How to Escape from North Korea

What do you think the best hotel in the world is?

You might say somewhere like The Plaza in New York? Or perhaps the Ritz in downtown Paris? What about the Four Seasons Resort in Bora Bora?

Well, I hate to tell you, but you’re wrong.

The best hotel in the world, with an unheard of six stars, is in North Korea. I know! I can’t believe it either…

Known as the Hyangsan Hotel, it promises its guests a veritable wealth of opulence totally devoid in the rest of the country. Staff waiting on patrons hand and foot, luxury amenities at the drop of a hat, and in a gorgeous scenic location.

Yes, this is clearly the best hotel in the whole wide world. Even Pyongyang says so.

Or is it?

Because after all, this is North Korea, where everything isn’t quite what it seems.

And when you start to delve a little deeper, and put the Hyangsan under the microscope, the façade starts to peel away revealing the rot of the Kim regime underneath.

So what’s the story here? How does a country where many of its people don’t even have running water, manage to pull off something this decadent?

And can we find out what’s really going on here?

A Hotel Fit For A Kim

Ok let’s break down this utterly bizarre hotel. The Hyangsan is out in the sticks of the North Korean wilderness, its right next to Mount Myohyang, also known as “Mysterious Fragrance Mountain.” I wonder what the “mysterious fragrance” (here’s a hint, it’s human rights violations). This is about 150 kilometres (or 93 miles) due North of the hermit kingdom’s capital, Pyongyang, and just inside the region of Chagang.

And I can honestly say I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Tucked away up here in a valley with mountains all around it, it’s more akin to a not-so-subtle Bond villain’s lair, either that; or an ancient Inca temple with its pyramid-esque structure and Stalinist architecture. It’s about 15 storeys tall, with a tower in the centre and a revolving restaurant on top, much like many North Korean hotels do. But regardless its shape makes it instantly recognisable.

Outside the streets are well paved and the lawns are reasonably well-manicured even throughout the harsher winter months. Korean lettering is even landscaped into the lawn, but as I don’t speak the language, feel free to let us know what it says in the comments if you do.

The landscape surrounding the hotel is veritable natural paradise. Streams, waterfalls, mountains, forests, and many guests who go there talk about just how quiet it is, so quiet in fact that you can hear the Pyongyang officials spying on you through the wall.

For legal reasons, that’s a joke.

It’s said to have 228 rooms in total comprising of both suites and standard accommodation, but as far as we could find, it’s very rarely full for obvious reasons.

It actually has an almost 40-year history of catering to tourists both visiting and within the hermit kingdom. It was built all the way back in 1986 when design choices were…interesting across the board. Don’t get me wrong it was still seen as the veritable height of luxury even back then, but by the mid-2000s it was clearly becoming a little dated. So Pyongyang spruced the place up a bit around 2010 to render it the kind of opulent that most North Korean citizens could only ever dream of.

As you may have seen with our videos on North Korea lately, Pyongyang is on a bit of a tourism kick right now, trying to attract new people from across the world to gawk at a cruel and repressive regime’s Potemkin village-esque tourist infrastructure. That’s why Russians are the only people admitted to visit since the COVID-19 total lockdown in the country half a decade ago. But the Hyangsan has actually been considered the pinnacle of North Korean tourism luxury for decades now.

In a way, it, among other hotels in Pyongyang like the Ryugyong Hotel started the tourism building trend we’re seeing there today. They promise the very best in luxury holiday making, just as long as you don’t wander off.

And we weren’t kidding when we said it’s luxurious, you can kind of tell that already from the outside gardens, but look inside and it’s pretty similar to many nice hotels you would find anywhere else in the world.

Take the lobby for example. White marble adorns the floors with a golden square pattern throughout, with it polished so much that you could likely use it as a mirror to shave without cutting yourself. Red carpets cascade down staircases with silver trims and bright LED lighting overhead coming from tall ceilings. You see a few pictures and you start to think “this is surprisingly nice, even for North Korea.”

It even has one of those water features that so many fancy hotels seem to have nowadays. I mean, even looking at the old pictures of what the lobby used to look like, it was still covered with grey marble with a more Asian-style décor. And so it sticks out like a sore thumb in North Korea, not just because of its shape, but also because of the sheer contrast between how the average citizen of North Korea lives, and this land of luxury.

These kinds of contrasts exist everywhere, just look at the nicest hotels in New York for example and then travel a few streets over, you’ll see something pretty similar. But only in a country like North Korea is it that contrast so starkly out in the open. It’s the Kim-Jong-Elephant in the room that nobody visiting is allowed to talk about. For example, one of the main draws of the hotel according to many tourism companies who travel to North Korea is that there is hot water and electricity 24 hours a day.

