Tag: Veterans

On being a sidekick

I was born late into the fold. My brother and sister had already been in college when I arrived.

So I grew up watching “chinese fire drill” around the dinner table: Dad chasing brother, mom trying to intervene and my sister, w/nothing to do, joining the commotion. It’s like Chevy Chase‘s National Lampoon Vacation in Europe, caught on the inside ring of a Paris turn-about.

Later, when my brother picked up his date for an evening stroll at Flower Street Fest (Tous les garcons et les filles de mon age se promene dans la rue), two couples lost me in the crowd (but I found my way back to the car, stood on the hood, and raised the balloon up high for SOS).

Sidekick!

Born into a wrong decade. Too young to be drafted, but too old to pretend I am “Tommy this, Tommy that” in America.

My generation was a hybrid one: grew up in war time (Vietnam), but reaped not the benefits of peace time.

I am aware of the legacy, the hidden tolls (the Wall and all the wasted lives).

But because of ill-timing, I end up assuming the role of a memory keeper  (of dramatic events).

Sidekicks aren’t those who impact or influence an event. They just remember and recall it.

Hence, I stand on the sideline, watching dramas in my family, dramas in my neighborhood (monk burning), and dramas in the US  like  Happy Valley (see other blogs on VN evacuation, Three-Mile-Island, Monk Burning,  Boat People exodus, LA Riot, LA Earthquake, 9/11 and Katrina…)

I am not addicted to hype nor am I a thrill seeker.  But, I begin to notice my penchant for witnessing more than a fair share of disasters. They take a toll on my personal life. A sidekick wasn’t supposed to be impacted by the events he/she observed. I should have maintained that journalistic objectivity instead of being affected by events. Who wouldn’t; seeing all those suffering, striving and struggling?

My siblings seem to be coping much better, partly because they are much older (thicker skin) and have a better support system: they blocked out memories of the separation between North and South Vietnam (which had uprooted them even before I came into the picture). BTW, I did not intend for this blog to commemorate the division of North and South due to some Indochina agreement among the post WW II Colonial forces. I think it’s the 20th of July, 1954).

Here is how I see it: you can live life on the surface, skimming just the cream on top.

Or you can dig deep, to see the rottenness at the core. Or somewhere in the middle.

As a sidekick, if I end up digging, it’s because I can’t seem to erase the tape (like they did in Watergate or White House tape which lately have been declassified).

At Penn State, they were hoping for the problem to resolve itself by kicking the can down the road.

But we are not National Lampoon vacationing in Europe, to drive in circle as time lapses.

We live our lives forward, with memories as our guide and the future, our anchor.

Someday, I will pass these memories on. Because one cannot just get “shipped” to another place,

like they do with jobs and merchandise bought via e-commerce. Logistically, the US pulled it off really well during Operation Frequent Wind. But the long-term consequences and unintended consequences are there, ever-present, and creep up when least expected.

Yes, it’s hard to play sidekick. It’s not an option for me. Hence, it’s pre-ordained that I keep on retelling personal and social history as I remember it.

Is it painful? Yes. Is it dramatic? Yes. But not that different from other US immigrant stories, of leaving behind the known for the unknown. I still remember that veil of rain and tears the day I left Vietnam. I don’t know if my brother and sister could even recall their first trip leaving North Vietnam, let alone the second one leaving the South.

To judge them as heartless is premature. Perhaps they have used to blocking out painful past.

Now it’s my turn, to do the same, to move on while playing a perfect sidekick i.e. standing on the sideline of history and recalling snipets of memories which hurt every time, though not as much as those who had invested in much more than I.

Moving wall

Vietnam Wall that is. Coming to the square near you.

They did not reconstruct the WWII concentration camps on wheel. But they did it with Vietnam.

And on June 13th, the Nixon Library in Yorba Linda will release the full version of the Pentagon Papers, originally commissioned by then DoD Secretary McNamara. Portion of the “white papers” was leaked to the press, so the Plumbers were formed to stop the leaks (today’s equivalence of Wiki-Plumbing). Later, their side job was to break in the Watergate (of course, where ever there is water, there is leak). I must give it to them. It was the only time in history when we saw such a  well-dressed group of Plumbers. Instead of parading the miniature version of the Watergate building, they chose the Wall instead.

I hope it bring healing to those “deer hunters”, and wipe away tears from Meryl Streep’s types, who must be in their 60’s by now.

Forever scarred and defined by that conflict, which was more internal than external: from school busing to the Great Society and “I Have A Dream” speech. After waving goodbye from Air Force One helicopter, Nixon held up a peace sign (V). Even President Johnson, in his retirement, grew long hair in his Austin ranch. Vietnam brought out the worst in us, in our leaders (a lot of swearing, from “the bitch of the war” (LBJ), to “bastards”(Ford) – after Congress had refused funding for the Vietnam evacuation, per Rumsfeld bio – to the White House wiretaping the Nixon’s campaign promising the Thieu’s government a better deal if elected.

Vietnam still teaches us lessons: Kerry and Cain on the opposing sides of the aisle, Powell’s doctrine (of overwhelming force, entry and exit, or not at all, battle-tested in the first Iraq war), and Senator Jim Webb with his Vietnam’s best writing. Journalists like Woodward and filmmakers like Oliver Stone, all got their baptism by fire.

So the moving wall is coming to town, but don’t expect it to stir up as much as the subject of Vietnam did 40 years ago.

Hell No, we won’t go. Now, living in Canada, these grown men can’t come back.

Ironically, if they decide to backpack to Vietnam from Canada, they can now tour the Cu Chi Tunnel, where their GI counterparts (tunnel rats) barely got out alive.

Vietnam Moving Wall. Haven’t we moved on, from that place of anxiety over Red Scare, to the fear of being overtaken by global competition. It’s a new era defined by creative mind, and entrepreneur, logistic and competitive advantage. It’s soft power and software. Brain over brawn, capital over labor.

It’s so iconic that Michael Jackson’s father came to Vietnam to inaugurate  Happy Land construction. He said, “my son had always wanted people to be happy”. So he pitched in, invested, and stood by it. “I’ll be there”.

During construction, perhaps they will enlist help from a few plumbers.

This time, they are asked to stay within their job description: install and up-keep the flow of water for recreational use. No wiki-plumbing or break-in please. It’s Happy Land, where adults can once again have fun, like children, with flowers in their hair.