Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier
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0:10 - 0:13I've been a journalist for 32 years,
-
0:13 - 0:17and I'm going to tell you about the saddest story
that I've ever heard. -
0:19 - 0:26Inside Camp 14, 13-year-old inmate
named Shin Dong-hyuk -
0:28 - 0:30betrayed his family.
-
0:33 - 0:35It was late at night,
he was supposed to be asleep -
0:36 - 0:38but he heard his mother and brother
-
0:38 - 0:41talking about a plan
to escape from the camp. -
0:42 - 0:45The rules of Camp 14 are clear.
-
0:47 - 0:50If you try to escape, you'll be shot.
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0:51 - 0:54If you hear someone talking about escape
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0:54 - 0:57and you fail to report it, you'll be shot.
-
0:58 - 1:02Shin got out of bed,
told his mother he had to pee -
1:02 - 1:07walked outside and found a guard.
-
1:07 - 1:11While he was snitching,
he asked for more food -
1:11 - 1:14and easier work.
-
1:14 - 1:18About seven months later --
-
1:20 - 1:22about seven months later,
-
1:22 - 1:25he was taken to the execution grounds in the camp.
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1:25 - 1:27A place that he'd gone to twice a year
-
1:27 - 1:30ever since he was five years old.
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1:30 - 1:32There, the entire camp was assembled.
-
1:32 - 1:36There were about 20,000 people
in Camp 14 at the time. -
1:36 - 1:39He was taken to the front,
and he witnessed -
1:39 - 1:44the shooting death of his brother,
and the hanging of his mother. -
1:45 - 1:48Before his mother died,
she tried to catch his eye. -
1:50 - 1:53He refused to look at her.
-
1:53 - 1:56For the next 10 years,
he felt no guilt -
1:56 - 2:00for his role in the death
of his brother and mother. -
2:04 - 2:07In concentration camps survivor stories,
-
2:07 - 2:10there is a conventional narrative arc.
-
2:10 - 2:15The protagonist is taken away
by security forces -
2:15 - 2:19from a comfortable home
and a loving family. -
2:19 - 2:23The most famous of these stories,
I'm sure most of you've read -
2:23 - 2:26is by Elie Wiesel, it's called "Night."
-
2:26 - 2:30In the book, he writes that,
after his entire family perished -
2:30 - 2:34in the Nazi death camps, he was alone.
-
2:34 - 2:37Terribly alone. In a world without man,
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2:37 - 2:42without God, without love, without mercy.
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2:42 - 2:46Shin's story is even darker.
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2:46 - 2:50Words like love, mercy, family --
-
2:50 - 2:53for him had no meaning at all.
-
2:53 - 3:00God did not disappear or die.
Shin had never heard of him. -
3:01 - 3:04In "Night," Wiesel writes
-
3:04 - 3:09that an adolescent's knowledge of evil
should come from reading books. -
3:12 - 3:13In Camp 14,
-
3:13 - 3:18Shin saw only one book,
a Korean grammar -
3:18 - 3:21in the hands of his teacher.
A man who wore a uniform, -
3:21 - 3:26had a gun on his hip,
and who beat one of Shin's classmates -
3:26 - 3:29to death with a chalkboard pointer.
-
3:31 - 3:34Shin did not abandon
-
3:34 - 3:37civilization and descend into hell.
-
3:37 - 3:41Uniquely among all
the concentration camp survivors -
3:41 - 3:45we know, he was born there.
He accepted its rules. -
3:45 - 3:47He regarded it as home.
-
3:51 - 3:56In a very real way,
Shin was a creation -
3:56 - 4:01of the guards in Camp 14.
They were quite literally his breeders. -
4:01 - 4:05They chose his parents,
who were young adults in the camp -
4:05 - 4:08and they ordered them
to have sex. -
4:08 - 4:13He was raised mostly by the guards.
He had a very bad relationship with his mother. -
4:13 - 4:16But he was raised by the guards,
-
4:16 - 4:21to snitch on his parents,
and to snitch on his friends. -
4:21 - 4:25It was a long playing behavioral experiment
-
4:25 - 4:28run by the security apparatus of North Korea.
-
4:28 - 4:33And, it continues to this day.
The rules are very simple. -
4:33 - 4:37The more you snitched,
the more you ate. -
4:37 - 4:40Let me ask you,
how many of you knew -
4:40 - 4:44before I started talking, that there are
concentration camps in North Korea? -
4:44 - 4:46That's good.
