in the capital, our rule is successful. So they were not going to do anything until 90% of population dies.

Joe Rogan 10:04 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 10:05 And still there, same, same rule they have. Until the 90% dies out, as long as we keep the 10% alive, we are not gonna do anything to intervene the starvation.

Joe Rogan 10:15 So there's no effort whatsoever to get food to the people?

Yeonmi Park 10:18 They, they... It's not like effort, they're actually actively preventing people to get resources. Preventing... Well, and now even last time that Biden was calling Kim Jong-un, "Can we give you a vaccine?" And Kim Jong-un said no. South Korea was calling S- North Korea last year, there was a big flood, "Can we give you at least some medicine?" And Kim Jong-un said, "No, we don't want any medicine."

Joe Rogan 10:40 So th-... Good, because they don't want any aid from the West?

Yeonmi Park 10:44 M- even South Korea.

Joe Rogan 10:44 They just... They want to keep people as weak as possible.

Yeonmi Park 10:47 Miserable. Exactly. They want us... Today, I was on the way here thinking, getting up in North Korea as a child was challenging, because every day you get dizzy from the starvation. You get like... Hear noise every single morning when you wake up, it takes like 30 minutes to gather your thoughts, to able to walk straight, because everybody is in that mode of starvation.

Joe Rogan 11:08 (exhales)

Yeonmi Park 11:10 Yeah. (laughs) So as you can see me, I'm like very small. I eat a lot, I'm like still 80 pounds. But when I was escaping, I don't even know how little I was. And North Korean men above 4'10 feet high, they have to go to military. Women too is mandatory, men have to serve in the military 13 years mandatory, and women is 10 years.

Joe Rogan 11:32 And most men are very small because of malnutrition?

Yeonmi Park 11:36 Yeah, 4'10 feet.

Joe Rogan 11:38 4'10?

Yeonmi Park 11:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 11:39 Wow. And so, so they just le- allow people to forage for themselves? That's the idea?

Yeonmi Park 11:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 11:46 Like find your own food?

Yeonmi Park 11:48 Yes.

Joe Rogan 11:48 Are you allowed to have a garden? Can you grow vegetables? Can you have animals?

Yeonmi Park 11:53 Well, uh, one of the executions that my mom saw was a, a young man was eating beef, a cow, because he killed a collective farm cow and he got executed for that, is everything is owned by the state.... in North K- you don't even own yourself, right? So, I remember going to South Korea, people ... I got a gift one day, and it was a planner. So what you do, what you are trying to do is a notebook. And in North Korea, like, there's ... you don't plan your day. You, you don't get to plan what you do with your life. Like, a week before or day before, there is announcement from the government how you're going to spend your day, when, what to eat, where to go to work, what to do, when to go to sleep. Everything is determined by your own state.

Joe Rogan 12:42 So, this guy was executed because he killed one of the state's cows?

Yeonmi Park 12:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:45 And you're not allowed to have your own animals?

Yeonmi Park 12:48 The-

Joe Rogan 12:48 So this ... You can't have, like, chickens or something along those lines?

Yeonmi Park 12:51 They might hide it, but last year Kim Jong-un confiscated entire dog from the population, 'cause he-

Joe Rogan 12:57 All the dogs?

Yeonmi Park 12:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:59 That was because of COVID-19, right?

Yeonmi Park 13:01 No.

Joe Rogan 13:01 No? It wasn't?

Yeonmi Park 13:02 Because he said it was a, a corrupt Western sentiment where we have pets.

Joe Rogan 13:06 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 13:07 So he ordered to kill the entire dogs for the meat, to get rid of dogs, because even ... he just didn't like that it looks like Western having a dog, having a friendly relationship with animals.

Joe Rogan 13:19 So, everyone's dog-

Yeonmi Park 13:20 They're confiscated.

Joe Rogan 13:20 ... in all of North Korea was confiscated and killed?

Yeonmi Park 13:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:23 And what did they do with the dogs?

Yeonmi Park 13:25 I don't know what the regime leaders did.

Joe Rogan 13:29 Whew. Wow.

Yeonmi Park 13:30 Yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 13:31 So, do they provide you with any food?

Yeonmi Park 13:33 No.

Joe Rogan 13:33 No. So you have to find food on your own, and most of the food is wild food?

Yeonmi Park 13:38 Yes.

Joe Rogan 13:38 Like grasshoppers and-

Yeonmi Park 13:40 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:40 ... flowers that are edible, and ...

Yeonmi Park 13:41 Yeah. So this is why the, the most bizarre thing is that regime initially said, "Oh, give us your land. Give us your freedom. We are gonna provide free health ins- ins- insurance," right? "For education, free housing, free of everything. You don't have to take ... worry about anything. The state is gonna be taking care of everything." But after Soviet Union collapsed, North Korea came idea like this idea is called self-reliance. So you're relying on yourself.

Joe Rogan 14:12 But you can't farm.

Yeonmi Park 14:15 You ... No, you d- you don't have land. How do you farm?

Joe Rogan 14:17 Right.

Yeonmi Park 14:17 You don't have freedom. There's no free market. If ... My father was sent to prison camp because he sold metals. He sold dry-

Joe Rogan 14:25 Metals, right? Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 14:26 Yeah. Initially he sold, like, rice, dried fish, clogs. And trading is il- ... It's not like he was selling weapons or drugs. Trading is illegal. So how do you be self-reliant?

Joe Rogan 14:39 Yeah. (sighs) So, they just let you fa- ... So the whole idea is just to keep everybody weak?

Yeonmi Park 14:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:47 It is so strange to someone who has been in America their whole life, like me, to even imagine that the same time I'm living here ... Like, the ... One of the big problems in America is that people eat too much.

Yeonmi Park 15:02 Yeah. (laughs) I heard that.

Joe Rogan 15:03 Isn't that-

Yeonmi Park 15:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:04 Isn't that crazy?

Yeonmi Park 15:05 I was shocked. I never understood having too much can be a problem, 'cause I just never knew that could be a possibility of problem.

Joe Rogan 15:12 It's the number one problem here.

Yeonmi Park 15:14 Exactly how having too much is a problem, I don't get it.

Joe Rogan 15:17 I think the ... What is the percentage? Jamie, what is the percentage of people in America that are obese? I think it's large. I think it's more than 50%. I think it's, uh ... And it's a huge factor with diseases and ... I mean, 78% of the people that are in the ICU for COVID are obese.

Yeonmi Park 15:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:35 What is it? I said 42%?

Yeonmi Park 15:37 Wow.

Joe Rogan 15:38 43%. So almost half of the people in the country are ob- are obese.

Yeonmi Park 15:43 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:44 Meaning they eat far too much food.

Yeonmi Park 15:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:47 And for you-

Yeonmi Park 15:48 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 15:49 ... that concept must be insane. You might ... Like, you're in the Upside Down world. Like, you're in-

Yeonmi Park 15:54 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 15:55 Right?

Yeonmi Park 15:55 That's the thing is, like, uh, it's like different planet. The common law that I knew in North Korea doesn't apply here anymore. And it is just so confusing to me, how hard it is not to eat? It's hard when you don't have food-

Joe Rogan 16:11 Right.

Yeonmi Park 16:11 ... when you can't find it. And to me, that ... I don't know why that is so challenging.

Joe Rogan 16:16 Could you do me a favor and just push the microphone forward?

Yeonmi Park 16:18 Yeah, like this?

Joe Rogan 16:19 Yeah, yeah, so it's right in front of your face. There you go.

Yeonmi Park 16:21 Yes.

Joe Rogan 16:21 So, yeah, it, it must be, uh, y- yeah, like another planet-

Yeonmi Park 16:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:25 ... the idea of having too much food.

Yeonmi Park 16:27 Yeah, and that's the source of ... I mean, they're complaining about it (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 16:31 (laughs)

Yeonmi Park 16:32 So, I'm like, even that is a, a reason for complaint.

Joe Rogan 16:36 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 16:36 That's something unbelievable. I just don't get it. (laughs) How is that ... It's so easy. If you have too much, don't eat it. You just don't put it in your mouth, right? (laughs)

Joe Rogan 16:46 (laughs)

Yeonmi Park 16:46 No one is forcing you to eat a lot.

Joe Rogan 16:48 Yeah, but food is addictive, and people like to comfort themselves with food when it's everywhere, and it's also-

Yeonmi Park 16:55 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 16:56 It's, it's a strange problem, right? The problem of excess.

Yeonmi Park 17:01 Yes.

Joe Rogan 17:01 It's a strange problem. Like, you have too much.

Yeonmi Park 17:03 But this is, uh ... I mean, humanity, all our humanity, we've been starving.

Joe Rogan 17:08 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 17:09 It's the very first time humanity having this much excess. And I have some compassion for them, but, you know, a lot of problems, like, I met American friends in New York. I went to school there. And, like, my friends complained. I couldn't sympathize in the beginning.

Joe Rogan 17:24 Right.

Yeonmi Park 17:24 I literally ... 'Cause their problem is, like, some guy they went on date with, like, don't call them back. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 17:29 (laughs)

Yeonmi Park 17:29 And they call me and complain. Like, you know, like there is a people actual problems like life and death, right? (laughs)

Joe Rogan 17:35 Yes.

Yeonmi Park 17:35 This is not a problem, but ...

Joe Rogan 17:37 Well, it's an issue of perspective, right? Like, your life, you've seen horrific things, whereas so many people, the worst thing that's ever happened to them is someone broke up with them.

