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They didn't have to break rocks, just eat them.
As Laura Ling and Euna Lee celebrated their freedom and thanked Bill Clinton for his rescue mission on Wednesday, harrowing details of their ordeal as North Korean prisoners emerged.
Prison food was rice peppered with rocks. They were held in isolation from each other, gripped by fear that they would be shipped to one of the infamous hard-labor gulags in Kim Jong Il's Communist state.
"The past 140 days have been the most difficult, heart-wrenching time of our lives," Ling said, choking back sobs just moments after the two journalists were reunited with their families.
In a classic Hollywood ending, Ling, 32, and Lee, 36, bounced off a private jet at 6:19 a.m. at the Burbank airport near Los Angeles and rushed to embrace loved ones.
As tears flowed, Lee hugged her husband and knelt down to lock her 4-year-old daughter, Hana, in a tight embrace. Ling kissed her husband. Soon after, the families applauded when Clinton emerged from the plane.
"Thirty hours ago, Euna Lee and I were prisoners in North Korea. We feared that at any moment we could be sent to a hard-labor camp, and, then, suddenly, we were told that we were going to a meeting," Ling said.
"When we walked in through the doors, we saw, standing before us, President Bill Clinton," she said, pausing with emotion as she placed her hand on her chest.
"We were shocked, but we knew instantly in our hearts that the nightmare of our lives was finally coming to an end and now we stand here, home and free."
In June, the North Korean regime sentenced the journalists, who work for former Vice President Al Gore's Current TV cable channel, to 12 years of hard labor for illegally entering the country.
Kim pardoned them during Clinton's dramatic 20-hour visit.
As Laura Ling and Euna Lee celebrated their freedom and thanked Bill Clinton for his rescue mission on Wednesday, harrowing details of their ordeal as North Korean prisoners emerged.
Prison food was rice peppered with rocks. They were held in isolation from each other, gripped by fear that they would be shipped to one of the infamous hard-labor gulags in Kim Jong Il's Communist state.
"The past 140 days have been the most difficult, heart-wrenching time of our lives," Ling said, choking back sobs just moments after the two journalists were reunited with their families.
In a classic Hollywood ending, Ling, 32, and Lee, 36, bounced off a private jet at 6:19 a.m. at the Burbank airport near Los Angeles and rushed to embrace loved ones.
As tears flowed, Lee hugged her husband and knelt down to lock her 4-year-old daughter, Hana, in a tight embrace. Ling kissed her husband. Soon after, the families applauded when Clinton emerged from the plane.
"Thirty hours ago, Euna Lee and I were prisoners in North Korea. We feared that at any moment we could be sent to a hard-labor camp, and, then, suddenly, we were told that we were going to a meeting," Ling said.
"When we walked in through the doors, we saw, standing before us, President Bill Clinton," she said, pausing with emotion as she placed her hand on her chest.
"We were shocked, but we knew instantly in our hearts that the nightmare of our lives was finally coming to an end and now we stand here, home and free."
In June, the North Korean regime sentenced the journalists, who work for former Vice President Al Gore's Current TV cable channel, to 12 years of hard labor for illegally entering the country.
Kim pardoned them during Clinton's dramatic 20-hour visit.
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