Nodongdangsa

Nodongdangsa (노동당사) literally means "Workers' Party Headquarters". I was intrigued by hearing that it was way up north, almost into the DMZ, in Cheolwon, an area that had belonged to North Korea for a brief five years after the division of the peninsula in 1945. By the end of the Korean war, this area, known as the Iron Triangle thanks to a lot of bloody battles, had ended up on the southern side of the demarcation line. I didn't really get interested in the place, though, until I looked it up and saw pictures of a hulking ruin accompanying stories of torture and death. The North Korean leaders then, much like the North Korean leaders now, weren't too big on hearing the other guy's side of the story. Skeletons and bullets are still said to be hanging around the place - not within sight, obviously, but out back, buried under sixty years of earth and weeds.

Public transportation in rural Korea isn't all that. To get to Nodongdangsa from Seoul, you have to take Line 1 of the subway (the longest line) up to its northernmost station. That's close to two hours. Then you have to get on another little train line called the Gyeongwon Line. This line actually dates back to 1914, when it went between Seoul and Wonsan, and it was cut by the division of the peninsula. It now ends at Sintan-ri, though the northern section is actually still running as well... just not accessible from the southern section for obvious reasons. The first couple of times Chris and I went up, we found the Gyeongwon Line closed for construction. The second time we managed to get a bus out to Sintan-ri anyway, but the bus we needed to connect to there wasn't running. However, since reading about the history of the place I had become pretty determined to get out there, and so we made a third attempt, with me vowing to get a taxi one way or another if the buses weren't running for some reason.

So, to sum up: bus to Seoul Station (20-ish minutes from Chris' house), Line 1 (two hours or so), bus or train to Sintan-ri (40-50 minutes) and finally another little bus to Nodongdangsa (20 minutes). This is not a trip to be undertaken lightly.

After Soyosan (the end of line 1), the area gets really rural. It's mostly rice paddies and little houses interspersed with towns that look like no one's bothered renovating since the seventies. Cheolwon itself was a major transportation hub before the war, but was mostly destroyed in the war and never rebuilt. There are a few ruins around the area, but most of them are past the civilian control line in an area you can only see as part of a special tour, and we didn't have solid directions to the rest, so we just went to Nodongdangsa.


I'd really like to photograph it again, darker, on a day when it's about to rain. It's creepy how places where bad things happened are inevitably pleasant and tranquil. This one abuts a nice little park and is surrounded by flowers and bushes.


You can't go inside since it's crumbling and declared unsafe (psh!) Thanks to the windows, doors, crumbling walls and even the occasional bullet hole, you can pretty much see everything inside anyway.





As an aside, I really hate people who scribble all over historic monuments. Yes, your showing off is TOTALLY more important than preserving history. *eye roll*







The building is right next to the old signpost showing directions to various North Korean cities. They're pretty much illegible now.


Next plan: find a way to get on a tour into the civilian control zone...