In North Korea, kochebi, or “wandering swallows,” are the masses of children orphaned and left alone after their parents die or abandon them in search of food. These children were named the kochebi at the height of the famine in the mid-1990s for their tendency to flock together like birds scavenging for crumbs and migrating across the country in groups for added protection.
Kochebi Quotes in Nothing to Envy
The Nothing to Envy quotes below are all either spoken by Kochebi or refer to Kochebi. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 13
Quotes
Jun-sang knew the song by heart from his childhood, except the lyrics had been updated. In the verse "Our father, Kim Il-sung," the child substituted the name of Kim Jong-il. It was beyond reason that this small child should be singing a paean to the father who protected him when his circumstances so clearly belied the song. There he was on the platform, soaking wet, filthy, no doubt hungry.
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Kochebi Term Timeline in Nothing to Envy
The timeline below shows where the term Kochebi appears in Nothing to Envy. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 11
Kim Hyuck, one of the “wandering swallows,” or kochebi, whose parents had died or gone off in search of food, spent his early teen...
(full context)
Chapter 13
...middle of mountain ranges for days on end. On one journey, Jun-sang noticed a young kochebi singing on a platform: “We have nothing to envy,” he cooed. Jun-sang knew the song...
(full context)
Epilogue
...as the press left, the lights went out and stayed out. Demick also recalls seeing kochebi wandering along country roads just outside Pyongyang, searching for food and shelter. After interviewing recent...
(full context)
