Last weekend Kim Jong-il’s oldest son, Kim Jong-nam addressed media reports regarding his father’s health while transiting through the Beijing airport.  Via the Marmot’s Hole comes this Reuters video of Kim Jong-nam speaking to the media in very good English.

I love the fact that Kim Jong-nam appeared to be ready to go film a hip-hop video with the outfit he was wearing.  A few days later Kim Jong-nam was spotted arriving in Japan, but this time looking a bit more casual.  Here is a blog report from every Korea expat’s favorite ABC reporter Joo-hee Cho:

Kim Jong-nam arrives in Japan.

The Japanese media’s obsession with North Korea amazes me. Today, I was channel surfing at a remote hot spring resort room in Kinugawa Onsen and came across NTV’s daily evening magazine show called “Real  Time.” It was airing an interview with the North Korean leader’s eldest son, Kim Jong Nam, followed by an exclusive hidden-camera report on the communist country’s black market.

As a reporter covering the Korean peninsula for the past 15 years, I was half surprised and admittedly half envious over their luck at getting those two currently-most-wanted stories on camera. The world is eagerly watching and guessing as to when the famine-struck country might collapse, as well as who will succeed the  “Dear Leader” Kim Jong Il, who is old and reportedly ill.

So, grasping every sense of what little Japanese I could understand, here’s what I saw on NTV. They caught Kim Jong Nam in Beijing, wearing a black down jacket with matching black Ray-Ban-style sunglasses. Surrounded by about a dozen reporters, he spoke in broken but comprehensible English.

Asked about his father’s health, he replied that he cannot say anything because that kind of information is a “state secret.”  A follow-up question: do you want to be the successor? He answered with a shrug. “That is too early to tell. My father will decide when he decides… but personally I’m not interested at all.”

As he tried to walk away, reporters continued to fire questions at him. “Do you speak Japanese?” “Do you like Japan?” (Obviously, these reporters were Japanese.) Kim’s answer: “No, but I think Japan is clean and economically interesting.” Another reporter asked a question in Japanese. With a smirk, Kim replied, “I told you I don’t speak Japanese. I speak English and French.”

When another reporter asked whether he wants to travel to Japan, my first journalistic instinct was that that was the end of the interview, since we ask sensitive questions last. Kim Jong Nam was kicked out of Japan in 2001 for trying to enter the country with a fake Dominican passport. He has said he wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland.

Surprisingly, Kim was not upset; rather, he seemed to enjoy the attention. He simply gave a silent laugh and said, “I cannot travel to Japan since that day a few years ago.”

Kim got in a taxi, alone. It was odd to see the Dear Leader’s eldest son without a North Korean diplomat or an official escorting him in a limousine, which, after all, gives weight to the theory that he is an outcast at the moment because of his western lifestyle and his birth background.  [ABC News - Joo-hee Cho]

I thought it was funny when they asked him if he liked Japan and he responded no.  If I was a reporter there I would of followed up by asking him why is he in Japan then?  With Kim Jong-nam running around like this it makes me wonder the North Korean regime is trying to get him in the spotlight a bit in order to set him up as the new leader?  With North Korea who knows?

Anyway here are the many faces of Kim Jong-nam that reporters have been able to capture over the years and despite his varying wardrobes, one thing that remains consistent about him is that he is still the fattest man in North Korea:

Here is my favorite one, Kim Jong-nam doing an Al Pacino impersonation:

I think the outfit he would look best in though, is a Santa Clause suit.