Yeonmi Park 17:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:49 You know? When you were talking about going to the doctor when you were a child-

Yeonmi Park 17:55 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 17:56 ... and that ... Uh, this is a d- very disturbing story, but I, I want you to try to explain it to people, how people were dying in these hospitals and rats would eat the eyeballs of the people who were dying, and children who were starving would eat the rats.

Yeonmi Park 18:14 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 18:15 And then the children would die and the rats would eat the children.

Yeonmi Park 18:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:18 Explain what this was like, that you ... What, what ... How, how did you see this?

Yeonmi Park 18:24 Well, I mean, seeing dead bodies on the streets is like an everyday thing. It wasn't, um ...

Joe Rogan 18:29 Where were the bodies? Like, w- just laying around on the streets?

Yeonmi Park 18:31 Uh, so they are floating in the rivers and then they also... Train stations somehow had a lot of dead bodies because North Korea is very cold. And there's a train waiting area and North Korea has one train go to one distance, like, once a month (laughs) . And like, here it would take, like, one hour to go the other place. In North Korea, it would take a month at least to go because there's no electricity. And sometimes people have to push the train.

Joe Rogan 18:57 They have to push the train?

Yeonmi Park 18:59 Yeah. Yeah. Traveling in North Korea is, uh, un- unbelievably difficult thing within North Korea. So, uh, I mean, anyway, so in train stations, that's when people die mostly. And in North Korea, the hardest thing as a child for me is that when my mom goes away to find food. Like, it... we don't have a call... like, we don't have phones, we don't have letters. If I say goodbye to her, I don't know when I'm gonna see her again or if I'm ever gonna see her again, because she could have cared and, like, raped and starved. You just never know how to find people. So in the, you know, in the morning when you go, like, walk in the train station, they've just put the piles of the dead bodies. And they're all, like... become rigid, right? They're almost like the... like wood. Piled around them and taking away and... One... But the thing is, for me, I didn't even know the word compassion. Like, nobody told me, "You have to feel bad for it," because for me it's like, like fish in the water don't notice the water, right? Like that-

Joe Rogan 19:59 Right.

Yeonmi Park 19:59 It was just something every day I saw as a child.

Joe Rogan 20:02 So you, you never went days where you didn't see... this was a normal thing to see dead bodies?

Yeonmi Park 20:07 Yes. It was every day as, as, as... like normal as, like, breathing the air right now. And one thing that I used to remember is, sister... my, my sister and I was walking by, by the well. Like, in North Korea we don't have a sewage, we don't have running water obviously. We have to go to well or river to bring the drinking water. And there's a young teenage boy, I think, lying down and his intestines coming out of his, uh, back. When you're really malnourished that thing all opens up. You got zero, zero fats. Every hole all opens. And, and you see dogie-... like, dogs looking at his organs coming out. And he was still somehow conscious, begging for food at that time.

Joe Rogan 20:50 He was begging for food while his organs were hanging out of his body?

Yeonmi Park 20:52 Yeah. And I don't know why he was, like, pants were off and I felt nothing. That still haunts me to this day. Like, I don't know how I felt nothing at that point and that just looked horrible. And because you're... just the fact that he's alive and so much flies flying by on his organs and how he's st- somehow consciously begging for food and I, I didn't feel anything.

Joe Rogan 21:22 You felt no compassion?

Yeonmi Park 21:23 No, nothing.

Joe Rogan 21:23 It was just normal?

Yeonmi Park 21:25 Yeah. It's... yeah. So that's... that was, like, daily life thing. And then in the hospital when I was 13 years old, I... my, my parents took me to hospital because I had a bad stomach ache and then we don't have, like, X-ray machines, we don't have MR... none of that, just doctor rubs your belly and then he says, "Oh, we need to operate on her." I think her, like, appendix were bursting or something. So that afternoon they, they cut me open without any anesthesia and... but it's normal thing in people in North Korea... operation without anesthesia. But the, the chances of you going through surgery is a lot higher for you getting infected because we don't have penicillin. The nurses using a one needle to inject every single patient so who... do you know what the other person has? You get from actually more sick by being in the hospital.

Joe Rogan 22:16 Right.

Yeonmi Park 22:18 And this is where... we don't, of course, have indoor bathroom for the patient. We have to go outside and in between there there's a piles of dead human bodies and that's when I was seeing this, uh... some are rats eating human eyes first for some reason.

Joe Rogan 22:35 Because they're probably soft and easy to eat.

Yeonmi Park 22:37 Uh-huh. And this woman, I don't know, in her... my age probably. Short hair, wearing this flower pants and when they're dead all, like, their mouth is somehow open and their all eyes are hollow. And you see k- children, like, looking at the rats and laughing and chasing them and adults telling them, like, "Don't eat those. You're gonna get sick from it." But of course kids don't care, like, even finding a rat is delicacy because even finding a snake is a, is a, is a big prize. You don't find those, like, often.

Joe Rogan 23:10 So they were finding the rats and then just trying to eat them?

Yeonmi Park 23:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:13 Were they eating them raw?

Yeonmi Park 23:15 Sometimes if you find the skin you do, but they do find some, like, fire and roast them.

Joe Rogan 23:22 So they were excited to find a rat to eat?

Yeonmi Park 23:24 Yeah. They love-

Joe Rogan 23:24 So they would catch them with their hands?

Yeonmi Park 23:26 Yeah. Oh yeah, of course they do catch them, uh, with their hands and, and these piles of human bodies, like... she was on top, that's why I was able to see her wearing this flower and pants to this day and then, like, her eyes are so hollow. It's like when you look at the human body, like, nothing is left. I think that's what... it's not like just death is sad, it's just like how it becomes nothing.

Joe Rogan 23:50 Right.

Yeonmi Park 23:50 So empty inside. She does not know the shame or pain, just she was lying there like that and you see children just chasing them and laughing and try to catch the rats.

Joe Rogan 24:01 And the children didn't feel anything being around the dead bodies? Just was normal?

Yeonmi Park 24:05 No. It's our daily normal thing. Seeing a death is like our daily life.

Joe Rogan 24:10 And they would eat the rats and then they would get sick and some of them would die?

Yeonmi Park 24:14 Yeah. Yeah. A lot of them die.

Joe Rogan 24:16 And then the rats would eat them?

Yeonmi Park 24:17 Yeah. This is the cycle we talk about. It's like that's, uh... spring is for North Koreans a season of death.

Joe Rogan 24:24 And so the diseases that they would get from the rats, they were willing to risk those diseases just because of hunger?

Yeonmi Park 24:29 Because when you are... there's a, uh, North Korean proverb-There's no wish for the person who died after their stomach is full. So even the im- in middle of the earthquake, the North Koreans not try to run. So my mom was talking about that there when she was in the university. There's earthquake happening and do you know what the students doing? Is not running out of the building and try to survive, they go to kitchen. So before they die, they eat at least, so they can die. So if you have that promise of eating a one meal, they're gonna risk everything for that.

Joe Rogan 25:06 So it's just a, an entire country in a perpetual state of starvation.

Yeonmi Park 25:10 Yeah. It's... I remember playing with this game, you know, my sister as a, as a younger, I never ate till I felt full. So I would compare myself, like I tell her like, "I can eat 100 bread." And she's like, "I can eat mountains of bread. I can eat like 10,000 more than what you just said," 'cause I don't know the limits of my stomach-

Joe Rogan 25:29 Right.

Yeonmi Park 25:30 ... 'cause I never tested it.

Joe Rogan 25:31 So you always were hungry.

Yeonmi Park 25:33 Always hungry. Never felt full.

Joe Rogan 25:36 (exhales) So you escaped. Your... So your father was arrested for trading in, in metals, right?

Yeonmi Park 25:46 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 25:46 And he was... Well, he was just trying to find resources, trying to get money for the black marker, for food and things like that?

Yeonmi Park 25:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 25:54 Is that what it was?

Yeonmi Park 25:55 To get us alive. He, he had to... Because regime does not provide food for the people, so they had to break the law, which is trading to survive, right? Without trading, how do we even survive? So he was trading these matters and he got... and that he got caught, and that's how he's in the prison camp.

Joe Rogan 26:14 And how long was he in prison for?

Yeonmi Park 26:16 Several years, but he was sentenced to more than 10 years. So, uh, I think he was totally in prison 34 years, but he got out for sick leave, which is had to go back once he got better.

Joe Rogan 26:28 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 26:28 But, of course, in North Korea, that's a like, "Who, who cares if you die?" He was very smart guy, so he tricked the guard saying, "If you get me out for the sick leave, I'm gonna get you money," 'cause North Korea is the most corrupt country that you can find right now in today's world.

Joe Rogan 26:45 Hmm.

Yeonmi Park 26:45 So corrupt.

Joe Rogan 26:47 So he tricked the guard, told him that he'd get him some money, and so he was in for how many years? You said four years?

Yeonmi Park 26:53 Three, four years.

Joe Rogan 26:54 Four.

Yeonmi Park 26:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 26:55 And what w- what was it like when he got out?

Yeonmi Park 26:58 I didn't recognize him when he came back to me. I did not know that was my father. Even his voice changed. It's, it's, um... When I call North Korea even to this day, I do have, uh, people underground. I get information. You... Their voice is different. It's like the, v- their voice is so oppressed. You can't tell this is North Korean is speaking.

Joe Rogan 27:23 You can tell just by their voice?

Yeonmi Park 27:25 Yeah. That's the thing is when some Chinese... Like, we have the brokers try to trick us. By voice, we can tell if you are Chinese, like, tr- Korean ethnic Chinese living in China trying to trick us or actually North Korean is speaking to us.

