Inside the Growing, Booze-Fueled Market of Dark Tourism

Take me to the torture palace No Images? Click here           The Disaster Tourist Whenever Kent Russell returns from assignment, he'll avoid me for days, sometimes weeks. Calls go unanswered, texts get a one-word reply, sometimes two. He'll only break the three-word barrier when he needs the extra space to insult members of my immediate family. Eventually, he'll pick up the phone and mumble something about how he got good stuff while he was out on the road and that I should stop worrying already. When I press for more, he'll say he has a cold and can't talk, or he'll pretend to go into a tunnel. It'd all be frustrating, if it weren't also kind of hilarious, and if I didn't love him as much as I do.  So it wasn't until I received the first draft of his latest piece—"The Disaster Tourist"—that I learned what really happened on his train from Moscow to Vladikavkaz. I still can't quite believe it. But, first, let me back up: At the beginning of 2016, Otto Warmbier, an honors student at the University of Virginia, was in North Korea on a tour with a mysterious travel group called Young Pioneer Tours. On his way out of Pyongyang, he was apprehended by the North Koreans and eventually charged with KT. Seventeen months into a 15-year sentence, he was flown back to the U.S. in a persistent vegetative state. Days after that, he was dead.  It's fair to say that Young Pioneer Tours did not look great in the ensuing media coverage. It came across as a group that escorts the drunk and privileged to shady parts of the globe so they can take selfies in front of statues of mass murderers. And so Eve Fairbanks, another Highline contributor, suggested that we send someone to see what YPT was all about. Within hours, Kent was booked on a YPT tour—this one to the Russian Caucasus, since Americans are no longer allowed in North Korea.  What Kent came back with—I ultimately learned—was wild. And the piece he wrote is at once hilarious and enlightening. So, give it a read. You really deserve to find out what happened on that train from Moscow to Vladikavkaz.   —Greg Veis   READ THE ARTICLE     Highline combines the rigor, depth and obsessiveness of the best magazine journalism with the experimentation that becomes possible when no paper or staples are involved. And our goal is simple: We want to publish stories that stay with you. Did you like reading this email? Forward it to a friend. Or sign up! Can't get enough? Check out our Morning Email or Must Reads.   ©2018 HuffPost | 770 Broadway, New York, NY 10003 You are receiving this email because you signed up for updates from HuffPost. Feedback | Privacy Policy | Unsubscribe     - - Preferences  |  Unsubscribe