US President Donald Trump talks about North Korea a lot, but what do average North Koreans think of him?
CNN went to a park in a residential neighborhood of Pyongyang, where locals were playing volleyball and basketball, and cheering enthusiastically on the sidelines.
We had asked our government minders to talk with ordinary Pyongyang residents. We would point to a person and they would try to persuade them to talk with us. They were not always successful. They tell us it is not easy to persuade people to talk with American reporters.
Access to outside information here is limited by Kim Jong Un’s government, which carefully manages the messages to the country’s 24 million citizens.
The people we spoke to had heard of Trump, but they weren’t aware of the controversies surrounding his new administration.
In fact, most of them didn’t even care who was president of the United States.
Yu Gwang Chol, researcher
“Normal people do know that there is a change of government in the US. We know the new president is a person, Donald Trump by name, and we know that before President Trump there was … President Obama.
“But we don’t really care who is in power in the United States. The point should be whether they would stop a policy of hostility towards my country.”
How much do state media here tell you of Donald Trump’s tweeting and behavior?
“We do not talk much in the state media (about) how President Trump behaves and what actions he is doing. We talk about our own things.”
Pak Chol Song, computer engineer
“We are not very interested in individual Americans, what we want is a better relationship in the sense of American politicians putting a stop to the anti-DPRK policies of the US.”
President Trump said he would like to sit down to a hamburger with Kim Jong Un. Would you like to see the two leaders meet?
“It could be a good idea on the personal part (for) President Trump to have a meeting with my great leader.
“But if he wants a more important, very historic summit meeting perhaps he had better express himself like, ‘I am willing to put an end to the hostile policy Mr Supreme Leader before we actually come together for a meeting.’”
Yu Bong Suk, teacher
“I myself don’t care very much who is in power in the United States … as long as you have the sanctions, you have the hostile policy that is still basically the same.
“As you can see from that slogan over there, ‘The power of the great spirit of self reliance and self development.’
“As long as we have that strong slogan and as long as we are guided by the Supreme Commander comrade Kim Jong Un, we think we can be very victorious in our struggle and the difficulties in the bilateral relationship.”
Kim Chol Ryong and Kim Chun Ae, work team leader and housewife
Kim Chol Ryong: “I saw at the end of last year a piece of news about Trump as the new president. We don’t care very much about US politics.
“We care more about our everyday lives and we think we are doing OK, living well. As long as we have the good leadership of Marshall Kim Jong Un, there can be no problems.”
Are you affected by who is president?
“I am not the slightest bit interested who is the President of the US. The point is thinking about our own reality. Seeing our things at home. We have the leadership of Marshall Kim Jong Un … we don’t care about outside politics.”
Kim Chun Ae: “I know there are currently in place a series of sanctions against my country. I would not say we are affected in anyway by these sanctions. Sanctions do not affect our personal lives. I would say (I) don’t feel affected by the sanctions.”