-
4:46 - 4:50Well, there are about six of them.
Between four and six. -
4:50 - 4:55135,000 to 200,000 people
are in them right now. -
4:55 - 4:57Half of them are the relatives
-
4:57 - 5:02of perceived political enemies of the state.
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5:02 - 5:03The relatives.
-
5:03 - 5:07The way justice works in North Korea,
there's collective punishment. -
5:07 - 5:12If I were to say that the leaders
were stupid and corrupt -
5:12 - 5:16my kids and my parents
would go with me to a camp -
5:16 - 5:22like Camp 14, and eating a diet of corn,
cabbage and salt, we would all be worked to death. -
5:22 - 5:26These camps have existed for half a century.
-
5:26 - 5:31They're clearly visible on Google Earth,
you can see them on your Smartphone. -
5:31 - 5:34North Korea continues to deny,
-
5:34 - 5:37officially deny that they exist.
-
5:37 - 5:41North Korea didn't invent these camps.
-
5:41 - 5:45They were invented
in this form by Stalin. -
5:45 - 5:50But, when Stalin died
in the former Soviet Union, -
5:50 - 5:53the camps died out too.
-
5:53 - 5:59In North Korea however, the camps
have survived the death of founding dictator, -
5:59 - 6:04they've survived the death of his son,
-
6:04 - 6:08and they're thriving now
with the third generation -
6:08 - 6:12of totalitarian leadership, Kim Jong Un.
-
6:12 - 6:16Who's about 28, 29 years old.
Coincidentally, he happens to be -
6:16 - 6:21about the same age as Shin.
-
6:21 - 6:24But you can see from this slide
the camps have existed -
6:24 - 6:28twice as long as the camps
in the Soviet Union, -
6:28 - 6:33about 12 times as long as the camps
in Hitler's Germany. -
6:33 - 6:38And the reason North Korea
seems to have lost none of its appetite -
6:38 - 6:42for being cruel to its own people.
-
6:42 - 6:46They're just as cruel now
as they were 50 years ago. -
6:46 - 6:51The camps are operated
in almost exactly the same way. -
6:51 - 6:56Shin's story is the case study in that cruelty.
-
6:56 - 6:58He's the only person,
-
6:58 - 7:02the only person so far,
born and raised in those camps -
7:02 - 7:05to get out and tell the story.
-
7:05 - 7:12But, his story is more than just a tale
of state-sponsored sadism. -
7:12 - 7:17It is an escape adventure,
and it's a story about the resilience -
7:17 - 7:20of the human spirit.
-
7:20 - 7:26The guards in Camp 14
spent 23 years trying to turn Shin -
7:26 - 7:30into a blinkard, malleable slave
and they failed. -
7:31 - 7:35They failed because he was very lucky
when he was 23. -
7:35 - 7:42A newcomer came to the camp, and this was
an individual who had been raised in Pyongyang. -
7:42 - 7:45A member of the elite.
He'd been educated in the former Soviet Union. -
7:45 - 7:49Shin's job, was to teach Park,
that was the guy's name, -
7:49 - 7:53how to fix sewing machines
in the uniform factory. -
7:53 - 7:58Shin was also supposed to snitch on Park,
to find out what he thought -
7:58 - 8:03about the leadership,
and then report to his superior. -
8:03 - 8:06For the first time in his life,
though, instead of snitching -
8:06 - 8:10Shin listened to what Park had to say.
-
8:10 - 8:13Park told him --
broke the news to him -
8:13 - 8:17that the world was round,
which was news to Shin. -
8:17 - 8:20He told him that the United States,
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8:20 - 8:23South Korea and China existed.
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8:24 - 8:28But, he also said, and this is
what got Shin's interest -- -
8:28 - 8:30He said, "If you get out of here,
if you get out of this camp, -
8:30 - 8:34and went to China,
you could eat grilled meat". -
8:34 - 8:38That's what interested Shin.
(Laughter) -
8:38 - 8:41He started dreaming about grilled meat.
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8:41 - 8:44Within a few weeks he asked Shin --
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8:44 - 8:48Shin asked Park
to escape together. -
8:50 - 8:52Park agreed.
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8:52 - 8:55On January 2nd, 2005
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8:55 - 8:59they went for the fence.
