<font color='black' size='2' face='arial'><b style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Pyongyang
Marathon</font></span></b><br>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">We were feted with a movie not too long ago of 300 naked Spartans
poised against the Persians in the Battle of Thermopylae. I did not watch the
movie though I saw the posters all over Saipan with the main character looking
like he was showing off his abs after a session at the gym. It reminded me of an earlier historical
encounter in the plains of Marathon where the Persians were also defeated but
then withdrew to sail to Athens, and a runner named Pheiddipiddes (aka Philippides,
a name this guy born in the Philippines remembers) ran the 26 miles distance to
warn the city of an impending Persian attack, thus, the 26-mile distance of
present day marathons including that of the Olympics!</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">We could meander down Darius and Xerxes historical paths at the zenith
of the Persian Empire, or, more recently, the history of the Olympics run since
1896 in the Games in Athens that needed a popular drawing card and came off
with the marathon, or even the odd 26.385 mile measure once held because the
King of England was seated exactly at that distance from the starting point,
but the marathon itself is not our immediate interest. It is its recent Pyongyang incarnation that
caught our fancy, not unlike the one in Saipan, where three events were held:
the main one, the half run, and the 10K meters.</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Pyongyang had its run earlier than Saipan and we are not after
details of who was first to cross the finishing line as much as we are
surprised to discover that the event has been held since 1981; in fact, has
already been running for more than two decades (would be three but there were
years it did not run). Further, the last
one on April 13 this year was open to foreign amateur runners where more than
200 participants entered. </font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">(We shall be forgiven if we mention the first year anniversary of the
Boston marathon, marred last year by the explosions at the finishing line allegedly
from bombs planted by the Chechen brothers Tsarnaevs, making participants this
year on Patriots’ Day more determined – “we own the finish line”- to run the
event oblivious of any fear that may have been inflicted by last year’s
occurrence, in spite of the ugly prank of a copycat who left backpacks with a
rice cooker at the finishing line a few nights before the run that police had
to explode just to be sure. We do lament
the fact that we kept the young Tsarnaev alive so we can punish him for life!)</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Now, back to Pyongyang. I am
obviously not too keen on finding out about whose legs got them fastest to the
finish line and received the medal at the Mangyongdae Prize International
Marathon. OK, what’s with
“Mangyongdae”? That’s actually the name
of the village where founder of <i>Chosun, Chaoxian
</i>in<i> </i>Chinese for “North Korea”, Kim
Sung Il was born, sort of like Abe Lincoln’s Kentucky log cabin but with much
more patriotic hullaballoo, though not as touristy as Mt. Vernon. </font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">I am only four hours away by regular train to the city of Dandong,
China’s shipping port at the mouth of the Yalu river right across from NoKor’s Sin’uiju
city with an unfinished bridge standing halfway across the river from the China
side. The border traffic is hardly
noticeable as the Koreans on the Dandong side, aside from being part of
Korea-in-China, previously Kogoryo of old, now formally administered as
Yanbian, are undocumented immigrants, or clandestine agents. </font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">There’s a tourist ride on the Dandong side of the Yalu river that
gets to the riverbank of the other side, close enough to actually see the bathers
turn around and execute a cute “belfie” (butt up front) on camera
clickers. The late afternoon ride I took
had a young couple perform an X-rated act to the delight of the men folks and
giggled embarrassment of the demure ladies.
I was told that such irreverence was not sanctioned but nonetheless tolerated
when they occurred, though occasionally, it is used as an object lesson to
instill discipline on the unruly but nature-loving farm hands.</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Compared to Dandong, the largest port facility in the Far East, brightly
lit at night against the dark boulevards of <i>Chaoxian’s</i>
thoroughfares, Sin’uiju is a sleepy town.
In fact, the Internet has a satellite night photo of the Korean
peninsula where the South looks like a Chicago Christmas tree and the North, a
replica of a starless Himalayan night. I
was reminded of Dandong when I visited Heihe across the Amur River from the
Russian Far East city of Blagoveshchensk where China again burned the midnight
oil (a resource it does not have much of) so that its Russian neighbors would
be reminded on the difference of public façade, never mind the actual economic
realities on the ground.</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">The Wall Street Journal reported that the Pyongyang marathon is one
of NoKor’s tourist attractions to earn valued foreign exchange currency. With a new ski slope and the recent
suggestion of joint investigation on SoKor’s three drone attacks that Seoul
thinks came from the hermit kingdom, perhaps, <i>Chaoxian </i>is inclined to play.
Why not indulge them, to keep their skills honed on games rather than on
perfecting the refinement of weapons grade uranium they are determined to
attain since we accuse them of doing it anyway?</font></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Yo bosaeyo, Chaoxian!</font><font face="Times New Roman"></font></span></i></div>
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<br>
<div style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 18px; clear: both;"><i>j'aime la vie</i><br>
<a href="mailto:pinoypanda2031@aol.com">pinoypanda2031@aol.com</a><br>
<div><i>yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today. participate. In all, celebrate!</i></div>
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