North Korea, formally the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, is a notoriously closed dictatorship created after World War II and run by three generations of the same family.
For a fascinating look inside the tightly controlled nation (about the size of Virginia) I highly recommend "Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea," an exhaustively reported and elegantly written nonfiction work by journalist Barbara Demick. It was published in 2009.
More recently, world traveler Nikolai Johnsen, who hails from Norway and has been living in South Korea, has worked to organize educational tours to North Korea, "in hopes that more people around the world will be able to see past politics and see also North Korea for its warm and welcoming people, rich culture and beautiful scenery."
Here are some of his photos and video clips, embedded from his publicly accessible Instagram page:
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