The electric fence. -
8:59 - 9:02The electrified fence
that surrounds the camp. -
9:03 - 9:06Shin was supposed to be the Mr Inside Guy
in this escape attempt. -
9:06 - 9:11He was supposed to get to the fence first,
then Park having more knowledge -
9:11 - 9:14of the outside world,
would lead them to China. -
9:14 - 9:21Unfortunately, as they ran towards the fence,
on a snowy cold evening up in the mountains, -
9:21 - 9:23Shin slipped and fell on his face
-
9:23 - 9:25and Park got to the fence first.
-
9:26 - 9:31He was electrocuted on the fence.
Shin did not hesitate, though. -
9:31 - 9:36He crawled over
Park's smoldering body and ran off. -
9:37 - 9:40The Mr. Outside Guy on that escape attempt
-
9:40 - 9:43unfortunately was dead on the fence.
-
9:43 - 9:46But Shin still, through a combination of luck,
-
9:46 - 9:53keeping his mouth shut, and being shrewd,
he found his way out of North Corea in 30 days. -
9:54 - 9:58In a year-and-a-half
he'd found his way across China -
9:58 - 10:01and found his way to South Korea.
-
10:01 - 10:06Two years later he was living
in Southern California. -
10:06 - 10:11Eating at In-and-Out Burger, which he still says
it's the best burger in the US. -
10:11 - 10:14(Laughter)
-
10:14 - 10:18And he was working for LiNK,
'Liberty in North Korea' -
10:18 - 10:21as a Human Rights volunteer.
-
10:21 - 10:24But, he's not been a very happy person
outside the camp. -
10:24 - 10:28He's struggling to understand
what it means to be free. -
10:28 - 10:33He says that he's physically outside,
but not psychologically outside barbed wire. -
10:34 - 10:37One of the things he told me is
-
10:37 - 10:41that he's evolving from being an animal
into trying to be a human being. -
10:41 - 10:44But it's going very, very slowly.
-
10:45 - 10:48Very slowly. He still has dreams
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10:48 - 10:50about his mother's death.
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10:52 - 11:00What's terrifying though is that Shin's story
is not an isolated tale of horror. -
11:00 - 11:05The two other big adjustment problems
that are going on, or that will soon go on. -
11:05 - 11:09There are 24,000 North Koreans
now living in South Korea. -
11:09 - 11:13Almost all of them have come there
in the past 12 years. -
11:13 - 11:18Almost all of them have been examined
by government psychiatrists and psychologists -
11:18 - 11:22in South Korea who say that,
virtually all of them are clinically paranoid, -
11:22 - 11:26a useful adjustment for life in North Korea,
a place that crawls with security agents -
11:26 - 11:31but they have a very difficult time
adapting to modern life. -
11:31 - 11:35They have a hard time distinguishing
between criticism and betrayal. -
11:35 - 11:42And, there are 24 million people in North Korea
who, if that state ever collapses -
11:42 - 11:45will have to go through
the same adjustment problems. -
11:45 - 11:50And no one is thinking that North Korea
is on the verge of collapse, -
11:50 - 11:53but totalitarian systems don't last forever.
-
11:53 - 11:57And, someday, all of those people
will have to go through a version -
11:57 - 12:00of what Shin has gone through.
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12:00 - 12:05Now, the reason Shin told me his awful story
-
12:05 - 12:08was because he wants you to know
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12:08 - 12:12that these camps are still in operation.
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12:12 - 12:17They're still breeding children.
They're still teaching them to betray their parents. -
12:20 - 12:26He doesn't believe that knowing about this
is going to overthrow North Korea. -
12:26 - 12:29But, he went through the humiliation
of telling me his story -
12:29 - 12:31and he's traveling the world talking about it,
-
12:31 - 12:35because he believes that knowledge
is better than ignorance. -
12:37 - 12:40Thank you very much.
-
12:40 - 12:42(Applause)
- Title:
- Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier
- Description:
-
Hear the astonishing story of Shin Dong-hyuk's escape from the notorious yet almost unknown Camp 14 in North Korea, where totalitarian State supported sadism 'teaches' prisioners and children alike into how not to be a human being.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 12:50
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier | ||
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Ivana Korom approved English subtitles for Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Escape from Camp 14: Shin Dong-hyuk's Odyssey - Blaine Harden at TEDxRainier | ||
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