20
“Uc Da Loi, Cheap Charlie, he no buy me Saigon
Tea,
Saigon tea cost many many P., Uc Da
Loi, he Cheap Charlie.”
(Sung to the tune of This Old Man)
JON: Every serviceman, from Private to General, on
reaching 30 days from before leaving Vietnam and going home, fills in a ‘Short
Time Calendar’, from day numbers thirty to one. It is a line drawing of a nude
girl, divided into thirty sections, and you can guess which part of her anatomy
is number one! We’d only just found out that we had thirteen days to go and
being honorary officers we also had to fill in a calendar, starting from
numbers thirty to thirteen – a left tit!
A
band from
We
had received another directive from Colonel Maxwell at the Aussie Embassy. It
was no longer safe for Australian nationals to remain in
The
next day we received a nasty surprise. A Navy truck arrived with three sets of
double bunks – the Beaumarks’ sleeping arrangements. They took up the whole
lounge room! “Bloody poofters, why can’t they put them somewhere else?” Michael
complained. “Never mind, Muck, we can play some lovely tricks on them when they
get here!” I said gleefully.
We
went out to meet them at the airport that afternoon with Frank and Fred. What a
sorry looking bunch they were, walking oh-so-carefully down the tailgate of the
C123. They introduced themselves. They were John “Killer” Strange (bass), Terry
Wright (lead guitar), Bob Pierse (rhythm guitar and vocals), Basil Green (with
a face to match) on piano and Bob Lepard on drums. Basil seemed very sick and
totally freaked out with the whole situation.
After
some drinks, Frank said, “We better get these guys out to the villa to freshen
up.” Freshen up indeed! In our villa with our maids! Not fair!
“Hey, Fred, You bring their gear and we’ll take them home in cyclos and show
them some sights on the way,” I said with a knowing wink at Fred. Fred caught
on. “Okay Jaarn, meet you at the villa, mite!”
We found a few cyclos and, with horrified looks on their faces, the Beaumarks boarded the dreaded armchairs with rear-attached motorcycle. Screams of fright came from their cyclos, especially Basil’s, as we crossed the city to Seven Dang Dung. On arrival we informed them that, seeing as we had been doing it all the time, it was now their turn to stand guard at night. We showed them how to use the M2 Carbine automatic rifle that somebody had given us for protection. “Be careful to hold it down as you fire because it has a tendency to pull up as you spray bullets,” I said, sounding like a sergeant, “Basil, you can take the first watch.” Basil was petrified.
“Err,
no man, I hate guns. Besides, I’m real sick!” moaned Basil from a lower bunk in
our lounge room. “Okay, Killer, live up to your name. You’re the first
watch,” said Lieutenant Isackson. John ‘Killer’ Strange was a reassuring sight,
as he marched up and down the front porch with the M2 over his shoulder (with
an empty magazine). Mama San made coffee and we mercifully let them go to
sleep, warning them to be careful of the “Vietnamese Killer Bee”! “Can you take
it?” was the name of the game and it was not over yet.
Michael’s
father Tom owned the Amoco service station in Rozelle, back home, and had sent
us some Amoco Banger-Balls to play with. These were plastic ping-pong bats with
a little hard rubber ball attached by a long rubber band. About eleven that
night, while they were all peacefully snoring, we tied the end of the rubber
band to the ceiling fan and turned it on. As the fan got faster, the rubber
band started to make buzzing sounds. Faster still and the rubber ball began to
bounce off the walls. BZZZZ! BZZZZ! PLOP! BZZZZ! PLOP!
Beaumarks
fell out of bed in all directions. “The Bee, the Vietnamese Bee!” screamed
Basil in terror. We turned on the light and showed them what it really was,
while we collapsed on the floor with laughter. They were not amused. It had
been a long day. The maids were also trying to hold back their laughter,
peering through the barred door, which separated their quarters from ours.
“We
were only kidding. No one has to stand guard,” said
“You
guys are sick,” said Basil. “I’d not be the thrower of stones if I were you,
Basil. You’d be looking pretty sick yourself. “Never mind Basil, you’ll get
over it,” said a resolute Bob Pierse. “I think we’ll all turn in now. Promise,
no more tricks,”
The
Beaumarks were doing virtually the same gigs as us, BOQs and BEQs but they also
had some trips up-country scheduled, places like Pleiku, Chu Lai and
“Whirrrrrr! Crash! Grind! ‘Select
first gear on the time machine lad!’
‘Ooh, I don’t like these games,
Captain.’
(Thinks: I could get deaded!).”
