Sep 21

North Korea: Ryongjin, the preferred soft drink of the proletariat

by in Asia, North Korea


This is a bottle of Ryongjin, which I believe is North Korea’s attempt to produce a beverage somewhat similar to Coca-Cola. Although you could buy Coke at our hotel and various other places in Pyongyang (I was a bit surprised to see an old lady selling cans of it in Moranbong Park, for instance) I really wanted to try this North Korean soda. I picked up a large bottle at the Yanggakdo Hotel gift shop for a little less than 50 cents. What a deal!

But the taste? Ugh. It was like a flat version of Coke that had stayed out in the sunlight for several hours. Even Pepsi tastes better than this stuff!

Perhaps I should have expected this, though, if only I had bothered to read the label more carefully before consuming it.

Ah, that explains everything. It’s a cocoa crabonated, not carbonated, drink. No wonder there wasn’t any fizz.


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7 Responses to “North Korea: Ryongjin, the preferred soft drink of the proletariat”

  1. From Adam:

    I take offense to you slandering Pepsi. Coke did not win the cold war like you believe it did.

    Posted on September 22, 2009 at 2:22 pm #
  2. From Lindsay:

    That was aimed specifically at you, BTW.

    Posted on September 22, 2009 at 2:25 pm #
  3. From Cindy C:

    Was there Diet Ryongjin? :P

    Posted on September 28, 2009 at 2:18 am #
  4. From Lindsay:

    Hahaha, unfortunately no diet version was available!

    Posted on September 28, 2009 at 11:23 am #
  5. From Jimmy:

    How dare you mock North Korea’s superior crabonating technology! It was invented by the Dear Leader himself and is thus superior to all imperialist colas.

    Posted on January 26, 2010 at 1:18 am #
  6. From Kiago:

    jimmy stfu ok its just because your leader drink it its not some what divine plus your not even in north Korea because their is not internet in north Korea. Plus North Korea sucked i am glad i escaped the country with false ideal forced down your mouth. The gulags that they hide are just horrid to bare i cant so tell me how great your leader is when the outside world advance in both modern and medical technology and there are rolling blackout were i lived Pyongyang.

    Posted on February 2, 2010 at 9:22 pm #
  7. From Schaffer:

    Kiago, english must not be your first language since you are the only person that did not realize Jimmy was being sarcastic. Do you honestly believe that a north Korean would be able to view this webpage. Fail.

    Posted on December 4, 2010 at 6:11 pm #

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