This is in a country where many citizens do not have indoor plumbing, electricity, or heating at all.

After all, whilst the average North Korean citizen risks starvation every year, North Korea is out here calling this monstrosity a “six-star hotel.” Some even call it a “seven-star” hotel. This is total madness when you think about it for several reasons.

For starters, the star system for hotels beyond five genuinely means nothing. Many places all over the world “claim” to be six-star hotels, you might have even stayed in one, but they’re really just fancy five-star hotels. If a hotel came one day that would blow the rest out of the water it would simply become the new five-star standard and others would be downgraded.

But I digress, the other reason this is a weird label is because North Korea doesn’t even use the classical star system for rating hotel luxury. So in every way possible it simply means nothing, which is pretty fitting for North Korea. Especially considering that whilst the hotel is clearly pretty nice, it is more likely a solid four-star hotel, not five.

That’s still pretty impressive, but just like with almost every foreign-facing aspect of North Korea, its positives are exaggerated.

Ok, so what is the average person paying for a stay in the lap of the Kim dynasty? We couldn’t find lots of information on this, but one source that acts as a Chinese intermediary tourism company for North Korea put the price at around €100 euros per person per night. That’s about $115 dollars. So on top of being the only real six-star hotel in the entire world, it also happens to be reasonably priced, isn’t that just so kind of them!

Believe it or not though this was actually after the price was increased post-renovation. So before it must have been a steal. I’ll be booking my flights tomorrow.

A Six-Star Experience?

Ok, but that’s enough about what this hotel is, as in, what it really is. Let’s look at it as just a hotel like any other you might go to in the world. What is it like? What amenities does it have on offer?

Well let’s go back to the lobby for a bit. Beyond the glass, marble, and water features, there’s also what appears to be a sit-in bar replete with comfy-looking chairs, and a marble centrepiece table once sat in the centre of the lobby with a beautiful display of what appear to be fake flowers. Lots of the greenery in the lobby appears to be fake, but we’ll give them a pass on this one as this is standard in many hotels across the world.

Now this appears to have been replaced with a nice-looking seating area, whilst one bar seems to have been replaced with a little gift shop so you can give some money to the regime in exchange for an “I heart the supreme leader” t-shirt or something. There’s also a concierge desk where there are staff on hand to help you with what you need, which includes a currency exchange. I’m sure the rates are just fantastic.

Ok, but any hotel can make a lobby look good, that’s kind of the point, to wow you with decadence before you get to see the rest of it. What about food? How does its restaurants stack up?

This is actually on the first floor of the hotel and it’s this horizontal long piece here. It used to be open to the outside with guests able to see out of windows, but this appears to have been covered up into a more enclosed space at some stage, perhaps since the remodel.

The main dining area is pretty fancy with enough white mirrored pillars and bougee lighting fixtures to even make Donald Trump say it was “a bit much.” Its white and blue colour scheme is pretty nice though, even if it does look like someone did a pretty impressive job of recreating a fancy hotel restaurant after only having one described to them.

But how it looks is irrelevant if the food is poor. So what does North Korea, where people routinely starve to death every year, serve to tourists?

Well it’s mostly a fusion of western and Korean cuisine, usually served in three courses, but some tourism websites show up to eight different dishes being served over the course of a meal. It’s a mix of potatoes, chicken soup, various fish dishes, vegetables, and more. It seems to depend what you’re there for though as some tour groups stop for lunch there even without staying overnight. There is an option of a western or Korean style breakfast, and vegetarian options are available as well if fish isn’t your thing.

The one thing they serve that everybody is reportedly happy to see is bread. Yep. Bread. White, fluffy, and served with delicious butter, it is apparently the best bread in the whole of the DPRK.

Now the reason that this is, is because bread as we know it in the west is almost completely unheard of there. Rice and kimchi are the common staples in North Korea instead. The reality is flour and wheat come as a premium in the hermit kingdom, it is considered a luxury item by most citizens. Yes, the most basic of foods we have in the west is considered something of a status symbol in North Korea.

It tells you all you need to know about the plight of the people.

Other food options are available as well. For starters there is also a semi-outdoor barbeque restaurant. But don’t jump for joy thinking you’re going to be seeing some prime rib, it’s fish again… but this time with a fun twist!

There’s an outside pool full of fish so that you can pick your dinner, and the chefs will butcher and serve it for you right then and there. This used to actually be inside the hotel pre-remodel.