-
Apologies
to The Goon Show
DATELINE: DECEMBER 14, 1966: The gang this time was Lucky Starr
(The Fortunate Planet), Terry Scanlon (comedian), Sheryl Blake (aka Black,
Blue, or Black and Blue), Pat Burke (Sheryl’s chaperone) and of course, The
Fabulous Rajahs, the scourge of Asia!
We
boarded the BOAC 707 at Mascot. Things are looking up for the AFOF. No C130s
this time, very nice! As soon as we had reached the top of our climb and the
mandatory gin and tonics were ordered (Gordons of course), lunch was served. We
had just finished this glorious repast when BOOM! One of the port engines
snuffed it. We were roughly over Dubbo, a nice place to be over. Things were
getting a little turbulent. Yes, I was going green again. “It’s queasy being
green!” We banked around to jettison some fuel and head back to
DATELINE: DECEMBER 15, 1966: There was some reported trouble with the brake lights but we
eventually took off and landed safely in
Next
day, it was up the coast by Fokker Friendship. First stop Malacca – very Muslim
indeed! We were shown the sights of this magic countryside in an old
Back
on the Fokker, we found out that this flight was like a little ‘milk run’ –
first in best dressed. Those left standing were thrown off. We managed to get
seats but there was no room on the plane for our gear. It followed on a later
flight. A short stop in
We
were soon on a Silver Kris Airlines Comet to
A night of nightclubs and the opulent bars of the Rama gave way to abject poverty the next night. It was the “Night Train to Ubon”. The train to Ubon was very slow! All the way there, people were walking along beside the tracks, actually keeping up with us.
Fortunately
for us, we didn’t have to grovel amongst the pigs and chooks. There were two
carriages on the back for Europeans. I don’t think Sheryl could have stood the
grovelling. All this was very new to her and she also had a bad case of the ‘
Ubon
was a nice little town, semi-mud-grovelling but with a large
Next morning, Lucky and the Rajahs were bundled into a De Haviland Beaver, which was a small, fairly ancient, high wing monoplane, a “Bird Dog” or spotter plane. It had a big tiger painted on the front. The others were in something that looked like a Cessna. We were wearing parachutes. The pilot was very helpful. “If anything happens, open the door, throw your gear out (our instruments were crammed all around us), jump out, and then pull your D-bar!” “Don’t I have to count to ten?” asked an anxious drummer. “No, just yell ‘Geronimo’!”
The
Beaver took us to a place called Mukdahan, right next to the ever-flowing
Out
on the tarmac of Ubon Airbase stood a USAF Douglas C47, (DC3). Memories of the
JO’K tour came flooding back. It was only a transit stop to
A
Thai Airways Caravelle took us to
It was true. The war had escalated and the curfews were a lot earlier. The US Army now ran special Services and ‘Bozo’ was showering people with US Navy dollars and making paper hats somewhere else.
DECEMBER 25, 1966, Christmas day. VUNG TAU: We were back at the airfield where we’d been mortared on our first tour. One show there and then out to the 2nd Field Ambulance Hospital at Back Beach where we served Xmas dinner to our Diggers and a couple of astonished Viet Cong prisoners, who couldn’t understand why they weren’t being tortured or killed. A barbeque was held later. Well we couldn’t go without a good Aussie ‘barbie’, could we? “How do you like our boozer, boys?” I thought to myself, “Same tin hut as last year!”
BOXING DAY: A Caribou to Nui Dat. The Aussies had moved camp from Bien Hoa. Nui Dat was, basically just a clearing in the middle of a rubber plantation. The Caribou plopped down on the tiny runway and we were transferred to a Landrover. On the way to the encampment, we saw a bunch of Diggers going out on patrol. “Stop! We’ll give these guys a show, so they won’t miss out,” said Lucky. We put on an impromptu show for them right there on the road with just Lucky’s guitar. Some songs and some gags from Terry. Happiness and laughter came to their faces. It was an unforgettable moment.
We played the Nui Dat “Opera House”, a tiny stage, down a hill, in a natural amphitheatre. They loved Sh’Boom! They captured us later for some drinks in someone’s tent. One of the Diggers shoved a bottle of Jamaican rum in my hand. “We did a show for some of the guys on the road on our way in. They were going out on patrol,” I told the rum supplier. “Sorry to tell you this mate but they never made it back. They were nearly all wiped out,” he said. Well, at least we had given them some laughs and some memories of home. God bless ‘em!
Back
at Vung Tau we were treated to a joy ride in an Iroquois gun-ship helicopter. I
found myself in the side seat with the door open and nothing between me and
oblivion but a seat belt. I didn’t care anyway. Out came the camera that the
guys had christened the “clacking pig” because of its pig-like appearance and
the loud clacking noise of the shutter. Clack! Clack! Clack! went the pig.
