For most, the journey will first pass through China, Vietnam and Laos, where they must be on the alert for police who might arrest them and send them back the way they came — to certain and brutal punishment in North Korea.

Not until they cross a fourth frontier from Laos into Thailand are they are finally safe.

Kim, the young and tempestuous North Korean leader, is issuing increasingly shrill threats to the outside world, flying missiles over Japan and threatening to strike the United States.

For the people of North Korea, his threats are not just bluster. They are a very real part of daily life.

Behind the visible salvos of missiles, ordinary North Koreans are risking their lives to make this invisible journey out of Kim’s clutches and to safety.

The Thai authorities do not send them back. Instead, they will slap them with a minor immigration violation and alert the South Korean Embassy in Bangkok, which will start the process of transferring them to Seoul — not far from where many started their journey. There, they will start a new life, one of constant Internet connectivity and white rice every day.

“I want to learn all about computers,” said a 15-year-old boy who had arrived in Thailand from Laos, just 12 days after escaping from North Korea. “I want to become a computer expert.”

“I want to be good at computers too,” chimed in his 8-year-old sister, who was playing with an imitation Barbie that a humanitarian worker had given her on arrival in Thailand. It was the first doll she had ever owned.

The brother and sister were two of the 11 North Koreans who told their story to The Washington Post of their escape after arriving here, on the Thai side of the Mekong River, before turning themselves in to the police.