Joe Rogan 27:39 Ch- wow. So you could actually hear the oppression in their voice?

Yeonmi Park 27:42 Yeah, you can.

Joe Rogan 27:44 What does it sound like?

Yeonmi Park 27:47 It's like complete fear, like, terrified to the point they don't even know they're terrified. They're like... I don't think even bug would be that scared. Like, h- he was calling me like y- un-niya in his voice. I didn't see my father and he was so scared, and I could see he was so scared. I was like only nine something, 10. I don't even know. I was like young. And I could say, "Why is he so afraid?"

Joe Rogan 28:18 (exhales) And so he, he does get out, and they never put him back in jail again?

Yeonmi Park 28:24 'Cause I rescued him. After I went to China, I got him out. So he had to go back. He had to go back to jail, but he died in, in China.

Joe Rogan 28:36 (exhales) So you were 13-

Yeonmi Park 28:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:39 ... when you, you and your family... And you, you... Was it you and your mother that escaped?

Yeonmi Park 28:43 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 28:44 How did you get out?

Yeonmi Park 28:46 So the hospital, right? Initially, my sister and I was gonna escape. But when North Koreans say when you are escaping, of course, we don't have phones, we don't have map, we don't know what's the outside world look like.

Joe Rogan 28:59 Right.

Yeonmi Park 28:59 Luckily, I was living in this border town of North Korea by then. So at night, do you know if you see the satellite photo of North Korea, it is the literally the darkest place on earth.

Joe Rogan 29:10 Yes.

Yeonmi Park 29:10 We don't have electricity. So I was seeing these lights coming from China. So we... I thought, like, "If I go where the lights were, we would be finding some bowl of rice." So at 16, my sister left with her friend and she left me a note while I was in the hospital and got my... removing my appendix. And then as soon as I got out of the hospital, I found a note. And initially, my mom and I went to look for sister where she went, but when we found the lady, she told me that she could help me to go to China that day.

Joe Rogan 29:45 And so this was you and your mother, and you were 13 years old?

Yeonmi Park 29:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:49 So how did you get across and what is that... what was that experience like?

Yeonmi Park 29:53 So, uh, this is, uh... So I, m- told my mom, like, "Come with me to China." And she, my mom was like, you know, father is like... My father wasn't home. He was waiting. But the thing is that's... The tragic thing for North Koreans is we cannot even say goodbye to our loved ones. So if we got caught on the journey and if my father knew that we are escaping, he's gonna be punished so much. So it's better off that he does not know that we are escaping for his own safety 'cause they're gonna torture you to the point that you're gonna say anything 'cause they do this all subconscious, like, torture that they make you not sleep in a single room, has like no air, much air. If you put there for 40 days alone, you go crazy. You say whatever they ask you.... so if he, he actually knew that we were escaping, it wasn't good for him. He would be dead. So I told my mom, like, "You cannot tell father that we are escaping." So that day we climbed up this, like, several mountains, and then we went to the riverside. But she had a connection with the guards.

Joe Rogan 31:01 Why did you not bring him with you?

Yeonmi Park 31:03 Because he's a man and he was sick. And somehow, she said that only women can go.

Joe Rogan 31:09 Only women can go?

Yeonmi Park 31:10 I did not know why... what she meant by that. She's like, "You should just go with your mom. And don't even tell those people that's your mom." She said, like, "You are, like, 18 or something," and my mom was something 30, so she told me that our age wa- age was different.

Joe Rogan 31:26 So... and this would somehow now help you when you were going across?

Yeonmi Park 31:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:30 How would that help you?

Yeonmi Park 31:32 I don't know, all she told me what this is gonna be helpful and...

Joe Rogan 31:36 Well, part of the issue is, um, in China-

Yeonmi Park 31:41 Mm.

Joe Rogan 31:41 ... there's a, a disproportionate number of men in comparison to women.

Yeonmi Park 31:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:46 And so they want as many women to come across as... that are, uh, of legal age, like women that can be married.

Yeonmi Park 31:56 Mm.

Joe Rogan 31:56 Or can... Right? Is that the idea behind it?

Yeonmi Park 31:59 It's a smuggling. So like it's, it's... you got it right. Because of one child policy-

Joe Rogan 32:05 Right.

Yeonmi Park 32:05 ... a lot of girls got aborted in China, so they kept boys. Now-

Joe Rogan 32:10 So there's many, many men that have no chance of ever finding a woman because there are no women.

Yeonmi Park 32:15 Yeah, over 30 million men in the rural areas cannot find wives. So they-

Joe Rogan 32:21 30 million?

Yeonmi Park 32:22 Over 30 million, and it's number gonna keep going up right now.

Joe Rogan 32:25 (exhales)

Yeonmi Park 32:25 So that's a big problem for Chinese region. But the thing is, even that they don't allow North Korean women to stay there. They catch us and they send us back to North Korea. Last month, China repatriated 50 North Korean defectors back to North Korea. It, it's sending them ............................ Literally, they are sending them to death camp, but they... Chinese regime still do catch us and send us back, because they think we are a... posing a threat to the regime and they don't want the regime to collapse. So they are ta- catching all the defectors. But the human traffickers seize the opportunity here because we are so vulnerable, right? We are running away from Chinese authority. So even they rape us and kill us, the last place that we are gonna go is going to police and then report on them.

Joe Rogan 33:14 Why did they think that women coming over from North Korea are gonna somehow now collapse the empire?

Yeonmi Park 33:21 Because, uh, the... that's what Kim Jong-un believes. He thinks they're gonna collapse through the defection, through the defectors.

Joe Rogan 33:27 Mm.

Yeonmi Park 33:28 So after Kim Jong-un came into power, he literally... the country cannot afford the electricity, put up a electrified fence entire border. Not only that, putting the machine guns with the guards, have a shoot-to-kill order whoever crosses. They don't even bother to ask you stop. They shoot you right there. And not only that, he buried the landmines on top of that. The-

Joe Rogan 33:53 So there's electric fence, and then there's guards shooting to kill, and then past that there's landmines?

Yeonmi Park 33:57 Yeah. Entire country became a concentration camp. Entire country.

Joe Rogan 34:03 When did they start putting the landmines in?

Yeonmi Park 34:05 A few years ago.

Joe Rogan 34:06 So this is after you had already escaped?

Yeonmi Park 34:08 Yeah. Now there's no... you can... you don't see North Korean defectors escaping from North Korea anymore. It's impossible to escape at this point.

Joe Rogan 34:16 Um, one of the more horrific things that, um, Jordan and you discussed was you seeing your mother raped.

Yeonmi Park 34:25 Mm.

Joe Rogan 34:26 And that your mother sacrificed herself because they wanted you.

Yeonmi Park 34:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 34:32 And this was the first time you had ever even seen what sex was?

Yeonmi Park 34:37 So I didn't even know that was sex. I did not know even that was rape because we didn't have the vocabulary in North Korea. So in North Korea, there's no word for stress 'cause-

Joe Rogan 34:46 There's no word for stress?

Yeonmi Park 34:48 Because how can you be stressed in the socialist paradise? So there's no word trauma, there's no word depression, because you cannot be simply depressed in socialist paradise. There's no word for liberty. There's d- no word for human rights. There's no word for rape or even sex. So I, I just thought something I was seeing was horrible, but later they te- told me that was rape. I did not know that was rape.

Joe Rogan 35:15 But you also said that you never heard the word love.

Yeonmi Park 35:19 Yeah. No, there's no word for love in North Korea.

Joe Rogan 35:22 So your mother never told you she loved you. You never told your father you love him.

Yeonmi Park 35:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 35:27 None of that?

Yeonmi Park 35:28 So in North Korea, there's even no word for I. So they don't want people to be individualistic, right? That's the worst thing you can be. It's all collectivization. So when North Koreans say, "I like water," I say, "We love water, we love kimchi." So that's how... and when I'm in South Korea, we keep saying, in South Korea there's difference between we and I. So when you say, "I like this," say I, and then, of course, all the North Koreans keep saying, "We love this country," and South Koreans get so frustrated that we are keep misusing I and we. And that's, that's how regime controls your minds through language. It is George Orwell's 1984. They create doublespeak-

Joe Rogan 36:09 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 36:09 ... why language is so important, because it controls your thoughts. So that's how I got rid of the romantic love. We don't even know possibly another human can love another human. Only love that North Koreans know is like a returned form love that when we describe our feeling towards the leader. And we don't know that word can be used to describing our feelings to another human.

Joe Rogan 36:34 When Kim Jong Il died and, um, people were crying in the streets and people were sent to prison-

Yeonmi Park 36:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:41 ... for not crying enough-

Yeonmi Park 36:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:43 ... what... uh, it was the strangest thing for us to watch as Americans because-

Yeonmi Park 36:48 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 36:48 ... it was performative-

Yeonmi Park 36:50 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 36:50 ... where people were performing. They were-

Yeonmi Park 36:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:52 ... they were, they were not really crying. They were cr- they were wailing-

Yeonmi Park 36:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:56 ... in this very theatrical way-

Yeonmi Park 36:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:58 ... to let everyone know that they were complying.

Yeonmi Park 37:01 Mm-hmm. It's, uh, your life is on the line. People watching you. If you don't mourn enough, that's the thing, is if you don't mourn e- the most extreme high, they're gonna send you to prison camp and execute you. So we are doing it to survive.