But even that’s not all. Because there is even a revolving restaurant perched on top of the hotel. It’s the spaceship-looking thing. There’s not really a whole lot known about this restaurant though.

It’s pretty small as revolving restaurants go, and it’s rarely open to tourists, often being reserved for VIPs. We could only find one random picture inside of it from a Flickr account all the way back in 2008 on the entire internet. That’s pre-remodel. So “Kim-knows” what it looks like now.

Don’t say we don’t do our research. Overall the food across the hotel appears to get mixed reviews, being considered everything from luxury to inedible slop, so it seems a bit hit and miss depending on when you happen to be visiting.

Ok, so far so good. A bit strange in parts but otherwise serviceable as far as hotels go, and certainly good for a country as backwards as North Korea. How about the rooms? Where will a person actually stay when they visit this place, and what options are on offer?

Well there’s two kinds of room available at the Hyangsan. Standard and suite. Let’s start with the standard because there’s a lot to cover here. Overall the standard rooms are pretty nice, about what you would expect for what we’ve seen thus far.

Western-style beds, a desk, and the single chair you find in every hotel room corner (you know what it’s for, I’m not going to explain it to you). Some rooms appear to have carpets, whilst others seem to stick with the same polished marble we’ve seen elsewhere. Every single room has a balcony, so you can almost guarantee at least something of a view no matter where you are, although at certain times of the year its simply too cold to use them.

Then comes the rest of the standard stuff you would get in any other hotel room. Coffee table, hot drink-making facilities, and even a fridge and mini bar, although that’s not included in the price. Come on now, they can’t give you everything.

When it comes to technology is where there’s some more interesting deviations from the norm. There is a TV in most rooms apparently capable of transmitting some local and even international channels but from what we’ve seen nobody was able to get them to work. There is even an ethernet port for guests to access the sorry excuse for the North Korean intranet, but again this is apparently unreliable, needs to be requested to switch on, and very expensive to access. There’s some nice quality of life stuff like apparent heated flooring (although the appearance of carpets questions whether these work either) and air conditioning too.

On the bedside tables there is whatever this strange contraption is, the likes of which I’ve never seen before. It appears to be a control panel for a radio, an alarm, and lights in the room given the lack of switches nearby on the walls. It seems a bit strange compared to western hotels which don’t tend to have this, but it also seems to be pretty standard in North Korean hotels.

The bathrooms are pretty normal for the most part, with Western style toilets unlike the Korean-style squat toilets you’ll find everywhere else in the country. Other standards apply, shower, sink, and those tiny little bottles of shampoo that say… Shangri-La hotel on them…

Wait. What?

And yeah, the more you look at the details of things around the rooms more closely. Everything seems to say “Shangri-La” on it. The clock for the bedside table, the leather-bound book on the desk, and other items. Shangri-La is a multinational luxury hotel chain. They are not affiliated with North Korea in any way as far as we know. So how did this hotel, in the middle of a country with some of the strongest trade embargos on it in the world, get these items?

We’re going to have to shrug our shoulders on that one, but I highly doubt it was legitimate however it was done.

The suites have a bit more going on in them. A freestanding desk, a little kitchenette with a hotplate for cooking on, a small dining area. Some also appear to have drawing rooms which look a bit creepy and bare. They appear to also have slightly larger bathrooms as well.

So that seems like an awful lot, but it doesn’t even end there. There are a lot of other amenities that the Hyangsan provides. There’s apparently a gym, although we couldn’t find any pictures of it, but there is definitely a 25-metre-long swimming pool, alongside a plunge pool, jacuzzi, sauna and spa which costs extra to access. We can’t confirm the existence of the beauty salon, the clinic, the photo studio, the dance hall, or the theatre.

The photos of these things simply don’t appear to be out there, although they do seem to be present on maps of the hotel. Interestingly these maps also show the 11th, 12th and 13th floors as “maintenance service”, which is North Korean speak for “this is where we spy on you from.”

We can confirm there is a karaoke room, billiards tables, table tennis tables, and outdoor tennis courts (although I wouldn’t get inside a cage in North Korea if you paid me all the money in the world).

People who visit this hotel and this region can also hike nearby trails (likely under supervision of course) and visit places like the Pohyon Temple, one of the largest Buddhist temples in the DPRK. This is something of an oddity because North Korea is supposed to not have any religion other than towards the Kim dynasty. You can also see the Ryongmun Cave and the International friendship exhibition.

I don’t know about you, but “despotic, hostile, isolationist regime” and “international friendship exhibition” don’t really go together, but that’s just me. Around three kilometres west of the hotel there’s even a helicopter landing pad for VIPs to fly in on.

