North Korean defector Oh Chong-song, whose bold dash across the heavily armed border in November last year made global headlines, has been struggling in South Korea since he was released from hospital.
"I took a job as a construction worker to feed myself," Oh (not his real name) told the Chosun Ilbo Wednesday. "I experienced how hard it is to make money in the South." Oh left Hanawon, a halfway house that helps North Korean defectors adjust to life in South Korea, in June after a long hospital stay to treat his many gunshot wounds and clear him of a mass of parasites in his stomach.
He now lives in Seoul. "I couldn't work too long on the construction site due to my bad back, and I now work part-time at a social enterprise," he said.
Oh denied a media report that he bought two cars and ended up selling them after running out of money. "That's not true," he said. "What I was given when I left Hanawon was W4 million in settlement support money and am entitled to live in public rental housing," he said. "I didn't have much money left after I bought furniture and a refrigerator (US$1=W1,130)."
Oh now looks no different than many young South Korean men in their 20s. He is slender and around 177 cm tall. Dressed in a navy-blue suit and white shirt, he had also dyed his hair light brown. Because he was born and raised in Kaesong close to the inter-Korean border, he does not have a distinct North Korean accent.
Oh insisted he had been misquoted in an interview with Japan's Sankei Shimbun last weekend. The right-wing Japanese newspaper stirred up controversy by quoting Oh as saying that the South Korean military is a joke.
"I was misquoted and what I said was lost in translation," he claimed Wednesday. "I watched video footage of South Korean soldiers crawling to save me," he added, raising his voice as his emotions ran high. "I served in the North Korean military and do not know much about South Korean military life. You serve 10 years in the North Korean military and two years in the South Korean military, and all I said was it must be easier in the South."
"But what I was quoted as saying made it sound like I laughed at the South Korean military." Oh claimed the Sankei sent him a message apologizing for mistakes by the interpreter.
Oh denied that he traveled to Japan just for the interview to make money but said he went because a friend in South Korea offered to introduce him to someone in Japan. "An acquaintance in Japan told me it would be a simple interview, so I met the Sankei people," he said.
He denied being paid a huge amount for the interview. "They paid for my airfare and hotel fee and nothing else, and I received W1 million. That's it," he said.
Asked what he likes about South Korea, Oh said, "I like the freedom. I like the fact that I can go wherever I want to and do whatever I want to. In North Korea, there were so many things you weren't allowed to have."
He also denied giving paid lectures to activist groups here. "I never gave a lecture to a civic group or received money from them," he said.