Joe Rogan 37:18 Did you see anyone who didn't mourn enough?

Yeonmi Park 37:21 No. I mean, you, it's impossible. How do you not mourn enough? How do you not possibly? That's the- your life generation is depending on you when you mourn.

Joe Rogan 37:30 So everyone knows this?

Yeonmi Park 37:32 Of course we all know.

Joe Rogan 37:33 And everyone knows it's a threat?

Yeonmi Park 37:34 Even babies know. Even babies know. When you're born in North Korea, you know what it is. You don't like start questioning. It's... I mean, the first thing my mom told me as a young girl was not even, "Be careful of strangers. Be careful," you know, 'cause like none of that. She would say, "Be careful of your tongue because that is the most dangerous weapon you got in your, in your body. Don't even whisper because the birds and mice could hear you." So, that's the first thing you hear it from your parents, how dangerous what you say is gonna be.

Joe Rogan 38:06 Did you personally see people that you knew get imprisoned because of things that they said?

Yeonmi Park 38:12 They just disappear. Like, um, one of my sister's classmate, her mom one day executed, and then because they accusing her to receiving money from the foreign CIA or the South Korea intelligence. But a month later they, they said, "Oh, it was not a problem. She was not spy." So they brought the family members back out of the concentration camp.

Joe Rogan 38:34 So they killed her for nothing?

Yeonmi Park 38:35 And they don't even say sorry to that. It's like we don't even know that's a concept government can be sorry or they can ever make a mistake.

Joe Rogan 38:43 So how did they find out that she wasn't really a spy?

Yeonmi Park 38:46 We just don't know. Just one day that classmate came out and my sister, Ms. Classmate came out and then she... they said like her mom was not a spy, so they got out of the prison camp. (exhales) And that's it. There's nothing, nothing we were not... none of that.

Joe Rogan 39:03 And so this was a common thing?

Yeonmi Park 39:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:05 And you, and you just lived in constant fear?

Yeonmi Park 39:08 It's, uh, like, this is the thing. And I, we are s- three people sitting here, right? I'm watching you, and he- Jamie's watching me, and you're watching somebody else. So even I'm being a nice person, not gonna report on you, I know Jamie's being watching, watching me. He's gonna report on me. But even if we try to be nice, but he knows he's being watched by somebody too. So you're being spied on and you're spying on somebody. So no escape.

Joe Rogan 39:31 And everybody has to report-

Yeonmi Park 39:33 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 39:33 ... anything that they find. Like if you said something negative about the government, I would have to tell on you, otherwise I would get in trouble.

Yeonmi Park 39:41 Yeah. And the other person don't report on you, that person get in trouble.

Joe Rogan 39:45 (sighs)

Yeonmi Park 39:45 There's no way out of it. That's how they create distrust. Like, one thing that shocked me when I came to the West, like how trust exists. In North Korea, there's a saying like, "Don't even trust your own back." 'Cause you can, you don't know who is a spy. You don't know who is listening, who is watching.

Joe Rogan 40:04 (exhales) And people just disappear.

Yeonmi Park 40:08 Yeah, just disappear. And public executions happens in a stadium next to market where most people go. And in North Korea there's no concept of minor, right? There's no concept like minors cannot do labor. Like that's a not a thing. As a child at seven years old you go to school, you work. You go to work in the dam, construction, in the farm. And you are minor, so therefore when there's public execution happens, you're on the front line because you are the shortest. They still line up five, six years old in the beginning, and then like in the age going sit like old. It's a mandatory to attend.

Joe Rogan 40:44 So you... y- it's mandatory to attend public executions?

Yeonmi Park 40:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:48 And how do they kill the people?

Yeonmi Park 40:49 M- after Kim Jong-un got in power, he became more brutal how he kills people. He used, uh, this, uh, the air, like, uh, m- missiles that shoot down the airplane, that kind of powerful weapon. So when he kills people, they blow up into pieces, like they literally just become just red pieces and fireworks. That's how it... that's what I hear from now, nowadays executions. But my time was more the guard standing and shoot you here, here, and three times, nine shots. And then it... body becomes like rolled and rolled and rolled. And then like they just put in a luggage and take it out. But nowadays I heard they are using way more... uh, they, they are started hanging too. Before my time was just execution, but Kim Jong-un said even the bullets we don't want to waste on this, like, trash. They call us trash and so just hang them and like... or like stoned to death. So bring the people around the town and hit them with the rocks until they die.

Joe Rogan 41:50 So the people in the town would contribute-

Yeonmi Park 41:53 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:53 ... to the execution? They would, they would be the ones throwing the rocks?

Yeonmi Park 41:56 Yeah. Otherwise you get punished, you have to.

Joe Rogan 41:59 And what are the crimes that you could be sentenced to death for?

Yeonmi Park 42:06 It's as le- as little as... So in North Korea every room has to have a portraits of Kims. And the inspector comes out of nowhere in the middle of the night and then touch the portraits. If they see any dust they say, "Your loyalty is not high enough." And then you can get executed and sent to prison camp three generations of your family. And-

Joe Rogan 42:26 So if the picture is dusty, you get executed?

Yeonmi Park 42:29 Yeah. And if your house get on fire, the first thing is not you run with your family or your children or parents. You have to protect the portrait with your life. Otherwise the three generation gets punished for that. Even murderers and rapists in North Korea don't exist. We don't even know what rape is c-... I mean, they have pleasure squad.... right? Every year, they go around the country, pick up the virgin girls, bring them back to Pyongyang, make them call a satisfactory groups, train them to become sex machines. Every year they do that. So these officials, now the guy who's in the second power in North Korea, his name is Choe Ryong-hae, he has his own pleasure squad and he takes entire teeth out of these girls. So when they kiss him down there, he has more pleasure. So these things is not a crime in North Korea. Like it, literally when women walk down, if the guys stand you and rape you, you cannot go to police, "You got raped." It's your fault. So this country, uh, I mean, every hu- every wives get beaten by husband in North Korea. This is not a crime, but if there's a newspaper, there's a portrait of Kim Jong-un, right, or Kim Jong-il, you didn't see the front page, in the back page, you ripped it by mistake. That's how you get executed. That is what we call crime in North Korea.

Joe Rogan 43:49 (sighs) Wow. Um, having escaped that-

Yeonmi Park 43:58 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 43:58 ... and looking back on it now and knowing, knowing that it exists right now what, what can be done? What could the rest of the world do? I mean, North Korea has nuclear weapons.

Yeonmi Park 44:09 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 44:10 It's, uh, they have a powerful military.

Yeonmi Park 44:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 44:13 What can the rest of the world do to stop this from happening? Because it seems like... I mean this is horrif- it's a, it's a form of genocide and it's happening right now.

Yeonmi Park 44:22 See, it's a, it's a holocaust. In 2014, UN conducted its investigation for a year and the conclusion was the only resemblance that we find in our history what is happening to North Korean people is a holocaust. So holocaust is happening again. And of course, we are denying it again. Right? When it was holocaust was happening a lot of people say, "How this are possible? It's so hard to believe that." And North Korea using these concentration camp, these people do the biology test. They put them in the gas chambers. Right now they do that.

Joe Rogan 44:56 A biology test?

Yeonmi Park 44:57 Of, of course.

Joe Rogan 44:57 What, what, what's the biology test?

Yeonmi Park 44:59 They test a lot of, of the weapons, biological weapons. So they, you know, keep tr- trying to... They are s- North Korea spends entire their GDP on developing nukes and, uh, wea- weaponries. I mean, they, they are the biggest provider to the Middle East. When there's a war, they buy missiles from North Koreans. North Korea makes money by selling as-, I mean the crystal meth and opium. That's how Kim Jong-un makes money in hacking, right? He steals a lot of Bitcoin and get out of banks, like ATM machines, that's how he makes money, 'cause they don't export anything other than drugs and weapons and hacking and human trafficking.

Joe Rogan 45:40 So they experiment on their own people to find out if these biological weapons work?

Yeonmi Park 45:44 Yeah. And also, they need a lot of concentration like prisoners because they have to clean the nuclear debris because they do a lot (laughs) of tests, like, uh... So since 2017 North Korea conducted almost 30 missile tests. If the one test missile cost to, to feed a 25 millions entire year, so he, if he chose to do four like less tests, nobody had to die from, in North Korea, from starvation. And right now Kim Jong-un recently admits that 11 million North Koreans are severely malnourished and he's proud to say that. And he's, he's not even, like, bothering to hide it like in the past, like, "Yeah, they are starving. So what?"

Joe Rogan 46:26 And he's fat?

Yeonmi Park 46:27 Oh, yeah. That's his problem, being too fat.

Joe Rogan 46:33 (sighs) Wow. So they, they're forced to clean up nuclear waste from these-

Yeonmi Park 46:40 The debris, everything, yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:43 ... test sites? And of course they die from radiation.

Yeonmi Park 46:45 Of course. They, they don't last really three month. Normal life expectancy when you go to concentration camp is three month.

Joe Rogan 46:51 Three months?

Yeonmi Park 46:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:53 And-

Yeonmi Park 46:53 So they need a lot of those people.

Joe Rogan 46:54 And they just use those people for fodder?

Yeonmi Park 46:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:58 How many people are... Do they know how many people are in these concentration camps?

Yeonmi Park 47:02 Nobody knows exactly, but, uh, 700,000 of them. But there's also prison camps. Concentration camps, prison camps, and labor camps.

Joe Rogan 47:12 And some people are born into these camps?

