North Korea is a country with a very bad, and mostly well-earned, reputation. It is often presented as some sort of “ideal” dictatorship: saying that something is “like in North Korea” is equal to saying that this thing or policy is unfair, oppressive, vicious, totalitarian.

However, North Korea is not hell, and if one looks carefully it is actually possible to find some good things about this country. Some of these came to life thanks to initiatives of the North Korean leadership (mostly Kim Jong Il, who was less of a cruel person than his father or youngest son), some managed to survive decades of dictatorship and some appeared despite the policies of the Kim regime.