Meir Alfasi is a rabbi, photographer, and former photojournalist who lives in Israel and has traveled to 80 countries.

He spent five days in North Korea , where non-state-sanctioned religion is strictly forbidden.

He had some close calls with North Korean officials and told INSIDER he'd "never felt so scared in my life."

Wherever Meir Alfasi goes, he wears the uniform of the Chabad sect of ultra-Orthodox Judaism : a black hat and long black coat called a bekishe.

A rabbi, photographer, and former photojournalist from Israel, Alfasi has been to 80 countries. He's spent a year living in India doing Jewish outreach and even printed copies of religious books at Everest Base Camp and in Antarctica.

"I travel with the uniform of a religious person, a Jewish person, because maybe someone will see me and ask a question, then I could tell them more about Judaism," he told INSIDER.

In North Korea , he had to hide his religious identity.

While North Korea's constitution says it allows for freedom of religious beliefs, a 2017 report from the US State Department found that any religious activities that are not state-sanctioned, including reading the Bible or praying, result in "executions, torture, beatings, and arrests" or other forms of "severe punishment, including imprisonment in political prison camps."

The report also estimated that between 80,000 and 120,000 political prisoners were being held in prison camps, some for religious reasons.
Alfasi spent five days touring North Korea, calling himself the first Chabad rabbi to visit the country.

He couldn't speak openly about Judaism and hid his religious books and ritual objects from authorities. But he did wear his black hat and bekishe.

Here's what his trip to North Korea was like.

He applied for a visa directly through the North Korean government after getting rejected by tourism companies.

At first, his request was rejected because the companies saw that he had worked as a photojournalist, and journalists aren't allowed into North Korea . He then reapplied and listed his occupation as a wedding photographer and was approved.

On the plane from China to North Korea, flight attendants wore pins with photos of the North Korean leaders.

When he got up to stretch his legs, Alfasi says he was sternly told to sit back down.
When he landed at the border, North Korean soldiers went through his suitcases.

"You have to write down every detail before, then they take your list and see what you have. They say, 'How many socks do you have?'" he said.

Alfasi brought a prayer book, a prayer shawl, and tefillin (small leather boxes containing scrolls of religious writings that are worn during prayer) all of which are forbidden in North Korea.

When the soldiers found his tefillin, he narrowly avoided having them discovered as a religious item.

"Before you come in they tell you you're not allowed to bring any religious things," he said. "They said 'Okay, what is tefillin?' I said 'I put this on my arms.' I didn't tell them it was religious because I didn't know what was going to happen."

One of the soldiers wanted to open the tefillin, but an English-speaking guide intervened just in time.

"I was scared because if they open it they'll see the religious parchment and it would be very dangerous," he said. "I told the guy, 'Don't open it. If you open it, I'm staying here in the airport.'

The soldier called the guides who speak English, and the guide said, 'Let it go, it's okay.' That was my beginning in North Korea."

Alfasi says it soon became clear that his every move was being watched.

"I prayed inside my room every day, but I got so scared because once I wrote something down in my room and in the morning one of the guys said, 'What did you write down in your room?'" he said. "I realized that this is not a regular country, I have to be more aware. Every little thing you do or say...more below

Source: https://www.babanewsline.com.ng/2019/01/an-ultra-orthodox-rabbi-visited-north.html

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