Yeonmi Park 47:14 Yeah, those are people in the concentration camps, and they don't even get to know the name of Kim Il-sung or Kim Jong-un. They're too, too below the level. They don't even bother to tell them who's the leader of the country is.

Joe Rogan 47:28 And what did someone in their family do that would allow them, that would make them get put into these concentration camps?

Yeonmi Park 47:35 So they find out later their great-great-grandfather was, uh, working with the Japanese for like a week when the Japan was colonizing or the Korean War starting, they were talking to American soldiers, or they were, they're like, like cousins of nephews of like some in-law was a Christian, 'cause North Korea's number one Christian per- persecution country, 'cause they copy the Bible, right? They said, "Oh, Kim Il-sung loves us so much. He's a god. He gave us his son Kim Jong-il and he dies, but his spirit's with us all the time. That's why they can read my thoughts, knows how much hair I have and that's how..." So be- when you become a god, you don't need to explain, you don't need to make sense.

Joe Rogan 48:19 So they essentially use the story of the Bible for Kim Jong-il and, and-

Yeonmi Park 48:25 Kim Il- Kim Il-sung. Yeah, they copy the Bible. Exactly copy the Bible.

Joe Rogan 48:29 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 48:29 That's why, like, I believe that Kims was reading my mind and if the people believe in the Bible like, like Jesus knows what you're thinking, why do you think it's surprising that North Koreans believe that?

Joe Rogan 48:40 So someone's great-grandfather speaking to the Japanese would be the reason why they would be raised in a concentration camp-

Yeonmi Park 48:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:47 ... and never even be told the name of the leaders?

Yeonmi Park 48:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:50 And that's happening right now?

Yeonmi Park 48:52 Oh, it's, it's been happening for the last almost 80 years.Yeah, this has been going on, and as you just ask, what can be, be done? Kim Jong Un cannot last even one week without Chinese regime support. The only reason the regime exists is because of Chinese Communist Party. How do you test missile without oil? Kim Jong Un cannot even drive his Benz in Pyongyang. China refused to not helping the regime, they keep helping Kim Jong Un, keep sending the oil. Even last year the New York Times covered it. The ship, oil, the ship with full of gas, oil going to North Korea, so Kim Jong Un could test missiles, even, even amid a pandemic.

Joe Rogan 49:36 Why does China support North Korea?

Yeonmi Park 49:40 (laughs) Uh, I, I really, really ... I think one is they don't want that democracy come to next door, right? That South Korea, Japan, Americas all right next to North Korea geographically and North Korea's like this, almost like a buffer zone for them, for this Western movement coming into their country. And also they think of T- North Korea more like Tibet or Xinjiang. If they let North Korea go, then Xinjiang people are gonna want to go, Tibetans gonna be independent, Hong Kong's gonna be independent. So they cannot give up any one of them. So because of the stability and symb- symbolic thing for the Chinese people in the, within the country wants to be independent, so they all want to maintain North Korea forever. And Mao said that relationship between China and North Korea is like the relationship between your lips and the teeth. Without lips you cannot really close your mouth and eat, without your teeth you cannot, like, chew, so you need each other to survive. And that's how Mao's son died at Korean War by defending Communist Party in the north. That's how Mao lost his son. That's how he believed that they need North Korea.

Joe Rogan 50:54 And so the, the Chinese Communist Party today shares a sentiment and they're, they're using it strategically?

Yeonmi Park 51:01 Yeah. They run the dictatorship in North Korea. They run the whole thing. And that's the thing, like, it's, we have not been solving North Korea because we, we just never named the accountability, who is responsible for this crisis? That is China. And of course in American mainstream they do not want to call out North Korea, uh, China to, committing, you know, genocide. That's why I've been having so many attacks from Marxist, Communist, and Maoist, and Leninist, all these people, and North Korea is almost this last country that holds ideological to Socialism. So it's a very symbolic country, so a lot of, um, empathizers of Communism and anti-Western civilization people, they defend North Korea like hell.

Joe Rogan 51:50 But do they, when, when they speak of it-

Yeonmi Park 51:53 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:53 ... like the Chinese Communist Party, when they speak of North Korea, do they have a distorted image that they project of what it's like in North Korea? Do they have a, uh, do they change the narrative? Do they have, uh, a story of North Korea that's false, that makes it seem like North Korea's a nice place?

Yeonmi Park 52:12 No, they know exactly what's going on (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 52:15 They know?

Yeonmi Park 52:15 Even Chinese people know. Uh, when I was-

Joe Rogan 52:18 So there's no defending it?

Yeonmi Park 52:19 No, no. Even Chinese people see it, like, uh, when North Koreans get captured they, Chinese is still very ni- nice to North Korean guards. They like handcuff off sort of blinds us, but North Koreans come and they put the wire in between here, in between your bones, so connecting all the prisoners together so they cannot run. Like cows. And they-

Joe Rogan 52:44 They put a wire, like, through their collarbone?

Yeonmi Park 52:45 Yeah. So they, they prevent us to escape. So why we are in China, that's w- when the outsiders watching, but imagine what they're gonna do inside the country when there's no camera.

Joe Rogan 52:57 So this is what China does to North Koreans?

Yeonmi Park 52:59 No, China catches us and give us to North Korean guards and they watch it. And-

Joe Rogan 53:05 And they watch them do that?

Yeonmi Park 53:06 And then they, they, they even horrified but of course they don't do anything about it. There's like, you don't have to go that far, but of course North Koreans do not accepting defection, right? That's why we are defectors, we are not refugees. When we escape, we defy the ideology.

Joe Rogan 53:21 Yes.

Yeonmi Park 53:22 That's why this is North Koreans are not just refugees, they are political prisoners, they are political refugees. They should be covered by Geneva Convention and international law. So China catching us and us back, that is a crime against humanity. They're breaking the international law.

Joe Rogan 53:39 But the, no one will punish them for that?

Yeonmi Park 53:41 And nobody gonna talk about it even here in the West. Right? Why ... I mean, there's a, Michelle Om- Obama, right, Nobel Peace Prize giving the girls like captured by ISIS, or like Taliban, like Malala. Michelle Obama stands up for the girls who were captured by, you know, ISIS and Boko Haram. Who is standing up for North Korean girls being captured and raped in China right now? There are 300,000 North Koreans right now when we are speaking in China and are s- sexual slaves.

Joe Rogan 54:13 300,000?

Yeonmi Park 54:14 Yeah. And most of them are women and girls.

Joe Rogan 54:20 China has incredible power.

Yeonmi Park 54:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:23 And when you see the, the, the power that China has and that they're supporting North Korea and that there's no pushback from America-

Yeonmi Park 54:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:34 ... what, what does that feel like to you when you see this? Knowing what you went through and, and not only knowing what you went through but the fact that you talk about this openly, you talked about it in your book that came out in 2015.

Yeonmi Park 54:44 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:45 And you, you speak about it as often as possible, but yet there's not a lot of support from, uh, especially from political leaders.

Yeonmi Park 54:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:55 There's no, there's, no one is stepping up to s- say your story.

Yeonmi Park 54:59 Yeah. It's total hypocrisy. It's, I mean-... all these people in America talk about how slavery is wrong. I agree slavery is the worst thing that we can do to another human being. But why some slavery matters over some other slavery? Right? Like-

Joe Rogan 55:15 Right.

Yeonmi Park 55:16 ... I mean, all these corporations talking about how they do not support the bigotry and racism and slavery. (camera clicks) . It's happening right now in China and they have business with China.

Joe Rogan 55:25 And they don't say anything about it.

Yeonmi Park 55:26 You know, like, this is the thing. When Hulu made a movie about dissent, uh, no, about assassins, about Kim Jong Nam's assassination three years ago in Malaysia. Remember the Kim Jong Un's half brother got-

Joe Rogan 55:40 Yes.

Yeonmi Park 55:41 So, they made a movie. Hulu was supporting to make that movie.

Joe Rogan 55:44 He killed his half brother and someone else too, right?

Yeonmi Park 55:47 And his uncle.

Joe Rogan 55:48 His uncle.

Yeonmi Park 55:48 Yeah. So his brother is more shocking because he got killed in the international territory in a, like, VX nerve the, the poison. And they made a movie, but when the Hulu was bought by Disney, Disney wanted Hulu to drop that movie. So that movie couldn't be shown in Hulu. So they-

Joe Rogan 56:08 Because it would offend China?

Yeonmi Park 56:09 Yes. Why there is not even one single movie coming out of Hollywood about North Korean people suffering? They made about Congo genus, they made all about genocide, not about North Korea. You see-

Joe Rogan 56:22 That is a strange hypocrisy, isn't it?

Yeonmi Park 56:23 Of course it is.

Joe Rogan 56:24 And it's about money, right?

Yeonmi Park 56:25 Absolutely. It's all a- it's all about money. All these people talking about justice, what they care about, I mean, none of them do when it's real life.

Joe Rogan 56:34 And this is not, these are not secret stories.

Yeonmi Park 56:36 It's not. I mean, so this is the thing, "Oh, don't make it up. And Kim Jong Un kills his, his uncle," right? That was on the national newspaper. He kills his half brother. And look, do you remember the 00:01:12? The American tw- 21-year student?

Joe Rogan 56:50 Yes.

Yeonmi Park 56:50 Who was accused of stealing the banner.

Joe Rogan 56:53 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 56:54 He was brain dead. He was-

Joe Rogan 56:56 By the time he got to America-

Yeonmi Park 56:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:57 ... he was beaten to death, right?

