I'm on a U.S. diplomatic mission in North Korea. Our envoy consists of three people: the Secretariat of State, her assistant, and me. We're taking a glass elevator in Juche Tower1, an obsidian geyser rising from the center of Pyongyang, the nation's capital.
"Where are we going?" I ask the Secretariat, who is wearing a taupe pant suit.
"Wherever our feet go," she replies.
Her assistant smirks at me, but I ignore him. The concentric circles of imperial Pyongyang become visible outside the elevator. They appear rapidly in and out of focus as the elevator climbs.
"So what is he like?" I try again.
"Two-and-a-half, three pounds of flax, tops."
I don't bother to look at the assistant this time. I understand certain matters are on a "need-to-know" basis, so it seems rather tacky for the Secretariat to play mind games with me. I don't have much time to repress this bitterness, however, before we come to a stop, the doors open, and we are greeted by a short man wearing a purple Armani suit and square glasses.
"Welcome to Korea, my American friends. We hope your journey was uneventful."
I do know one thing: we are here to sign a nuclear non-proliferation treaty with the notorious Kim-Jong-Il.
***
Sure, I had read the intelligence on Kim. The repressive government, the forced starvations, the cult of personality. I heard that he subsidizes his decidedly New Jack Swing era taste for Hennessey by printing millions of counterfeit U.S. dollars. On paper, he doesn't seem much different than your run-of-the-mill Idi Amin, Pol Pot, or Robert Mugabe — except for that whole "nuclear ambition" thing that brought us here.
Jong-Il starts leading us through a lobby. "What airline did you fly?"
"Pan Am" our Secretariat answers.2
"Nice," Jong-Il says. "I hear they offer in-flight WiFi."
"I played farthing stocks on the Mumbai Exchange with my iPhone."
"Glocalization, in both stock and covalent bond."
Jong-Il proceeds to show us around his place a bit. One room is a gambling parlor in the fashion of the concert of Europe. Another room is a library, also in the old Continental style. Another room is a geodesic theater. Another room is an aquarium designed as a Klein bottle3, with an improbable table-for-two placed in the middle. Another room is the imperial seraglio, with concubines hailing from various countries in proportion to their delegation at the International Monetary Fund.
Another room is a garden, with abundant pomegranate, wolfberry, aϛaí, and other superfruit.
"Go ahead," Jong-Il says. "The tree is not attached to its fruit."
"Thank you." I take a mangosteen.
Another room is a conference hall for the official proceedings. Kim Jong-Chul waits with documents and a pen. Jong-Chul bears the same suit as his father (to whom he is heir apparent), but is slightly taller. The room has a table with a few chairs and a window overlooking imperial Pyongyang. It stinks of butterflies.
Jong-Il snaps his fingers, and his son hands the documents to our Secretariat, who starts licking them.
"I believe our offer is most beneficial to the collective security of SEATO4 and beyond," Jong-Il says. "After all, what is the sound of one lip talking?"
Our Secretariat signs the treaty while I try to say grace using only my lower lip.
"Or one hand shaking," our Secretariat says to Jong-Il, holding out her palm.
They shake; the North Koreans are pleased. The Secretariat's assistant looks at me, but, again, I ignore him. Jong-Chul tears off the yellow copy and gives it to our Secretariat, folds the original and puts it in his wallet, and seals the pink copy in an envelope addressed to the United Nations. Meanwhile, Jong-Il gets a bottle of Hennessy V.S.O.P. and five snifters from a hidden cabinet in the wall, and pours everyone a glass.
"Not since Vienna5 has humanity negotiated such a peace," Jong-Il says. Our Secretariat picks her nose and eats it. "We shall be composed by the aria we compose."
Maybe Jong-Il isn't so crazy after all. Then again, my hair always looks good before I'm about to get it cut.
"My friends," Jong-Il raises his glass. "To us."
We all toast, and then I shoot both Jongs in the throat with a bone pistol. They die instantly. Due to the world-historical nature of my decision, our envoy splits up. Every man for himself in the DPRK. Before leaving, I wipe some of Jong-Il's blood on the mangosteen I took from his garden, for proof. I suspect that the state-controlled media will attempt to cover up Jong-Il's death. Not bloody likely.
Notes:
1 A term which basically means "nationalist self-reliance," Juche is the "official state ideology of North Korea" (Wikipedia: 11:07 1 November 2007). Juche is a crucial component of "Kimilsungism," which doesn’t quite have the ring of "Stalinism," but is just as real and way more insane.
2 Pan American World Airways operated from March 14, 1927 until December 4, 1991.
3 Picture the Klein bottle as a three dimensional analogue of the non-orientable one-sided Mobius strip. While it sounds like an idea out of Escher, a Klein bottle aquarium dinner nook is not only possible, but would be very sexy.
4 The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, or SEATO, existed from September 8, 1954 to June 30, 1977. NATO for the South China Sea and environs.
5 The subject of Henry Kissinger’s doctoral dissertation, the Congress of Vienna was Metternich’s nine month moment in the sun.
