Blaine left today for an amazing trip: to Beijing and, on Monday, to North Korea (!) with the New York Philharmonic. Blaine's travel can be tiring for both of us, but I think this is so cool.
It's very hard for American journalists to get into North Korea; many foreign correspondents who cover the Koreas never get there. But the Philharmonic had space on the plane and naturally said yes to the Washington Post, among others.
The Philharmonic is on tour in Asia. It will play in Beijing on Sunday night (Blaine is going to that, too) and then will fly to Pyongyang on Monday for a concert on Tuesday night. The orchestra and journalists will leave N Korea on Wednesday to fly to Seoul; Blaine will probably be back in Tokyo on Thursday.
I don't know anything about where Blaine is staying or what else he'll be doing in Pyongyang, but I'll blog if/when I get details.
The program in N Korea includes Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 From the New World and Gershwin's An American in Paris. Will Kim Jong-il be there?
(Here's a creepy website about the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, if you're inclined to read a "bio" of the Great Leaders.)
And if you want to see and hear the concert for yourself, the NYT says: "The concert takes place in Pyongyang on Tuesday at 6 p.m., which is 4 a.m. on Tuesday in New York. Channel 13, WNET, will show it on tape on Tuesday evening in the New York area, and it will be available two days later to other PBS stations. It will also be shown around the world."
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