Yeonmi Park 56:58 Yeah, and he was sentenced for 15 years in the labor camp for trying to steal the banner. But this is a country that did to white American mayor, to the most powerful country citizen. Imagine what they're going to do to their own citizen. You can, you can't even imagine what they do to their own citizen. So North Korea is like a nationalism, is to the highest. So when North Chine- North Korean go to China, get raped, and we get pregnant. When we go back North Korea, the guards kick our belly until baby dies. They don't let the baby live. They, they... (sighs) Yeah, it's, it's just unbelievable. This is happening in 21st century and still w- we can't, we somehow don't talk about it.

Joe Rogan 57:44 Not just don't talk about it, but it keeps going generation after generation.

Yeonmi Park 57:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:49 I mean, if it's been happening like this for more than 80 years-

Yeonmi Park 57:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:52 ... what's gonna stop it from happening for another 80 years? And if people are quiet, nothing. It's gonna keep going.

Yeonmi Park 57:58 And this is what is to me, as an activist, right, I'm a dissent, I'm, I'm fighting against this regime. We know when Jamal Khashoggi get killed in Saudi consulate, there is no accountability for the dictator, right? Saudi Prince, he didn't get anything. When Kim Jong Un killed his half brother in Malaysia, nothing. There were like... There's no accountability that we are asking of these people. So standing or fighting it doesn't incentivize people anymore, right? So you don't see justice being served. And I think that is why it is so hard to fight now, 'cause when people think justice there, but I don't think it is that... It's something I don't see in real life when we actually fight against injustice, it's most likely gonna be just like get killed and nobody cares and just keep moving on.

Joe Rogan 58:53 What can be done? I mean, if, if the United States and the relationship the United States has with China-

Yeonmi Park 58:59 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 59:00 ... they're unwilling to do anything or, or even speak out about it.

Yeonmi Park 59:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:03 When they talk about the problems of the world-

Yeonmi Park 59:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:06 ... North Korea is rarely discussed.

Yeonmi Park 59:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:08 And their horrific crimes of the North Korean regime against their own people, rarely discussed by-

Yeonmi Park 59:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:15 ... politicians. They'll talk about Afghanistan, they'll talk about Iraq, they'll talk about all the problems we have with Iran. They don't talk about w- what's going on right now.

Yeonmi Park 59:24 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 59:25 What you're describing in North Korea with these concentration camps-

Yeonmi Park 59:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:28 ... and these people. They don't talk about these things.

Yeonmi Park 59:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:31 What can be done?

Yeonmi Park 59:32 I think by talk... I think this is a beauty of li- living in democracy. Like, when I go to Whole Foods, right, coming from North Korea, I'm shocked by how many hand washing is like by... I mean, all about, like, environment friendly products.

Joe Rogan 59:50 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 59:51 Right? And that means a lot of people want to support this cause.

Joe Rogan 59:56 Right.

Yeonmi Park 59:56 That they want... I mean look at how many vegan restaurants are popping up in New York. So a lot of people demand that now.

Joe Rogan 1:00:03 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 1:00:04 So if individuals are being educated on what is happening and who is actually responsible for supporting North Korean regime and how hard it is for the people who are being oppressed. If they start demanding the politicians and the world leaders and companies to be conscious and act, I think that is, at this point, my only hope is individuals. I have stopped trying to talking to UN. I don't even give talks anymore at the UN.

Joe Rogan 1:00:32 Did you give talks in the past?

Yeonmi Park 1:00:33 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:33 What was the response?

Yeonmi Park 1:00:35 They... In Geneva, in September, the Gen- Human Rights General Assembly meeting, how dumb of them, they literally put me alone to right next to North Korean delegation team because geographically we are somehow close. So these five guys from North Korean delegation team are swearing at me. And the UN, that's what they do. That's how dumb they are.

Joe Rogan 1:00:56 They sat them next to you?

Yeonmi Park 1:00:57 Yeah, they put me right next to North Korean delegation team.

Joe Rogan 1:01:02 And no protection?

Yeonmi Park 1:01:03 No. I was so scared that going to ho- like hotel room that night, 'cause I don't have like anybody protecting me. So...... I have tried, of course. But at the UN, who decides the human rights violators? Chinese and Putin and Saudis do. They decide who actually violates human rights.

Joe Rogan 1:01:22 That's crazy.

Yeonmi Park 1:01:23 Yeah. So I have to go ask Chinese who actually committing this crime and complain. So of course, they are not gonna listen to me. So what is the even point of the UN for this, right? And of course, I ... I met Nancy Pelosi, I met a lot of politicians and on surface like, "Oh, that's really horrible. Let me think about what can I do." But, of course, this is not what they care. They, they care about the systemic oppression that is happening in America more.

Joe Rogan 1:01:47 They care about what's gonna get them votes.

Yeonmi Park 1:01:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:51 And what's popular, what's, what's-

Yeonmi Park 1:01:52 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:01:53 ... on people's minds right now.

Yeonmi Park 1:01:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:55 And whatever the narrative is that they're currently pushing-

Yeonmi Park 1:01:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:58 ... that's gonna allow them to get elected again.

Yeonmi Park 1:02:00 Yeah. It's all about their own interest.

Joe Rogan 1:02:03 So when you spoke at the UN, what was, what was the reception like?

Yeonmi Park 1:02:08 Oh, they are saying like, this is the West propaganda trying to interfere other people's autonomy. And North Korea is a state of, of their own, you should not interfere the other people's affairs. That's like still to this day Chinese narrative, right? They don't, don't ask us what we are doing to Xinjiang Uighurs or Falun Gong or, like, organ trafficking, all of that. It's our own business.

Joe Rogan 1:02:29 Organ trafficking?

Yeonmi Park 1:02:30 Yeah. So when North Koreans go to China, we ending up, like, several different sources. Worst cases, they take us and they take our organs out and suddenly we die.

Joe Rogan 1:02:43 Like which, which organs?

Yeonmi Park 1:02:45 Everybody. Your eyes-

Joe Rogan 1:02:46 Heart.

Yeonmi Park 1:02:47 ... hearts, lungs-

Joe Rogan 1:02:47 Kidneys, liver?

Yeonmi Park 1:02:48 ... kidneys, skin, you name all of it.

Joe Rogan 1:02:49 They sell them?

Yeonmi Park 1:02:50 Of course. North ... In China, you order the organ, it gets to you within three hours. How is that possible? How somebody dies miraculously in three hours for you? Like, (laughs) N- Nor- China is the ... Do you know how many hospitals are being built for, for the organ transfer in China?

Joe Rogan 1:03:08 How many?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:10 Thi- This is the biggest, like, uh, revenue right now being built in China.

Joe Rogan 1:03:13 So do people from other countries go to China for organ replacements?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:16 Yeah. A lot of the Middle East and those countries go to China to get organs.

Joe Rogan 1:03:21 So they just turn a blind eye to it?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:23 They don't think about the origin of the actual organs themselves?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:27 They just go-

Yeonmi Park 1:03:28 Get it.

Joe Rogan 1:03:28 ... "Oh, I need a lung replacement," and China says, "Well, if you go here, we can get it for you."

Yeonmi Park 1:03:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:33 And they go, and then they kill someone and take their, their lungs.

Yeonmi Park 1:03:36 Yeah. It became a biggest now, like, a new industry that is rising in China, is organ transfer.

Joe Rogan 1:03:42 And those people are generally North Koreans?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:45 Those are ... A lot of them were Falun Gong practitioners in China.

Joe Rogan 1:03:49 Okay. Uighurs?

Yeonmi Park 1:03:50 Yeah. Now they're Uighurs.

Joe Rogan 1:03:51 Mm-hmm.

Yeonmi Park 1:03:52 But Falun Gong is different, like p-

Joe Rogan 1:03:53 Uh-huh.

Yeonmi Park 1:03:53 ... peaceful religion, they were wanted. Falun Gong, Uighurs, and not as much Tibetans, but more like Xinjiang now with the Falun Gong and North Koreans.

Joe Rogan 1:04:03 And so they have them in some prisons somewhere?

Yeonmi Park 1:04:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:04:07 And they feed them and just wait for someone to come along that needs their organs, and then they kill them.

Yeonmi Park 1:04:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:04:12 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 1:04:13 Yeah. And-

Joe Rogan 1:04:14 And this is proven?

Yeonmi Park 1:04:15 It's ... I mean, (laughs) well, how ... It's ... A lot of other things are proven because when these people die, how do we ask them, "How did you die?"

Joe Rogan 1:04:24 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:04:24 They are dead. So that is ... Uh, a lot of Falun Gong survivors do testimony.

Joe Rogan 1:04:30 They have told about this?

Yeonmi Park 1:04:31 Yeah, it's, it's very well-known. Like, Joe can look it up. It's a very ... UN even condemned China for that. Even they, they, they couldn't. Like, turned eyes blind on it. It was too, too evidence. And another thing North Koreans go is the prostitution, brothels, right? And these girls resist. So what they do, they give them drugs. So they make them become drug addict. So now they... All they want is drug, so that's how they go to brothels. And then the... this men, as I said, in these villages cannot afford the women, these little towns, so they buy one girl, and they rotate the entire men in that, in that town. And, and then, like me, uh, some of them just being sold. Like, my mom was sold for a ... just, like, mentally retarded family, the farmer's family. And we go became a free labor for them and being a sex slave for them. And, and then-

Joe Rogan 1:05:28 Being a sex slave for a mentally retarded family?

