"I couldn't deny God, and so I was treated like a political criminal in North Korea," he says. "I want to live for God. I want freedom."
The muscular build of another 39-year-old defector attests to his 10 years in the North Korean army, where he says he was on a special forces team along the South Korean border.
With his family starving, he headed to China and worked on a farm for two years. But when he got home, he found that his wife and daughter also had fled. He returned to China to try to find them but was caught and sent back to North Korea. He escaped by breaking a window on the train back to his hometown: His forearms still bear the scars.
He says he beat up three policemen when he escaped, so he is not afraid of the authorities. But he is wary of the others in the group, and he asks a reporter about his prospects in South Korea. "Are North Korean refugees doing well in South Korea?" he asks. "Can people have the jobs they want to have? I can do any kind of work."
A 24-year-old woman with long brown hair was lured to China by the promises of an illicit job broker. Instead, he sold her for $400 as a bride to an ailing Chinese farmer, who took her to his remote village to work on the farm. After she gave birth to the son the family wanted, they began to abuse her.
An acquaintance in the village helped her run away, urging her to leave her 2-year-old behind. "Be strong, be cold," the acquaintance said. In Yanji, she met an accomplice of Chun's, who pressed Chun to take her along.
She admits that religion baffles her.
"I cannot believe 100% in God," she says. Nevertheless, she's concluded that South Korea and America are more prosperous than North Korea because they are religious. "I want to see with my own eyes what God has done to help the South Korean people," she says. She seems almost giddy.
Then there is the young couple. The man, 25, is confident, bordering on cocky. He has been sent back to North Korea five times -- four from China and once while trying to escape with Chun through Vietnam. His 20-year-old girlfriend is making her first attempt. She is stylishly dressed and pretty. Chun teases her about her earrings, which she says family members in Yanji gave her. Her parents, a brother and a sister will be on a trip that leaves a week or two later. Carrying a small knapsack, she is the only one to bring any luggage.
