By And why is the North Korean regime surprised this happened?:
North Korea has closed ten restaurants in Southeast Asia because waitresses working there got too involved with customers, a Hong Kong-based magazine said yesterday.Yazhou Zhoukan said North Korean waitresses were heavily chastised from their country’s leadership for flirting with South Korean and Japanese customers. Certain waitresses even got romantically involved with tourists or overseas representatives.
Over the past few months, the North has closed 10 restaurants specializing in North Korean cuisine in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. The establishments sold traditional North Korean food such as Pyongyang cold noodles to earn dollars for the communist country.
The magazine said North Korean authorities recalled and punished the waitresses in question for “tarnishing” their country’s image. Since certain waitresses worked illegally after their visas expired and immigration crackdowns in the three Southeast Asian countries grew tougher, the North decided to close the restaurants temporarily. [Donga Ilbo via Extra Korea!]
As Gusts of Popular Feeling points out hopefully none of these women are pregnant and subject to North Korea’s socialized medicine solution to such circumstances as this.
5:56 am on September 18th, 2009 1
Most of the customers at these restaurants are South Korean. Since fewer South Koreans are traveling abroad thanks to the flu hysteria, these restaurants probably aren’t making as much money as they used to…That’s probably the real reason why they’ve closed their doors.
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7:19 pm on September 18th, 2009 2
I can understand the prostitution angle. After all, traditional norK fare such as assorted twigs, weeds, rock soup and soylent green aren’t all that popular and likely difficult to export to foreign palates.
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9:48 am on December 29th, 2009 3
[...] gegen eine mögliche Rolle der Restaurants in Geldwäscheaktivitäten spräche). ROK-Drop dagegen berichtet dass 10 Restaurants geschlossen wurden, weil die Bedienungen mit den Gästen fraternisiert hätten [...]