Yeonmi Park 1:05:30 Yeah. I mean, because if they are normal and they wouldn't ... they can find wives, they're older, like, mentally retarded and not functioning people. Uh, th- those people cannot find wives, so that's why we ending up in the most horrible places. We don't just go and, like, fall in love and marrying some normal person.

Joe Rogan 1:05:53 (sighs) So when you were 13-

Yeonmi Park 1:05:57 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:05:57 ... you escaped. When ... B- b- tell us what it was like. First of all, where did you escape to? You escaped to China?

Yeonmi Park 1:06:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:06 And how did you get across?

Yeonmi Park 1:06:07 Uh, it was a frozen river in March, 20... uh, Mar- uh, end of, end of March, uh, in 2007.

Joe Rogan 1:06:13 So you traveled on the frozen river?

Yeonmi Park 1:06:15 Yeah. And we luckily didn't get shot by the guards, and when we got into the other side of the riverbank of China, that's when mom got raped, and then they took us in a house and they were, like, turning me around, like a slave market, right? They check my teeth and my body structure and somehow being virgin is very precious in China, so they sold my mom for around $65 in this 21st century, and they sold me less than $300, and they sold us separately. But the thing is, they didn't even try to force us. They were asking, "If you don't want to be sold, you can go back to North Korea." Right? And even North Korean regime doesn't punish me, I couldn't find food to eat. I was gonna die anyway. Even if the regime doesn't kill me, the starvation was gonna kill me. And for the first time, I remember that night in the, the trafficker's house, I saw a trash can-... and I did not know what it was. So I asked this lady, like, "What is that?" And then like a went around thing and said, "Oh, that's the trash." Like, "What is trash?" And she's like, "Oh, the things that you don't need you throw there, like in a throw bin away." And I said, "K- what do you mean you have things to throw away?" 'Cause we never needed a trash bin in North Korea. We had nothing to throw. Even if the hairs comes down, we don't have, like, heating, like, that we have to start a fire. And starting fire takes... Paper is very precious. So we burn, like, hair there, tr- to try to start a fire. Like, literally nothing was thrown away in that country.

Joe Rogan 1:07:56 Even human poop, right?

Yeonmi Park 1:07:57 Yeah. I mean, that's the thing, that regime cannot have a fertilizer. They don't even have the technology to have a fertilizer, so they demand us to bring the poop. And as us kids, you go to school, the teachers beat you and then go home and look for poop. So I would go in the streets and looking if anywhere, like, a dog pooped or somewhere. Of course, like, all those dogs are poops gone. So finding a poop, and when you don't eat, eat, eat much, you don't poop, like, in North Korea, like, few times a month.

Joe Rogan 1:08:26 Really?

Yeonmi Park 1:08:26 It's very precious then. Yeah, of course.

Joe Rogan 1:08:29 Few times a month?

Yeonmi Park 1:08:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:31 And it becomes very precious.

Yeonmi Park 1:08:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:33 And you have to give it over to the regime?

Yeonmi Park 1:08:34 Yeah. So that's nothing is being wasted in that regime.

Joe Rogan 1:08:39 So do they have toilets or do you go to the bathroom in outhouses? Like-

Yeonmi Park 1:08:43 Oh, we have all outhouses there.

Joe Rogan 1:08:45 Outhouses.

Yeonmi Park 1:08:45 And they're digging a hole, but we have to lock it, because they... some people come and steal it, because it's-

Joe Rogan 1:08:49 They come to steal the poop?

Yeonmi Park 1:08:50 Yeah, it's a government quota. You get punished if you don't bring poop. Everything is punishment in that country.

Joe Rogan 1:08:57 So how much... What is the quota? Like, how much poop do you have to give them?

Yeonmi Park 1:09:00 S- so sometimes per family they say one ton. How do you find that?

Joe Rogan 1:09:05 A ton?

Yeonmi Park 1:09:05 Yeah, so we-

Joe Rogan 1:09:06 2000 pounds?

Yeonmi Park 1:09:08 I do the kilograms, so like-

Joe Rogan 1:09:09 Oh.

Yeonmi Park 1:09:09 ... 1000 kilograms, right? It's like a ton.

Joe Rogan 1:09:12 1000 kilograms.

Yeonmi Park 1:09:12 One ton, so-

Joe Rogan 1:09:13 Yeah, it's about right, so-

Yeonmi Park 1:09:14 Yeah, yeah. In 2000.

Joe Rogan 1:09:15 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 1:09:15 So per family or they give you the quota, so, and-

Joe Rogan 1:09:19 So that's per year?

Yeonmi Park 1:09:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:22 (sighs)

Yeonmi Park 1:09:22 And then we have to bring them in usually January. So because the farming starts around March, so they have to, you know, f- they can... In, in, like, uh, January, they collect them and pile them up, and then they start to burying it, and then when the thaw happens and they start the farming process in the spring.

Joe Rogan 1:09:41 And even then, you don't get any of that food that they're growing.

Yeonmi Park 1:09:44 No, it's a collective farm, so they take the 98% of the food to the regime, and then that 2% is spread among the elites who's running the farm. So you work entire year in the collective farm, you gain nothing from it.

Joe Rogan 1:10:00 There's also cannibalism.

Yeonmi Park 1:10:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:10:03 How does that happen?

Yeonmi Park 1:10:06 It's, it's, it is really, like, people said, "Oh, don't dehumanize people of North Korea," and, like, because they say, "Oh, just say, tell us the nice things," right? Like, we... "That's just too much for us to handle." And, like, wh- I, I just... This is the thing, like, in... There's, like, people go to black market, you sell meat, people don't ask what meat it is. You don't ask if it's, like, pork or, like, is this rabbit? We don't... And we just... Sometimes we go find a very, very cheap meat and we don't ask. And luckily, I was too afford... Poor to afford the meat. I didn't get to eat them. A lot of children just disappear, but the thing is, there's no evidence. Usually everybody dies (laughs) in some corner, get drowned. So in the... We don't ha- ... We go to river to bathe. We only bathe a few times a year. Wintertime, we don't even bathe. And during the winter, we have to go to wash our clothes, so we make a small hole in the river, and sometimes you fall and slip through and you die like that. So it's just so easy to... Murder is not a thing, so in... It's so many cause killing you. So some people, you, you lose your children, we just don't even know what killed it and nobody bother to go out and, like, find it for you. So, so many people die, so that's why easy to sell the human, like, uh, meat.

Joe Rogan 1:11:33 So either they're killing the children or they'll find them dead and then just cook their meat and sell it?

Yeonmi Park 1:11:40 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:41 This is common?

Yeonmi Park 1:11:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:45 (huffs) So when you escaped to China, what is the process like when you're in China before y- ... How do you... How did you event- ... You eventually got to South Korea?

Yeonmi Park 1:11:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:00 What... How long were you in China for?

Yeonmi Park 1:12:02 Almost two years.

Joe Rogan 1:12:04 And what was that like? What was the process like?

Yeonmi Park 1:12:06 (laughs) Well, living in two years of China, like, feel like I lived 1000 years on this earth (laughs) . I feel, like, very old. Um, yeah, I remember after there for six months, one day, I was walking along and then, like, I literally felt like I lived 1000 years, right? Like, making it one day was such a struggle. Whenever you let one day live, you think like, "Oh my God, I made one more day on Earth."

Joe Rogan 1:12:33 In China?

Yeonmi Park 1:12:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:34 So i- it was that hard in China?

Yeonmi Park 1:12:36 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:12:36 What was so hard about it?

Yeonmi Park 1:12:38 Because, one, you don't know when you're gonna be arrested, so you always put your shoes on tight, shoe laces, and whenever you get into some indoor, you look for a place to run, right? If you are so invited to somebody's house, you see the hole to check the doors, "Where can I run? Which route do I run?" When you even sleep, you, you know how to run, right? You get ready to run from the police. And that is a constant threat. And, and of course you're raped every single day by these human traffickers, and they even come follow you to bathroom. There's no human dignity. They beat you and they... I mean, you're not your own person, and they... the common things that they t- tell us, tell us that you... our lives are even not valuable, like pigs, because even they kill us, they know that we cannot go to police.

Joe Rogan 1:13:28 How did you escape from all that?

Yeonmi Park 1:13:31 This is, uh ... So the man who bought me, uh, he was very impressed because by then I went through two human traffickers prior me. So by the third human trafficker, nobody's virgin. They all got raped. So he was Han Chinese and couldn't believe that I made it to him as a virgin, because the first trafficker, my mom covered. Second trafficker, I felt like hell. I literally lose my mind. And thankfully, he has his, like, mistress in the next room, so I didn't get raped, even he tried (laughs) so hard, I didn't. So by the third time Han Chinese, I was trying to kill myself and then he said, "Oh, if you become my mistress, I'm gonna help you to get in your- get your family to you." But before that, he showed me the phone he had, 'cause I'd never seen a phone in my life as North Korean. And he showed me, "Oh, this phone can take pictures and look at these pictures I took." And in a moment, the one picture was I saw with my mom in it. And I started telling just like, "My mom, my mom." And that's how he knew that I had that... the woman that he sold was my mom and of- obviously, he raped her too. So he said if I become his mistress, he's gonna, uh, get me... help me mi- with my family. So he took my virginity, raped me, and thankfully, he did help me. He brought, he brought my mom back from a farmer that he sold, and he brought my sick father from North Korea. That's how I brought my parents back to me.

Joe Rogan 1:15:05 How did you escape from him?

