Perry recalled a vivid example of just how alien his counterparts were: To get him in the room, the communist government once enlisted hundreds of forced laborers to shovel snow along 60 miles of highway so he could be driven across the demilitarized zone from South Korea.

“The weirdest is they sincerely believe that the Kim family are gods,” Perry added. “There is a reverence for their leaders that is hard to understand. It hangs over everything.”

Dealing with the North Koreans also involved constant reminders of their dire poverty and deprivation. When diplomat Christopher Hill appealed to the North Koreans for common steps to build mutual trust quickly, his use of the phrase “early harvest items” was misconstrued as literally meaning the harvesting of crops early to stave off starvation — something the famine-ridden country is all too familiar with.