North Korea News Podcast by NK News - Bart van Genugten: How Western tourists put North Koreans’ lives at risk

Episode Date: May 8, 2025

This week, Dutch YouTuber Bart van Genuchten returns to the podcast to discuss his recent trip to North Korea for the 2024 Pyongyang International Marathon — the country’s first major tourism-related event since before the pandemic. Van Genugten shares what it was like being among the first Westerners allowed back into Pyongyang, navigating both awkward […]

You're listening to an exclusive episode of the NK News podcast available only to subscribers. You can listen to this and other episodes from your preferred podcast player by accessing the Private Podcast feed. For more detailed instructions, please see the step-by-step guide on the NK News website at nknews.org slash private dash feed Hello listeners and welcome to the NK News podcast. And today we are recording this episode live in the studio on the first of May, Labor Day or Nordung Joll. And we have we welcome back a former guest and that's Bart van Genuchten. He's a Dutch YouTuber living in Seoul.

His YouTube channel is I go Bart. He first became famous in Korea several years ago for his travel videos taken on his first trip to North Korea at the very end of 2018 and beginning of 2019. And now he does a big project where he goes to every neighborhood in Seoul called Welcome to Maidong. And I've been on a few of those videos as a guest. Last month in early April, Bart was one of the first Western visitors allowed back to Pyongyang since January 2020, over five years ago because of the COVID lockdowns, and that was for the first Pyongyang International Marathon since 2019. So Bart, welcome back on the show.

Thanks for having me again. Yeah, Bart, has the DPRK become the next hot destination for online influencers? Sadly, yes. It was a bit embarrassing. Every time the bus doors opened, a group of 20, 40 foreigners stormed out with their cameras out and immediately started talking to the camera, pointing cameras in people's faces, asking weird questions.

It was weird. Now, as a YouTuber yourself. Yeah, I sound like a hypocrite now. Do you feel strange criticizing them? Yeah, a little. Because I'm there for the same reasons. You know that North Korean content does well, but not for everyone. Because I've seen a lot of the other videos that my fellow travelers made, and many of them didn't hit that many views.

So it still depends on your skills in making stories and coming with the right story. Right, now at the time of this recording, you've got two videos up already of the marathon. Yes. The third one's gonna drop tomorrow, so by the time this episode comes out next Thursday, that third video will be up already.

And you've got two, possibly three more, coming out after that. Right, possibly four more even. Oh wow, so it's quite a series then. The last video I want to do is together with a North Korean defector and then look at my footage and then discuss what happened in North Korea coming from the real expert. Now, so technically this this tour, the marathon tour, it wasn't actually a tourism tour, it was specifically just for runners, amateur runners. Did it feel like most people were there to create content rather than to run?

I mean, were there a lot of YouTubers and influencers there? Yeah, 100%. I think more than 50% was an influencer, a TikToker, Instagrammer, YouTuber. There were many beginner YouTubers, so they didn't have any content uploaded online yet. So they were there. And then, yeah, to make content about North Korea, asked there first. Right.

And were people busy uploading material while at the Sosan Hotel in Pyongyang? Some people were. Yeah, there was a guy from Georgia every morning. He just woke up an hour earlier than all the others to upload stuff on Instagram. There were guys from India also uploading stuff in the morning in the hotel.

Now that is something unusual, or at least it's new, because when I was last there in April 2019 for the marathon, you could only get very, very, very limited and patchy Wi-Fi at the Chinese-run casino in the basement of the Yanggakdo Hotel. So there wasn't, unless you bought a special data plan from the phone company in North Korea, there wasn't a place to get a good Wi-Fi connection. So how was the Wi-Fi when you were there? It was all right. 10 minutes, you paid a cup of dollars.

Ah, okay, so you actually pay time increments. Yes, yeah, you do. And then the only thing I couldn't do was a video call. So that was, that took too much data. I couldn't do that. So you could upload a recorded video. Some did, I didn't even try. Okay.

Because I was afraid. Right, right, right. No way I'm gonna upload stuff in South Korea while I'm in North Korea. Yeah. You think twice before you do that. Yes, because you do after all live here in South Korea. Yeah.

Now do you think that your North Korean guides knew who you were and what an online content creator does? That is hard to tell. They don't ask questions to you, not many. They don't ask what you're doing. They didn't ask any of us why we're filming. And that was the weird thing about it, because imagine out of the 200 plus people that were there,

maybe 110 were filming all the time. And one time the guide said in the bus, I know our country is a bit strange to you, so I know that's the reason you wanna film everything, you ask all these questions, but please be respectful. That's all she said. So no, I don't think they know why we're filming. So did other guides talk about the filming a lot as well?

No, no. But there was a time, and I know this because we've talked beforehand, there was a time when it was clear that your guide knew your YouTube handle. Yes, and I forgot, so stupid me, I forgot that I filled in one of the papers before the trip that my job is content creator. Right, which is, I mean, it may not be a job description that exists in North Korea, but anyway.

