Upon arrival at Camp Bonifas, DMZ tourists are seated in Ballinger Hall and a paper is distributed to everyone. Similar to our dental "consent" forms, this paper says that it relieves the military of responsibility and begins, "The visit to the Joint Security Area at Panmunjeom will entail entry into a hostile area and possibility of injury or death as a direct result of enemy action." There was a line at the bottom of the page for signature and date. Wanna go on the tour... sign the paper! Fortunately in the past 40 years no incidents involving visitors have occurred. From the North, several defectors have crossed over the line--including one Russian and one Chinese citizen. And some crossed to the North, even Americans. Bummer!
Note the generalized "mirth" among the Camp Casey docs (Captains Yong Kim, Kevin Lin, Ryan Romero, Colonel Hunter Clouse, and me) upon reading the DMZ "tour of death" document.
