Experiences and Final Thoughts
One time I was flying a plane – and this was the closest I got to I guess getting killed – is that one of the small arms fire – which means just a regular bullet – when into the gas tank and you could see this little stream of gas coming out, looked like somebody was peeing right out of the gas… like a little stream of gas coming out. And I’m nineteen, twenty years old and it didn’t really phase me at the time but later on you think about it. That could of caught on fire… or you could of run out of fuel and crashed. Didn’t even think about it cause I figured there’s another tank on the other side you fly off one gas tank. You didn’t need…something I didn’t think about…bursting into flame or catching a spark of whatever.
I’m looking at some of the pictures here and… I’m looking at a picture here, we have a girl who is… cleaning… helping us clean the barracks while we out working during the day, good-looking girl! I didn’t have anything to do with her.
A bunch of us boys here at the USO, we have a girl that came from the United States to come over and actually entertain us and help us play games and shoot pool and provide refreshments – things like that. They were over there -you know- kind of like doing their own services that way. We had girls at home doing the same thing; they had USOs all over the place. They’d dance with you…do all kinds of stuff.
I use to hang out with the Vietnamese, they liked me. Here’s a group of Vietnamese right here and um…”Chop Chop” on the back “Chop Chop” means to eat food. “Chop Chop, Chop Chop, Yum Yum, Chop Chop.” So they’re getting ready to eat and asked me to join them but I don’t like what they had because they eat dog and stuff like that. I can’t hang.
Whenever Pan American Airlines use to come in bring these pretty airline hostesses. There I am on the runway here with one of the runway hostesses hugged all up with her with my M16 and everything on out on the flight line. So I’m having a good time, matter of fact I got some hugs and kisses and stuff, she got back on the plane never saw her again. This was the only girl in the whole base that had round eyes! We called her round eyes.
Most people hear about Vietnam as being so terrible and you hear all the guts and all the blood and all the rapes and all the – you know – people cutting penises off and sticking them in their mouths and cutting their ears off and putting them into boxes. And my reason for doing this interview is so people will see that the average person that went to Vietnam didn’t comeback with shell-shock and have all these bad thoughts. I had a good time in Vietnam actually, even though I’m counting my days to coming home because I don’t want to be away from home – just like anybody else – I’m counting those days… I want to get back home. But while I’m there, make the best out of it, get as much entertainment as you can, make as much money as you can – you know – send money back home so mama can buy a hog and butcher can put it in the freezer that you just bought her and then drive off in the old Pontiac that you just bought her before you went to Vietnam. I was sending money home. All that black market money I was sending a lot of that home so… I did have enough left to get me up back in rhythm though.