As for staff, Hyangsan is like every other hotel you’ve ever seen, except its in North Korea, so its really weird. The concierge was apparently trained at the Tourism College in Pyongyang where many of the local guides do their training to give their infamous very guided tours. The pool has a lifeguard, bellhops carry luggage, there are service staff at the bar, and purple and cream uniformed waitresses server your food.

There’s no real factors that would indicate whether this is staffed by civil servants, military personnel, or anything else. It’s likely to be operated by a state-owned tourism bureau with hotel-trained professionals. But some staff seem absent. In the entire research for this video we didn’t once come across cleaning staff in photos or see any mentioned at any point, so who knows how the rooms get cleaned.

Ok, so on the whole this appears to be a pretty normal luxury hotel for the most part with its trademark North Korean quirks. But the existence of this hotel remains somewhat of a baffling concept to us. Are people really coming here enough to justify its existence?

Commercially? Probably not.

And that begs the question; what is this all really for?

The Six-Star Lie

So we’ve told you basically every material aspect of this hotel. But has it been a success for North Korea?

Well it depends.

From the perspective of the North Korean government, it doesn’t really matter what the hotel costs, what matters is how it looks, and what tourists experience when they visit. Remember, almost everyone who enters North Korea gets a warped and highly curated experience to mask the country’s horrendous human rights abuses, dictatorship, and suffering. That’s why there are stadiums full of North Korean dancers and musicians performing solely for tourists, its why you can’t go anywhere unsupervised, and its why hotels like Hyangsan exist.

Because if North Korea can successfully launder its image to enough tourists willing to overlook it, the horrific crimes the Kim regime has committed become that little bit more ok in the eyes of the general public, whether we like it or not.

So, as a commercial venture, what happens at Hyangsan is irrelevant, in fact for large parts of the year it appears to be eerily quiet and almost totally empty. One reviewer who had been a few times in the early 2010s stated that he was pretty sure he was the only paying lodger in the entire hotel. That doesn’t exactly scream “massive financial boom,” and it doesn’t have to. It’s a Potemkin village; it’s designed for you to see it how its being shown to you and nothing more.

And we can prove it.

One reviewer of the hotel took a picture of the so-called “Pyongyang Times” weekly newspaper which was available in the hotel to read back in 2015 or so. North Korea has never had a massive influx of English-speaking tourists. Most who go there are Chinese, or now Russian. What need is there to have an English-translated newspaper in the hotel when barely any English speakers visit it?

What need is there to have an English-translated newspaper in a country with so few English-speaking visitors at all? The Russians and Chinese aren’t reading it, and you know the Koreans aren’t so what is it for? It’s state propaganda, it’s targeted for you and I, English speakers.

And the deeper that you look into the Hyangsan, the more it appears to be that way for it too. It’s a touristy veneer, a simulation of what a “six-star hotel” is supposed to be to endear people who go there and don’t know any better than to simply judge what they see in front of them. That’s not a critique; that’s just the slightly gullible nature of human beings.

Take the elevators for example. There’s five of them, but only one ever appears to be switched on, like the other four are simply there for show, because that’s what a fancy hotel “should have” when it’s all held together with duct tape and smiles through gritted teeth for the good of the regime.

Those who visit often talk about how hot water and electricity are spotty despite claims to the contrary, which further peels back the curtain on the realities that everyday people face within the country.

There is apparently underfloor heating which appears to be temperamental, and the air conditioning only has two modes (on and off), and one temperature. And then there’s all the goods from the Shangri-La brand of hotel resort. Toothbrushes, combs, writing pads, tissue box holders, obviously something illicit is going on there and even though it’s only a small thing, it contributes to this distinct feeling that not everything is quite right.

Before its remodelling it was known colloquially as “the overlook hotel.” You know, the one from the film, The Shining, because the vibe was so creepy. It was well-known for its doors counter-intuitively opening outwards, hypnotic wallpaper, spooky music, and deserted corridors.

The latest remodel is simply another coat of paint, and it’s no more real than the actual Overlook Hotel was. I think I’m starting to realise what the “mysterious fragrance” really is.

Cough Bullshit. Cough

It’s hard to even tell if the reviews online are real. We know what North Korea is like in terms of attempting to launder its public image and their agents are present online. Some of the more positive reviews tend to be written in broken English, that’s not necessarily an indication of it being fake, but it could be. The general consensus from what we could find is summed up quite well by this anonymous reviewer, quote;

“Room is very comfortable and definitely better than the hotel we stayed in Pyongyang but being NK, it is not comparable to 4- or 5-star hotels in the rest of the world.”

