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The DMZ is a place rife with division and pain,
but we decided go there to record hopes of peaceful unification
through images of thriving nature.
Korea's DMZ is the only place in the world where the Cold War never ended.
Our first destination was Chorwon, the bird paradise.
White-naped crane (Natural Monument No. 203)
Red-crowned crane (Natural Monument No. 202)
Cranes rule the fields of Chorwon every autumn.
Cranes happen to be a symbol of peace and serenity,
the two things the people of this land want the most.
The DMZ stretches 155 miles and cuts the Korean peninsula in half.
In 1953, South and North Korea each retreated two kilometers
from the military demarcation line,
resulting in a 4-kilometer strip of land enclosed by a steel fence.
Thus was formed the DMZ, short for Demilitarized Zone.
The eastern portion of the DMZ is marked by rugged terrain,
but an observation post at the end offers spectacular view of Mt. Geumgangsan.
Beside Mt. Geumgangsan flows the Namgang River,
the only river to flow from South to North Korea into the East Sea.
Barbed wire closes off everything from the East to the West Sea.
However, the eastern DMZ offers scenery too beautiful to be trapped in.
Not far from East Sea is a dainty little lake named Damho,
where Korea's best-known fairy tale of woodsman and fairy is to have taken place.
The fence then cuts across rough terrain towards the middle.
This is the abode of the goral, widely considered a living fossil.
The goral first appeared as a species about two million years ago.
Goral (Natural Monument No. 217) As if the law of evolution did apply,
the goral remained in its ancient form ever since.
The mother and young have come out to graze by the fence.
There is no safer place than the DMZ for an animal facing extinction.
The goral is a sensitive animal,
running from the sound of leaves being stepped on two hundred meters away,
and a mother raising her young is all the more sensitive.
The goral has gotten used to the sight of soldiers,
but they would have run the moment
they noticed the humans were not wearing uniform.
An encounter like this is frightening for a youngster less than a year old,
Practically everything the young goral sees in the DMZ is strange and scary.
A crow frightens the young goral, who retreats to its mother's side.
Though it wants to calm down by suckling on the mother,
the mother is not being very accommodating.
The crow then makes moves on the mother.
The crow actually has its reasons.
Inside the goral's coat in a tick-like parasite,
and the crow wants to eat the ticks out of the goral's back
if it is allowed to do so, just like crocodiles and crocodile birds.
The mother goral, however, does not warm up to the crow,
and the crow's advances come to nothing.
Yet given the constant changes in nature,
there may come a day when the two could form a symbiotic relationship.
Perhaps the goral would welcome an approaching crow then.
The cold now heralds the long winter ahead at the DMZ.
The soldiers in the DMZ engage in a unique operation when winter comes.
It is an operation to feed the gorals.
Winters can be especially harsh for gorals.
The grass they depend on to forage die off.
The soldiers once felt there was nothing they could do,
but at some point,
the troops developed a consensus as to saving the gorals from extinction.
What the gorals need in winter is food.
This operation called Trajectory of Life has gone on for years,
and food is delivered to gorals all winter.
There are many other operations intended to supply food to wildlife in the DMZ.
The troopers are carrying winter provisions for Roe deer, wild boar,
and other wildlife.
Only in the DMZ can one find armed soldiers laying their weapons aside
and engage in a labor of love for wild animals.
It is unrecognized efforts like these that have contributed greatly
to making the DMZ a realm where humanity and the wilds coexist.
Roe Deer
Humanity and wildlife coexist here,
and the DMZ offers humans unique happenings on a daily basis.
- Ready. - Ready.
- Ready. - Ready.
- Ready. - Present arms!
Wild boars are the best at clearing away scrap food in the DMZ.
One of them, however, is not walking straight.
It is limping and staggering down the slope.
A closer look reveals an empty stump where a foot should be.
It has lost its foot to a toe-popper landmine.
It was not the only boar that had been hurt.
The wounds from a severed front leg on this boar is yet to heal,
and still fresh.
Though the barbed wire kept most human away,
it has also let in dangers that have claimed many wildlife species.