Here are my discussion questions:
What does Hyeonseo Lee mean by saying a single Korea does not exist?
How did she feel when she found out North Korea is a byword for evil?
When there was a fire, why did her father rescue the portraits? Who were the people on the portraits?
How and where did her parents meet and how long was it between their first and second meetings? Why was there another wedding with her mother first?
How does Hyeonseo Lee describe the caste system that operates in North Korea?
Why is it impossible to rise within the system?
How did her grandmother’s safekeeping of the cards ensure the family’s high Songbun?
How did the grandmother prevent the marriage for some time, and almost have the baby adopted?
How does bribery work in North Korea? Was Hyeonseo Lee’s family involved?
What were some of her seven names and when did she acquire each?
Her birth name was Kim Ji-hae.
The second name was Park Min-young. Why? When did she get this name?
Who gave her the third name? Chae Mi-ran.
Then she was to be a Korean-Chinese called Jang Soon-hyang. Why?
What were her other names? Why did she assume them?
She lived in several places in North Korea with her family.
What was Hyesan like?
What was it like in Anju?
Then they relocated–to North Korea’s second-largest city, Hamhung. What was good about living in Hambung?
Then the family moved back to Hyesan. Kindness toward strangers is rare in North Korea. There is a risk in helping others. What unusual episode happened when they were going to take the train back?
Mothers superstitions drove her to fortune tellers. What story from a fortune teller became a kind of deliverance myth, that Hyeonseo Lee would remember in moments of danger?
When and why was winter the time for school vacation?
Aunt Pretty had an appendectomy. Discuss what happened.
The care of portraits was very important. Hyeonseo Lee states:
“About once a month, officials wearing white gloves entered every house in the block to inspect the portraits. If they reported a household for failing to clean them–we once saw them shine a flashlight at an angle to see if they could discern a single mote of dust on the glass–the family would be punished.” How did these inspections control the population?
What is another example of capitalistic thinking in North Korea that could be punished, such as putting clothes on dogs, a well-known example of capitalist degeneracy?
What were the holidays and how were they celebrated?
February 16 Day of the Bright Star
April 15 Day of the Sun
What were the mass games for Liberation Day on 15 August? Why were they the most sacred dates in the calendar?
When was the famine?
How does the North Korean system continue to this day, and how does the organized system of surveillance on every family contribute? Does Hyeonseo Lee think North Korea will change anytime soon?
What did people do on the weekends?
Is schooling in North Korea really free?
Hyeonseo Lee found out her father was not her biological father. How did she react?
What were the classes at school, and what topic was the most important?
What was the math problem example shared in the book?
Are North Koreans able to travel to other countries?
Who arrested Hyeonseo Lee’s father?
What was the reason Hyeonseo Lee gave for terrible drunken fights breaking out among men in Hyesan during the public holidays?
What did the mother do when the death certificate of the father said suicide?
Why did school close on the 8th of July, 1994? What happened over the next days? How did Hyeonseo Lee deal emotionally with these events?
What did the students know about sex? Menstruation?
What besides food was in short supply during the famine? What did school children have to bring to school in order to help?
Did all the provinces experience the famine in the same way at first? How did Hyeonseo Lee know?
How many students in Hyeonseo Lee’s class were in the songbun ‘hostile’ category? What did this mean for their futures?
When did Hyeonseo Lee see Changba? How did she feel looking back at Hyesan?
Why do you suppose there were none of the heavy green military trucks, the most common vehicles around Hyesan in Chanagba?
Her uncle and aunt made her feel instantly welcome. What did Uncle Jung-gil and Aunt Sang-hee do for a living?
She became almost engaged. When did she run away?
What did she learn about South Korea and North Koreans who succeeded in reaching Seoul?
Four years of frugal living meant that she had saved enough to pay a broker to find her family in Hyesan. It was many years later when she saw them again. Explain the travel and situations that happened, and how it appeared to be impossible several times.
What are the two kinds of people who leave North Korea and how do they adjust to living in Seoul? Why?