A handful of tour buses carrying foreign diplomats, the Korean press corps and students slowly lumbered across Unification Bridge into the demilitarized zone carefully negotiating barricades assembled halfway along the bridge’s length.

The schoolchildren were fidgety and chattering excitedly, jumping out of their seats to peer out of the bus windows at sights they scarcely could have seen before ― armored vehicles, heavily armed checkpoints and barbed wire strewn helter-skelter, the legacy of a three-year civil war and 60 years of national division.

About a dozen foreign envoys, along with the school children and others, joined a cavalcade on the bridge as part of what was described as “International Children’s Peace Day,” a day-long tour of various tourist sites in and around Paju, a sleepy rural town north of Seoul. It was organized by International Cooperation of Environmental Youth, a U.S.-based group led by organizer Lee Kyoung-tae, wife Melissa Lee and their son Jonathan.

The family has made headlines here occasionally over the years on peace and environmental issues, including a movement to build a children’s peace forest inside the DMZ.

“It is a great idea because peace is one of the most expensive ideas there are, and children can market the idea better than anyone else,” said Charitha Yattogoda, minister counselor at the Sri Lankan Embassy in Korea.

“We also know how expensive peace can be in Sri Lanka. We had a civil conflict for 30 years and only recently achieved peace,” he said during the day-long event. “We know how important it is, and we at the embassy immediately thought of joining this event to lend our support as best as we can.”

The DMZ’s contrasts can jar any visitor. Barbed wire fences and security checkpoints abound, sentried by soldiers lugging machine guns.

The soldiers are not without plenty of company, however, as busloads of tourists show up daily to gawk at the world’s most heavily fortified border, even as North Korea threatens to drown Seoul in a sea of fire.

“It is a good experience for the children. This is not an easy place to organize a visit, so we appreciate the effort the organizers made for the children. Normally kids under 12 years of age are not allowed inside the DMZ,” Wang Kai, wife of Austrian Ambassador to Korea Josef Muellner and mother of 7-year-old David. Wang delivered welcome remarks at Imjinggak Pavilion at the start of the tour.

Imjinggak Pavilion was built “to remind Koreans of their painful past and their commitment to unification,” according to a web site operated by the Gyeonggi provincial government.

The pavilion’s amusement park, fast-food joints and kitschy souvenir shops mix with an ever-present Cold War tension that is higher now than it has been in years, following North Korean outrage over U.N. sanctions and joint U.S.-South Korean military drills that included Cold War-style B-52 flyovers.

Sensing potential controversy, some foreign diplomats shied away from lending any insights about the divided Korea, the demilitarized zone or North Korea.

Most of them, however, accepted it with its ironies and contradictions trying to turn it into a teachable moment for not just children but everyone.

“War and peace is a game for politicians to play, but I think these young people will grow up to change the way the game is played,” said Sameer Alwahedy, finance attach at the Jordanian Embassy in Korea. “In Jordan, we believe in peace, everyone in the world has the right to live in peace. A children’s event like this could be a great help in the Israeli-Palestinian issue as well.”

It could be too easy to cynically dismiss the conflict zone tourist industry that has slowly grown in the area, including the Dora Observatory, where one can look at North Korea through binoculars for 500 won, and the amusement park at the Imjinggak Pavilion, the start and end point for the day-long tour.

The mix of tourist kitsch and reminders of the Cold War and the threat of renewed conflict could be the inevitable result of Paju residents making the best out of a bad situation.

“This event symbolizes to me the promotion of peace because, obviously, youth are the future. We have to make a commitment to conflict resolution and this is a conscious effort to promote peace,” said S.U. Ahmed, deputy head of mission at the Nigerian Embassy in Korea.

“Children are the ones who suffer the most in a conflict situation. That is why it is important to let them participate in being part of the solution in events like this one,” said Adamu A. Musa, minister at the Nigerian Embassy in Seoul.

In addition to the amusement park, which is complete with rides and carnival booths, there are a number of other touristy things to do and see: A bicycle tour; a Bell of Peace, in which one can bang a enormous gong for 10,000 won; walking on the Bridge of Freedom, that comes to an abrupt and symbolic dead end; and, a train stuck in situ since the Korean War, riddled with bullet holes.

Musa, Ahmed and their wives returned to Seoul with souvenir DMZ baseball caps.

By Philip iglauer (ephilip2011@herald.com)