The popular South Korean MBN program “I’m A Naturalist” is reportedly also gaining a sizable following in North Korea, North Korean sources have reported.
“USBs and SD cards with copies of ‘I’m A Naturalist’ are being sought by a lot of people,” said the South Pyongan Province-based source on October 16. “People want to watch it because they believe the show’s portrayal of ‘living outside in nature’ is similar to [living] in North Korea.”
Interest in South Korean dramas and other reality TV shows has been growing among North Koreans. Such shows allow them to catch a glimpse of South Korea’s economic progress and daily life, while celebrity reality programs allow viewers to see how celebrities live.
Popular shows since the early 2010s, including “Xmen” by SBS, “One Night and Two Days” by KBS, and “Infinite Competition” by MBC, have all gained in popularity in North Korea. More recently, reality shows that feature Kpop singers dancing have become popular.
The source reported, however, that the interest surrounding “I’m A Naturalist” is for reasons different to the other shows.
“Many [North Koreans] have said that the show is good because they can learn how to live in nature,” she said.
“People carefully watch the scenes where houses or tents are being built in the mountains. They learn how these structures are built, how the materials to build them are obtained and how they are used, and then try to copy what they have watched.”
Constructing tents in the mountains is a familiar activity for many North Koreans. Tent construction is particularly common at the peak of the fall harvest season. Farmers will pitch tents near their fields to keep watch and prevent thieves from stealing their crops.
Learning from South Korean reality shows is not limited to farmers, however. In an effort to survive, some fishermen now venture into much deeper waters than in the past because the North Korean government has sold the rights to fish along its west coast to China.
“Survival” programs including “I’m a Naturalist” are thus very popular in North Korea these days, according to a source in Pyongyang.
“North Koreans will carefully watch the parts of these shows where fish are caught out in the ocean, and will try to learn how they are prepared and eaten,” he said.
South Korean TV shows are generally copied in China illegally and then smuggled into North Korea. While it used to take about a week for current episodes of the shows to make it into North Korea in the early 2010s, the time taken continues to shorten.
