At the entrance steps, a carpet with a purple flower design yields to a foyer with a pair of towering vases and high ceilings. Down the hall is a vast, hexagonal room with a parquet floor. This is Magnolia Hall, where North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright had dinner earlier this week in pursuit of reconciliation between two nations that once went to war. Then there is University Hospital, one of the better medical facilities in Pyongyang. A walk up a short flight of steps leads to a dark, clammy corridor.
Electrical cables stretch across the wet floor of a dirty bathroom.
X-ray machines sit in a few rooms, but there is no electricity to run them. Many kings, dictators and even modern presidents have lived in luxury while their people wallow in poverty. But Kim Jong Il has gone further, fantastically distorting a miserable reality with an official, rose-colored take. His propagandists have cast him an all-knowing, godlike image. Magnolia Hall is so brightly lit that there is not a shred of shadow anywhere, giving the impression that it is sucking up a large portion of the city's meager electricity supply.