The International Friendship Exhibition is two enormous palace-style buildings tunnelled into the side of Mount Myohyang, holding the gifts that foreign heads of state, parties, and organisations have given to the Kim family since the 1940s. The official tally now runs to well over 200,000 items, displayed in around 150 rooms arranged by country.
The collection is genuinely astonishing in its range. There is a bulletproof armoured limousine from Stalin, an inlaid silver coffee set from Yasser Arafat, a stuffed crocodile holding a tray of cocktail glasses from the Sandinistas, a basketball signed by Madeleine Albright, and hundreds of objects from minor African and Eastern European dignitaries whose names mean little outside their home countries. The newer wing for Kim Jong-il and Kim Jong-un contains computers, model ships, and oddly mundane luxury goods.
Photography inside is forbidden, bags must be left at the entrance, and visitors are shown around in small groups by uniformed guides. The experience is sincere on the North Korean side and quietly surreal on the visitor's. There is nothing else quite like it anywhere.