Masaji Ishikawa wanted to drive a tractor, and the people in charge had a problem with that. Tractors drive on roads, they reminded him, and in North Korea the roads were classified as military secrets.

So he wrote back with a straight face. He said he’d worked hard to build the great socialist future of the motherland. He admitted he’d probably never remember the route from one trip to the next, but promised to do his best. Somehow, they said yes.

Ishikawa tells this story in A River in Darkness, his memoir of thirty-six years in North Korea. He was born in Japan to a Korean father and a Japanese mother, and his family moved to North Korea when he was thirteen, chasing a promise of a better life. What they got was the hostile class. That label meant smaller food rations, fewer chances, constant suspicion, and almost no way up. The government watched everything. Neighbors informed on each other. One wrong word could cost you your life.