Why I escaped from North Korea

Cherie Yang, a Special Ambassador to the nonprofit NGO Teach North Korean Refugees (TNKR), was born in Hye Ryeng, North Korea. Through her employment at a resort near her hometown, she realized that the North Korean regime had been lying to its people. She fled North Korea in search for freedom, departing in a dramatic escape. Whereas more than 30,000 North Korean refugees have escaped to South Korea in the last two decades, Cherie is one of only about 200 North Korean refugees to immigrate directly to the United States since President George W. Bush signed the North Korean Human Rights Act of 2004. One year ago, on October 28, 2017 at a TEDx Talk in London, she shared her harrowing journey in search of freedom. She granted permission to "Voices from the North" to print the text of her speech. She first delivered this speech in February 2017 when she won TNKR's 5th English Speech Contest.

When You Can't Live and You Can't Leave: Why I Escaped North Korea

By Cherie Yang

Imagine getting a dream job, but realizing it is a nightmare. You could quit, right? Most people give two weeks' notice or they just stop showing up for work.

In my case, I couldn't quit. That's because I was born in North Korea. I tried to quit, and had 400 soldiers and police chasing me.

North Korea is the worst country in the world. One writer said, "A system where you can't live, but you can't leave is the definition of hell." That is North Korea.

The soldiers and police were chasing me because I knew their secret. They were looking everywhere for me, checking every possible relative, friend, and connection.

I had been working at a government villa, which I thought was the opportunity of a lifetime. I was selected to work as a server in a government officer's villa. The officer was the mayor of my hometown. Women from all over North Korea wished to have this type of job because it is considered to be honorable to serve the Kim regime in this way. I was elated to have been chosen for such an esteemed duty, until I found out the real truth inside the villa.

When I first arrived at the mayor's villa, I remember being extremely surprised. The facilities in this villa were so lavish.

They were beyond anything I could have ever imagined. During the famine of the 1990s, when anywhere from 500,000 to 2 million people starved to death, we had been told that everyone, including our Dear Leader, was sacrificing for the good of the nation. We believed the propaganda that Our Dear Leader and government officers were working all day to provide us a better life. The minute I stepped inside that villa, I realized that the government had been lying to us. While so many North Koreans were suffering, starving and dying, North Korean government officers were living a lavish lifestyle.

In North Korea, asking questions about the Kim regime would be madness. My experience at the villa made me begin to question my loyalty to the regime.

It was my duty to serve the government officers their meals. I had to stand outside the door, still as a statue. When they needed something they would call me, and I had to bring it immediately.

Day by day, my body and mental health suffered, and I felt so lonely knowing that no one there cared. With every passing day, I missed my family, relatives, and friends more and more. I felt like I was in a prison. I couldn't live as I wanted, but I couldn't leave. I knew their secret. I knew about their extravagant lifestyle and their many lies.

What I had thought was an opportunity of a lifetime was the exact opposite. I felt trapped. I couldn't leave the villa. It was -hell. I decided to do the unthinkable, and escape back to my family. I started to plan carefully. Leaving the villa was going to be very difficult because there was only one door in and out of the complex, and the armed security were standing guard. So, in order to escape the villa, climbing over the eight-foot wall was my only option. One day, I noticed some rocks scattered near the wall. For 15 days, I put my dangerous plan into action: gathering the rocks together around 2 to 3 a.m. On the 15thh night, I was able to climb over the wall using the stack of rocks.

After escaping, I spent two hours walking down the mountain to my best friend's house. Soon after arriving, she informed me that 400 soldiers and police officers were hunting me down, questioning anybody connected to me, entering their homes unannounced. They wanted to find me.

I went into hiding. It was a miserable time -- I was sick, scared, I couldn't see my family or let them know I was alive.

I couldn't live, but I couldn't leave. That was the moment I realized I HAD to leave North Korea. That was the moment that I chose to embrace the madness of leaving my homeland.

So, I crossed the freezing Truman River in the fall of 2002. A year later, my parents and my sister also fled. We spent three years living in China, which was extremely dangerous and unstable for North Korean refugees. While in China, I saw a documentary about North Korean refugees who were fleeing from China to Laos. One group had an older man with an injured leg. He could not walk quickly enough over the mountains, and they were in danger of being caught by the police. The injured man told the group to leave him, to save themselves. And so, they left the man behind so they could make it to safety and freedom. I thought this would never happen to my family and me. But, it did.

In search of freedom in South Korea, my parents left China first. The journey from China to South Korea is very dangerous. Therefore, my parents thought that my sister and I would follow upon their safe arrival. When they departed, my father left us with these words, "I will come back to take you to Korea soon." But he never came back for us. We didn't know that those would be the last words he would say to us. Halfway through their arduous journey in the mountains to reach Thailand, my dad got sick. Sadly, he died in Laos. He was buried along the Mekong River. I lost the greatest mentor in my life and the father who loved me so much.

While my sister and I were waiting in China for my parents to return, I saw a news story about some North Korean refugees. This was one of MANY instances of the media informing and inspiring me about the outside world. But this particular news story was about North Korean refugees immigrating to the United States. This gave me an idea. I thought that we would go to Thailand to meet our parents, and then I would go to the U.S. embassy and ask to immigrate there.

So, that is what my sister and I did. All North Koreans risk their lives to escape to freedom. My sister and I were no exception to this danger. We each carried a razor. We planned on using those razors to commit suicide, by cutting our wrists in case we were captured. We were NOT going back to North Korea.

In 2007, five years after leaving North Korea, my mom, sister, and I went to the U.S. as refugees. At last, we were free. I still can't forget the feeling when I first arrived in the US. It was the first time since I left the villa that I could sleep peacefully. My nightmares of being caught finally ended.

I didn't really know what freedom meant until I finally felt it. In North Korea I was a prisoner, an object, a commodity, ripped from my family for the government to use as it pleased. Although now I am free, millions of others have not met freedom.

When I was in North Korea, I thought I had a dream job, but it turned out to be hell. I will never forget the fear that I had realizing that 400 soldiers and police officers were chasing me. "A system where you can't live, but you can't leave is the definition of hell." I grew up in this system, and was determined to escape. Yet, I am one of the lucky few. I wasn't only seeking survival. I wanted to LIVE as a human being. Now, I am a free woman, able to live as I wish.

Casey Lartigue Jr., co-founder of the Teach North Korean Refugees Global Education Center along with Eunkoo Lee, is the 2017 winner of the "Social Contribution" Prize from the Hansarang Rural Cultural Foundation and the 2017 winner of the Global Award from Challenge Korea.