Replica Panmunjom draws tourists after Korea summit

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With access to the real DMZ restricted, tourists are flocking to a replica of the border truce village of Panmunjom to re-enact the scene of Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in shaking hands.

With a low cement block between them marking the "border", they shake hands as the leaders of the DPRK and ROK did when they met at Panmunjom on April 27.

CGTN Photo

Many visitors joined hands and hopped over the mock Military Demarcation Line (MDL) to the "North" and back, re-enacting the scene that was broadcast live.

"My children urged me to come here after they saw the famous scene on TV at school class," Park Sook-hyun, a 44-year-old housewife, told AFP.

Chung O-Chul, 46, said he came from the southern city of Changwon to see the replica and "celebrate reconciliation" between the North and South.

"But I was overwhelmed by this huge crowd", he said.

ROK soldiers stand guard at the border village of Panmunjom between the ROK and the DPRK at the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), April 11, 2018. /VCG Photo

Panmunjom, known as the Joint Security Area (JSA), is inside the Demilitarized Zone, a 250 kilometer-long swath of land that divides the Korean Peninsula.

Despite its name, the DMZ is among the most heavily fortified areas on the planet and the JSA is the only place where soldiers from the DPRK and ROK stand face-to-face.

The replica was built for the 2000 blockbuster "JSA: Joint Security Area", a mystery thriller by renowned director Park Chan-wook.

The village has UN blue-colored huts, Panmungak, a drab cement building on the North side, and the Freedom House pavilion on the South side.

But despite the realism there is a complete lack of the tension visitors feel when they set foot on what former US president Bill Clinton once described as the "scariest place on Earth".

"It is almost like the real Panmunjom but what lacks here is the tense atmosphere," said Park, adding she had a chance to visit Panmunjom 20 years earlier.

There are only a few weeks left to visit 'Panmunjom' as the sets will be torn down after the end of May ahead of the studio's relocation to the southern city of Busan. /AFP Photo

The facility and two other outdoor movie sets belong to the Korean Film Council's Namyangju Studios in the eastern suburbs of Seoul.

"The two other movie sets used to be more popular than Panmunjom replica but following the summit, most visitors want to see Panmunjom set first," a studio official said.

And there are only a few weeks left to visit "Panmunjom" as the sets will be torn down after the end of May ahead of the studio's relocation to the southern city of Busan next year.

Source(s): AFP