It’s also hard to shake the feeling that anybody who stays there is clearly under active surveillance and is being watched. Only in places like North Korea are several whole hotel floors blocked off for maintenance at once. Some maintenance areas in worldwide hotels are mid-building, but reports of people who have snuck around to “maintenance floors” in other hotels within North Korea report full on spying apparatus, propaganda posters, and staff-only residential areas seemingly built solely for surveillance. We would assume that the Hyangsan is no different in that regard.

And people need to recognise that when they visit North Korea, they’re subjecting themselves to that twisted and alternate version of reality, that propaganda. It’s not real, and it’s designed to change your mind. It’s insidious, it’s sinister, and it’s calculated. And whether you like it or not, if you’re paying money to go, you’re also financing some of the horrible things that the regime does to its people.

Executions, torture, extrajudicial killing, concentration camps, the targeting of innocent family members for punishment and so much more.

Listen, we’re not trying to get on our moral high horse here. At least half of us have been on holiday to countries that do awful things every day and our tourist dollars finance that. And it is still important for some people to visit, to get the facts on the ground and establish what is really going on there. We need to recognise the impact that us regular folk can have, by choosing to take away people like Kim Jong Un’s ability to control the narrative about the despotic country he rules over with an iron fist.

Look, this is bigger than you and me. But you have to know that if you stay at North Korea’s supposed 6-star hotel, you’re not just going to a weird place for fun, you’re in a small part funding the immense continued suffering of so many people. There’s a responsibility there to at least own it, and recognise what you’re seeing for what it is as if it were anywhere else, and to understand when you’re being lied to. You have a responsibility not to get sucked in by the chandeliers and marble.

Because at the end of the day, the Hyangsan is a bit like putting a top hat on a poisonous snake.

It might look fancy, but underneath is still slimy, and it’ll kill you if you get too close.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Hyangsan Hotel?

The Hyangsan Hotel is a six-star hotel located in North Korea, near Mount Myohyang. It is known for its opulence and luxury amenities, contrasting sharply with the living conditions of average North Korean citizens.

Where is the Hyangsan Hotel located?

The Hyangsan Hotel is located near Mount Myohyang, about 150 kilometers north of Pyongyang, in the Chagang Province of North Korea.

What kind of amenities does the Hyangsan Hotel offer?

The Hyangsan Hotel offers a range of amenities including a revolving restaurant, a gym, a 25-metre-long swimming pool, a jacuzzi, sauna, spa, karaoke room, billiards tables, table tennis tables, and outdoor tennis courts. It also has a semi-outdoor barbeque restaurant and a variety of dining options.

How does the Hyangsan Hotel compare to other hotels in North Korea?

The Hyangsan Hotel is considered the pinnacle of North Korean tourism luxury. It started the trend of building luxurious tourist infrastructure in Pyongyang and other parts of the country.

What is the cost of staying at the Hyangsan Hotel?

The cost of staying at the Hyangsan Hotel is approximately €100 euros per person per night, which is about $115 dollars. This price was increased post-renovation.

What kind of food is served at the Hyangsan Hotel?

The Hyangsan Hotel serves a fusion of western and Korean cuisine, usually in three courses. The food includes potatoes, chicken soup, various fish dishes, vegetables, and bread, which is considered a luxury in North Korea.

What are the room options at the Hyangsan Hotel?

The Hyangsan Hotel offers standard rooms and suites. Standard rooms include western-style beds, a desk, a balcony, and basic amenities. Suites have additional features like a freestanding desk, a kitchenette, and a larger bathroom.

What is the significance of the Hyangsan Hotel for North Korea?

The Hyangsan Hotel is part of North Korea’s effort to attract tourists and present a curated, luxurious image to the world, masking the country’s human rights abuses and suffering. It serves as a Potemkin village to launder the regime’s image.

What are some of the unusual features of the Hyangsan Hotel?

The Hyangsan Hotel has several unusual features, including elevators that are mostly for show, spotty hot water and electricity, and mysterious Shangri-La branded items. It also has floors dedicated to surveillance and propaganda.

What is the general consensus on the Hyangsan Hotel from reviewers?

Reviewers generally agree that while the Hyangsan Hotel is comfortable and better than other hotels in Pyongyang, it does not compare to 4- or 5-star hotels in the rest of the world. The experience is heavily curated and not entirely genuine.

Sources

• Original Places video: How to Escape from North Korea
• Hero image source by Elegantstickman / openverse, by.