Yeah, and I filled in I go Bart. Yeah. I didn't know that would have been handed to them when I filled it in. So, yes, I was on the paper, on the guide's paper as I go Bart. I didn't know that would have been handed to them when I filled it in. So yes, I was on the paper on the guides paper as I go Bart, I see a CEO of I don't know, making content or whatever. Wow. Okay. So they may not have known what I go Bart was, but they knew that that was your handle. Yes. I don't think the guide know who I am, but I do think North Korea. Obviously, they. Obviously they screen everyone. Obviously, yeah. Now, did it seem to you, speaking of being respectful, that other content creators were

being respectful and culturally open? Yeah, yeah. How do I say this nicely? Because they are my colleagues after all. No, I don't think... People were there out for the sensation. They were there for the freak show. They were actively looking for the freak show.

They were actively asking questions that kind of, you know, they were on edge with what you're allowed to ask them. And you know the answers, and you know that you're gonna get a weird answer. You know you get this NPC kind of behavior from the guides. But still, they ask because they know back home, when you upload that, you can make a weird title,

weird thumbnail, and you get exactly the views. Yeah, yeah. As an example, did people ask, for example, about eating dog meat in North Korea? Was that something you saw them filming? Not that I've seen myself. We ask among like people ask me, for example, do they eat dog meat here? Because I know you've been there before and you live in Korea and you speak some Korean. Yeah, exactly. They didn't ask the guide, but they asked questions about Kim Jong-un, his family. I think one guy at some point asked where he lives, how big the house is, you know things like that. You can just see the guys becoming a bit uncomfortable. Did any of the other travelers have knowledge about Korea or Korean language ability as far as you could see? No not so many many, maybe a handful. Well, obviously, again, the Chordio guides, they do.

Maybe one or two others that could speak some Korean from the group. I think one guy was from Libya. Oh, wow. I'm sorry, no, Lebanon, Lebanon. Lebanon, and he studied Korean. Yeah, he was a teacher in South Korea. He was what, say?

A teacher. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah. It's actually funny you should say Lebanon, because back in the 1970s, the English language version of the three-volume biography of Kim Il-sung was published in Beirut, Lebanon. Oh, really?

Yeah. By, Peck Bong was the author's name. But there were even Americans in the group, three Americans. Dual national Americans traveling on other passports. On other passports. Under the new, well not new anymore, but under the auto warm beer law, Americans can be putting themselves into danger. Yes. Or at least, well danger with their own government that their passports may be cancelled.

Exactly. I think there's one YouTuber with specifically an American in North Korea, I think that may be his handle, right? Uh-huh. I saw some of his videos come up on not just YouTube but also Instagram. Oh really? Yeah and I think he said or put up a video of showing a passport that he had obtained by investing in a small Caribbean nation. I forget which one whether it's Dominica or wherever but he has a and so he did that. Maybe it was Malta with the golden what was it golden passport? Ah perhaps yeah.

No no I don't know. Yeah but two Melta with the golden, was it golden passport? Ah, perhaps, yeah. No, no, no, no. Yeah, but two of them were from California. One was from New York state. Wow. So have you seen videos of your peers since you came out of North Korea? Yeah, a couple of them.

OK. But they're a bit predictable. I think you can compare them with the videos that were uploaded in 2018 and even before me, 2017, 2016. Yeah, it's also predictable. It's about the but the rules is about what you're not allowed to do Taking photos with the leaders and stuff like that. So do any of them go beyond the level of clickbait and you know everything for the likes Yes Yeah, yeah, some of them do okay. Well, it's nice. Yeah, but most of them don't okay

What I find uncomfortable watching some of them is that you can clearly see they push boundaries, and I think they at some point put also the lives of guides at risk. Say more about that. If you ask certain questions, and you put those questions and answer on YouTube for the whole world to see, you expose the guide. You literally show that the guide was exposed

to certain questions about questioning the regime or the leaders or giving too much away about life outside of North Korea, then you show that that guide has information that maybe she or he is not supposed to know with certain consequences when all the foreigners leave the country. We don't know, but you know there is a certain risk. We don't know exactly what it is. And there's specifically asked before the tour that people just be careful, don't do that because there is this risk and you still see people doing it. It's kinda, it makes me uncomfortable seeing it. Well, it's hard to police, isn't it?

Even from the tour company, Kordio Tours Perspectives. Yeah. How do you personally balance that pressure to create engaging content, you know, because you want people to look at your stuff, with the ethical responsibility of representing such a closed society truthfully? I try to ask normal questions. Because when I was there in 2018, I was also there asking maybe the weirder questions.

Was that because it was, I mean, it was your first real engagement with Korea, with North Korea, right? a subscriber to NK News, you can listen to full episodes from your preferred podcast player by accessing the Private Podcast Feed. For more detailed instructions, please see the step-by-step guide on the NK News website at nknews.org slash private dash feed.