Yeonmi Park 1:15:07 Two... after almost two years, he became a gambling addict. He was a big gambler. He's spending all his money and somehow this evil man was letting me go, 'cause he couldn't even afford to give me food at that point, he w- he was so broke. So he said, like, "I'm letting you go." And in some ways, in his most evil way, he loved me. So after two years, I was let go, and then I went to this chat room. So this is another thing. A lot of North Korean girls, uh, capturing these chat rooms where we do body cams. Clients are South Koreans. So we chat and then we show our body. But North Korean women, we choose that route because it's better than being touched by men in person. Right?

Joe Rogan 1:15:55 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:15:55 It's you're not raped in person.

Joe Rogan 1:15:57 So, this is all on the internet with web cameras?

Yeonmi Park 1:15:59 Yeah. That's sm- or so number one thing that North Korean women do in China or this nightlife. So in that room, I heard about something called the South Korea for the first time, because the clients are South Koreans.

Joe Rogan 1:16:12 You didn't know what South Korea was?

Yeonmi Park 1:16:13 I knew the different name, like, different name, but I knew that country was colonized by Americans. I heard that in South Korea, the South Korea was very corrupt capitalist and raped by American soldiers every day and they all, like, cannot go to... kids cannot go to school and they all want to come to North Korea.

Joe Rogan 1:16:33 That's what you had learned from North Korea?

Yeonmi Park 1:16:35 Oh yeah, that's what I thought.

Joe Rogan 1:16:36 Wow, they all want to go to North Korea?

Yeonmi Park 1:16:38 Yeah, they all want to come to North Korea. The entire humanity wants to be like North Korea. So we are so fortunate. They tell us that we have nothing to envy in this world.

Joe Rogan 1:16:50 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 1:16:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:16:53 So you find out about South Korea from these chat rooms and you start to get a different idea of what South Korea must be like?

Yeonmi Park 1:16:59 Yeah. And we met this defector lady in that chat room. She told me she knows some missionaries and if we become Christians, they're gonna help us to go to South Korea and be free. And that's when I heard, like, free for the first time, I asked her, like, "What do you mean free?" And she said, "Oh, you can watch TV and you can wear jeans and nobody gonna arrest you for that in South Korea." (laughs) So that's what I thought of freedom.

Joe Rogan 1:17:26 Watching TV and wearing jeans?

Yeonmi Park 1:17:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:17:28 That's, that's what you thought of freedom? Wow.

Yeonmi Park 1:17:30 It was never like freedom of speech or none of that. It was like, "Oh, that's cool. I can wear jeans." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:17:36 (laughs)

Yeonmi Park 1:17:36 'Cause I was a teenage girl. I wanted jeans. In North Korea, you get sent to prison camp for that.

Joe Rogan 1:17:41 You get sent to prison camp for wearing jeans?

Yeonmi Park 1:17:43 Yeah. It's a joke for Westerners that North Korean, even haircut is, like, ordered by the regime. Like, the only thing that North Koreans are allowed to do that in that country freely, really, is breathing. Everything else is controlled. What we wear, what we watch, what we listen to, how we dance, what haircut that we get. Every single thing is controlled by the regime.

Joe Rogan 1:18:11 So you're working in these chat rooms.

Yeonmi Park 1:18:14 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:18:15 And you meet this woman and she says, "You just have to become a Christian"?

Yeonmi Park 1:18:19 No, we have to go there was shelter that Christians had. So we have to go in there, study Bible and we have to prove our faith to them. Then they're gonna rescue us. That was a condition to be rescued, by Christians.

Joe Rogan 1:18:32 So it's a Christian missionary-

Yeonmi Park 1:18:34 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:18:35 ... from South Korea?

Yeonmi Park 1:18:36 South Korea. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:37 And how... so did you have to go to South Korea in order to prove yourself to them or did they, did they-

Yeonmi Park 1:18:44 No, we-

Joe Rogan 1:18:44 ... do this all through online?

Yeonmi Park 1:18:45 No, we couldn't go South Korea, obviously. So we... they had a shelter in China, in some house hidden. So we went to their shelter and then we joined them as a group and studied the Bible every day. So we would go fasting. I mean, we've been starved all our lives, but they say, you know, "God provides, so you go fast, you study Bible, you memorize verses, they come test you and we pray together." And then once they think we are actually Christians, then they tell you how to go to South Korea.

Joe Rogan 1:19:16 How long did that take?

Yeonmi Park 1:19:18 Several month. And, but when you're so desperate, right, like, I'm gonna believe in rocks if somebody ask me-

Joe Rogan 1:19:25 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:19:25 ... to believe in. Like, you believe in anything, literally.

Joe Rogan 1:19:28 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:19:29 So... and it was so easy, like, North Korea regime was Bible.... like, I was like, "What the heck is this thing called Jesus and God?" And like, North Koreans are like, "Don't worry, baby." They said, "Plug God to Kim Il-sung and Jesus to Kim Jong Il." And per- perfectly made sense. Like, God loves us so much, he gave us his son, he kn- he's there to protect us, we gotta suffer and go to paradise with him later in life.

Joe Rogan 1:19:50 (sighs)

Yeonmi Park 1:19:52 So, I did become a Christian.

Joe Rogan 1:19:54 So, it made the same sense to you because it was so similar-

Yeonmi Park 1:19:57 So s-

Joe Rogan 1:19:57 ... to the story that they taught you in North Korea.

Yeonmi Park 1:19:58 Exactly. The logic was so similar.

Joe Rogan 1:20:02 So, you became a Christian?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:03 Yeah, I did.

Joe Rogan 1:20:04 And several months of this studying the Bible-

Yeonmi Park 1:20:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20:07 ... and then they eventually got you to South Korea?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:10 They told us how to go.

Joe Rogan 1:20:12 How'd you do that?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:13 (laughs) Which was, uh, literally walking across the Gobi Desert into Mongolia from China.

Joe Rogan 1:20:21 You walked?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20:23 Wow.

Yeonmi Park 1:20:24 So, they gave us one compass. We had even toddler in our group. We had one father and his father, and, uh, seven ladies and a few teenagers. They told us, um-

Joe Rogan 1:20:35 You went by compass?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20:36 Did they give you a map?

Yeonmi Park 1:20:38 Uh, you cannot look at the map in the desert. You don't have GPS. How do you know?

Joe Rogan 1:20:42 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:20:42 Nothing tells you if you're going circle or straight or backwards. That was the horrifying thing about desert is that it looks all the same.

Joe Rogan 1:20:51 Right, right, right.

Yeonmi Park 1:20:52 Nothing tells you what you're doing. You can just keep going circle all night. And then, so they told us, "Go follow the west and the north between in that direction, and if you cross the eight wire fences, hopefully that's gonna be Mongolia."

Joe Rogan 1:21:10 Hopefully.

Yeonmi Park 1:21:11 "And then you find the Mongolian soldiers and tell them that you want to go to South Korea, not North Korea." So, that means it's so dangerous, the chances of you making it in that desert is not even, like, 2% or 3%, right? (laughs) Like, 90, 80% of the time, you're gonna fail. So, they cannot lead us there. It's random luck. That's why they believe that God is gonna show us a miracle.

Joe Rogan 1:21:32 How long did it take you to walk from the Gobi Desert?

Yeonmi Park 1:21:34 It was just only one day.

Joe Rogan 1:21:36 One day?

Yeonmi Park 1:21:36 But we chose that in February 2009 after Beijing Olympic, and in the frozen Gobi Desert, it's, like, -40 degrees. So, those soldiers is thinking nobody's crazy enough to cross right now in this freezing time.

Joe Rogan 1:21:53 So, that's how you can do it?

Yeonmi Park 1:21:54 That security is lower. Other times, they're gonna shoot you because in that desert, nobody knows if you got killed or not. Just-

Joe Rogan 1:22:00 So, who's, who would be shooting you?

Yeonmi Park 1:22:02 Chinese or the Mongolians. Both of them can just shoot you.

Joe Rogan 1:22:05 The j- they would just shoot anybody walking through the desert?

Yeonmi Park 1:22:08 Yeah. It's called a shoot-to order. It's like a shoot-to-kill order. So, they don't, like, bother ask who you are. Just gonna shoot them right there and kill them. So, we don't even have ID, none of that, so we chose a time it was frozen and cold, and even guards wouldn't, don't wanna come out and look around. So, we from, walking from Chinese side, but they took us to border of China, Inner Mongolia that which was still China. From that border, we were started walking towards Mongolia. And entire day of walking, we got there, so miraculously, we didn't die from the cold.

Joe Rogan 1:22:43 And did you bring food? Did you bring water? What did you bring with you when you were walking?

Yeonmi Park 1:22:47 Like, in -40 degrees, you cannot even stand still for three seconds. Like, if you stand still for 10 seconds, you're gonna die right there. You're gonna get a heart attack.

Joe Rogan 1:22:56 Yeah.

Yeonmi Park 1:22:56 Frozen to death. So, you don't even need to eat. You just have to... Only thing I remember was moving, moving, moving.

Joe Rogan 1:23:03 Keep going.

Yeonmi Park 1:23:04 Keep moving. Whatever I was doing, I had to keep moving. Otherwise, you get very, like, you don't get enough oxygen-

Joe Rogan 1:23:10 Right.

Yeonmi Park 1:23:10 ... so very, like, hazy and not clear. You get very sleepy. That's the thing, like, dying from cold wasn't bad as, like, I thought. It was m- you become very numb and you don't really, like desensitized, and you become very, very sleepy. And that's when you know you're dying in that