Posted Monday, May 15, 2006; 20:00 HKT
Chairman Mao used to say that China and North Korea were "closer than lips and teeth." But take in the view of the Hermit Kingdom, across the Yalu River from the bustling Manchurian city of Dandong, and it's clear just how far apart the old communist brotherhood has grown. Sinuiju, the North Korean town on the other side of the Yalu, languishes in Cold War drabness. Soldiers, bundled in army-green coats, stamp in the cold as gray-clad dockworkers tend rusting boats. A few old factory stacks belch black smoke—and at night, the town is eerily dark, with nary a lightbulb in sight. Dandong, by contrast, is a riot of color, from giant billboards advertising the latest South Korean electronics to the alluring glow of nightclubs burning up the blackness with pulsing neon.

Those looking to get closer to North Korea can hire a Chinese speedboat and buzz the riverbank on the other side. Alternatively, it's intriguing simply to peer at Sinuiju from the old Yalu River Bridge, damaged by U.S. bombing during the Korean War and now standing as a monument to that tragic conflict. The bridge, however, doesn't reach the other side. The impoverished North Koreans dismantled their half, presumably to put the valuable steel and concrete to more pressing use. (A newer structure, called the Sino-Korean Friendship Bridge, now spans the river and is used each day by hundreds of cross-border traders.)

For those who want a memento of their Sinuiju sighting, enterprising Dandong hawkers offer plenty of North Korean trinkets, from Dear Leader badges to propaganda posters extolling the virtues of the Kims père et fils. Revolutionary fervor can also be experienced at Dandong's Museum Commemorating the War to Resist American Aggression and Aid Korea. There, flatscreen TVs show movies depicting the courage of Sino-Korean brothers-in-arms, resisting marauding U.S. imperialists. But these days, it seems like pure lip service. They may only be separated by a modest stretch of water, but rarely do two fraternal societies look so dramatically sundered as they are here.

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