Michael Palin's North Korea Journal

In North Korea, it’s hard for visitors to tell propaganda from reality. But in this extract from his North Korea Journal, Michael Palin finds himself intoxicated by the strangeness of this secretive dictatorship

Middle-school pupils play table tennis behind Michael Palin
An artist at the Mansudae Art Studio displays his poster depicting the hand of friendship and dialogue between North and South Korea

Photography: Doug Dreger

It’s 6am. A low vibrating hum seeps into my subconscious, which slowly becomes my conscious. I walk like a zombie to the window, and still can’t pin down what the sound is, where it’s coming from. I return to bed. Weird dreams that I’m in North Korea.

Later. I am ...