Tag: Rambo

Survivor’s guilt

We have heard uplifting stories about the human spirits, survivors at seas and in the wilderness. But the other side of the coin is survivor’s guilt. This reaction is just an extension of that loneliness as portrayed in Cast Away.

The story goes like this. Three guys survived a crash and found themselves on an island. Of course, “he ain’t heavy, he is my brother …” Then an angel appears to grant each one a wish. “I want to go home”.

The second guy gets the same wish. The third and only guy left couldn’t wait for his turn. He blurts it out “Gee, I wish my friends are still here with me”. You know what happened then. His wish to “friend” the other two canceled out their reunion at home, bringing them all back to that lonely island of three.

Survivor’s guilt.

It eats us up inside:

I woke up this past Christmas realising it was my friend’s last Christmas.

He has now passed away. But for that brief morning moment, I experienced a speck of guilt. Perhaps it will return next Christmas as well.

For ten years, between 1975-85, I lived in guilt. My dad had stayed behind in our home in Saigon while I partied on (Disco craze).

I ended up volunteering at refugee camps, longing to see my Dad‘s face among the crowd (in fact, one of the guys in my team got that wish: he was reunited with his two younger brothers right there in the Jubilee refugee camp).

That long decade saw the rise of Rambo character, who tried to relieve his guilt via rescue mission.

Relief or rescue, we were onto the same theme: guilt.

Eastern culture was more into “shame” than Western‘s “guilt”.

The aftermath of Vietnam left us paralyzed with both shame and guilt.

(Reflections of my life).

At times, while working out, I moved the damn weight away from my chest, all along with silent scream: ” I did not cause war”.

Yet the impact and influence are the same: separation, loss and bewilderment.

So, on that quiet beach walk, or a stroll through my moon alley, I picked up a stranded star fish, or a loose brick. Just do what I can, in smallest way to make life worth living. It matters to that particular star fish to be tossed back to the sea. Or the brick to the side of the road. Makes it a safer world.

A world without guilt. Survivor’s guilt.

New voice new vision

I browsed the DVD shelves at my local library (North Palm Beach) the other day, and saw Buffalo Boy next to Brokeback Mountain and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid.  It is by fate that the Cowboy and the Buffalo(boy) found themselves on the same DVD shelf, just like those black and white GI’s names are alphabetically listed on the same Wall (Vietnam Memorial Wall).

It was the intention of movies like  Apocalypse Now and Rambo series to move the American public forward to the next stage of grief. Yet, American are still in denial about Vietnam, thus forfeiting many valuable lessons otherwise applicable to today’s conflicts,  Iraq and Afghanistan e.g. tribal loyalty, theocracy and regional politics.

Of late, emerged a new generation of Overseas Vietnamese filmmakers with bold vision and audacious voice. I saw Powder Blue directed by a Vietnamese film maker. Or Norwegian Wood, a Beatles title, yet  screenplay is adapted from a Japanese novel.

I can’t wait to see it: Beatles’ song, Japanese story and Vietnamese film directing. What a collaboration!

(Just like  Ang Lee directed Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi).

Cowboy or Buffalo(boy), we are all on our epistemological quest (why are we here, where are we going, and how do we get there). With one exception: we are going to get there on horseback or buffalo back, not gas-guzzling Hummer.

That’s for the Chinese upper class. Weaving their Bentley’s in dense pollution.

Buffalo Boy and Cowboy don’t cause further environmental damage: they earn their living on nature and have a certain

reverence for it. Maybe the old way can teach us a thing or two. Plain old truth (have reverence for the things that feed you), just needs a new voice and new vision. Ironically the vehicle (technology) to reach and persuade us (like I Phone and broadband) themselves consume too much energy, creating a cycle of creative destruction. I have pondered about our “disposable society” for quite sometime now. How many automobiles, electronic devices, books and clothes, shoes and ties we have trashed or given to Goodwill on our lifetime! Yet Mother Earth mysteriously heals itself, like recent appearance of an Island after Japan’s Tsunami.

New world needs new worldview and other ways to lend expressions to it.