People of the Baekdu-daegan: Eight Guardians of the Mountains

They then face a grueling commute, walking up to Jangteomok Shelter over a full one night and two days.

Jangteomok Shelter runs with eight staff working two shifts of four people each to improve operational efficiency.

Located in a high-altitude area, the shelter supplies its own power through a solar system and diesel generators, with generator fuel flown in by helicopter.

They reportedly take professional pride in guarding a shelter that can accommodate up to 155 people a day.

Their sense of responsibility and satisfaction in managing the place where hikers come to take in Jirisan's views is high.

Under the shift system, staff take four days of rest after their duty ends.

During those roughly four days off, they go to Seoul to see friends and spend personal time.

Because mountain-hut staff must prepare their own meals, many develop solid cooking skills.

A couple living in Seoul decided to relocate to the countryside, burdened by the husband's father's declining health and the husband's frequent round trips to Gurye.

The wife, Yeong-in, received housing for one year through Gurye's rural relocation support center program. The couple moved to Gurye a year ago and are now looking for a home to settle in nearby.

The wife, Yeong-in, said she set down the weariness of Seoul life and gained self-esteem by preparing three meals a day herself in Gurye.

Self-sufficient rural living appears to have had a positive mental effect, improving their quality of life.

The wife, Yeong-in, continues to work remotely for a foreign company, and the husband, Tae-hyeon, is an investment professional with relatively flexible time.

The couple said that until they fully adapt to rural life, it is hard to completely give up city jobs because of practical income concerns.

Through the relocation center, the couple learned the one-year farming cycle according to the seasonal solar terms and experienced growing crops themselves.

This experience gave them confidence that they could settle in the countryside and tend a vegetable garden.

Unlike the intense Seoul routine of the notoriously packed Line 2 commute and lunches spent waiting in long lines, here there is leisure in looking after neighbors' chickens and sharing in communal childcare.

A community exchange culture, such as jointly caring for neighbors' chickens in a form of shared upbringing, has taken root, giving them a sense of community that is hard to find in the city.

Mountaineer Nam Lee began hiking in 1984, back when the name Baekdu-daegan was still unfamiliar.

He traversed the Baekdu-daegan relying on military maps and a compass, overcoming extreme conditions such as melting snow inside the mountains for drinking water in the bitter cold.

He became the first Korean to receive a Baekdu-daegan-related award in Switzerland, and he regards linking the North and South Baekdu-daegan as his final mission.

He is drawn to a life of carrying his own pack and deciding all his actions himself. He is also putting effort into studying how the Baekdu-daegan is managed to flesh out ways to connect North and South.

To maintain the tigers' wild instincts, they are fed only once a day, and one day a week they are deliberately kept without food.

Staff feed the tigers by hand while checking their teeth and observing their droppings, closely managing their health.