No Questions? Good. Now Enjoy Your Stay

"She was the beloved wife of the Great Leader!" fumed the guard in her fashionable red jacket with a matching propaganda pin bearing Kim Il Sung's face. "Don't you have a father? Isn't he the absolute ruler of your family? Mustn't he be obeyed? You must understand, Kim Il Sung is the father of our nation and we are his children. Everything related to him must be celebrated."

"Including his wife?" she is asked.

"Do not just call her his wife! Use her title!" she demanded.

What title?

"Her title! How can you not know her title?" Exasperated, the guard explained that Kim's wife must be referred to as "Great Revolutionary General Kim Jong Sook."

Most of this sprawling tourist complex, including hotel, hot springs and duty-free shops including Prada and Gucci, is run by Hyundai Asan, which each month brings in about 15,000 people, mostly South Koreans. The North Koreans feared so many foreigners would contaminate the minds of the locals, so the vast majority of employees here are ethnic Koreans shipped in from China.

But two restaurants do employ local staff, and it's there that foreigners have their best chance to interact with unarmed North Koreans. Waitresses wear '50s-style heavy makeup and modest attire. One nervous server fled from a table of foreigners every time she was asked a question. In another restaurant, a waitress looked stunned after a foreign guest asked her where one could buy a Kim Il Sung lapel pin like the one she wore.

She tilted her powdered face skyward, raising one arm to gently cup the pin with her hand.

"This," she proclaimed, "is not fashion. It cannot be bought in a store."

She went on: "This is a symbol of my love for the great founder of my nation."

Among the top attractions here is an acrobatics troupe shipped in from Pyongyang.

In one act, a disco version of the North Korean folk favorite "Nice to Meet You" plays as 10 men in stylized sailor suits, heavy rouge and blue eye shadow soar in front of a projected backdrop of sacred Mount Paektu, where Kim Jong Il is said to have entered the world with the blessing of Heaven. In a comedy act, a strongman wearing communist red gets the better of a weakling decked out in blue.