Back out to the airbase again. Boy, we sure moved around! This time we were herded into two Chinooks, the big double-bladed choppers, for our trip to Chu Lai. The commander here was General Stiles and we played in the Chu Lai Amphitheatre. This was a giant white structure that was supposed to be officially opened by Bob Hope. Bob couldn’t make it on time, so we opened it. There was a huge audience and it was a great show.
Fortune
smiled on us the next day. We were to have lunch with General Walt,
Commander-in-Chief of the US Marines. The General’s launch took us to his villa
at
“It’s
always an advantage to have God on your side when you’re fighting a war,”
whispered
“Pretty lights my ass. Them’s tracers!” said a voice behind me. It seemed that we had attracted some ground fire. After a while, we passed over, apparently unscathed. We landed around dawn at Danang airbase. As we disembarked, the Loadmaster beckoned to us, “Hey you Aussies, come and look at this!” “Oh Lord,” I said, looking at a line of fresh bullet holes across the wing, about four feet from the fuel tanks. “Now that was a close on, boys,” said the pilot. “You can say that again,” muttered the Muckle sullenly glancing over at the rest of us.
DECEMBER 31, 1966: The
As
we boarded a two-engine C1a Navy cargo plane, I noticed the seats were facing
backwards. “That’s to lessen the jolt from landing on the wire,” said a naval
person. The wire? Oh no! Not the wire! When we were out in the Gulf over the
The carrier had its own TV station, so we were taken there first for an interview, so the rest of the 4,500 guys could see what they were getting for New Year’s. They were supposed to be getting Bob Hope. Bob couldn’t make it again. Thanks Bob! He seemed to be following us around.
Next stop was the Admiral’s cabin for lunch. Good, I was starving. We were introduced to Captain Pugh, a dead ringer for Humphrey Bogart in The Caine Mutiny. “Come this way folks, the Admiral’s got a special lunch arranged for you.” After meeting Admiral Richardson, he said, “I thought I would serve you people a real American dish – Chilli Dogs.” Chilli Dogs? My hunger disappeared. They were okay, I guess, if you like crappy old hot dogs with a bit of chilli on them. I was expecting something a little more sumptuous.
We played two
shows in the hangar bay for over 2,000 men at each show, both standing
ovations! A standing ovation from 2,000 sailors is quite an experience, believe
me. Bob Hope couldn’t have done much better. The carrier was gigantic, only
about ten feet shorter than the
This
was all very thrilling for us. Not so for the people of
As
midnight approached, we were invited to the Captain’s cabin to celebrate the New
Year. “This is a dry ship but we do keep a couple of bottles of Bourbon for
medicinal purposes only. I’ll presume that you’re all feeling sick at twelve
o’clock.” We were glad to get to our cabins that night. It had been a long day.
The New Year was also celebrated in our cabin with a guy from the south of the
“Have you guys got a band on board?” asked Muckle.
“
NEW YEAR’S DAY, 1967: After a farewell show, we boarded the C1a Trader again, this time
for the whole 600 miles to Saigon, a long way for a relatively small aircraft
and a long way for a pilot who’d never been there and never landed on land
before. When we got to
JANUARY 3, 1967:
WE GOTTA GET OUT OF THIS PLACE
“The Time Machine grinds to a halt! ‘Whoa! Put the brake on Min!’
‘It doesn’t suit me Henry!’ SCREEEECH!!”
- More apologies to The Goon Show
So
saying, back to
Our replacement
band, The Beaumarks got a bad report from Special Services and were fined,
while we got a citation personally presented by General
Westmoreland, Commander-in-Chief of all the American Forces
in
I felt a little
patriotic thrill go up my spine when I heard these words. No matter what had
been said about the whys and wherefores of the American and Australian
involvement in
These roads
were by no means secure and, by night, were definitely VC territory. Barry
piled the three of us into the only left-hand drive Holden I’d ever seen. He
gave me a .45 automatic and
“What about me?” protested the Muckle. “You’ll just have to rely on intestinal fortitude, Michael. We don’t have any more weapons.” Muckle looked enviously at the heavily armed guitarist and drummer.
We were headed
for a place called Duoc Hoa where the VC had reportedly made a mess of the
village. Barry, being one of the Australian Military Advisors, was making the
trip to see if he could be of help to some of the villagers, now that the VC
had been run out. It all looked very different to
It was arranged to stop for lunch at an ARVN (South Vietnamese Forces) outpost. We were introduced to the Vietnamese Captain in charge. “Ahhh, Uc Da Loi, you come, have lunch. We very busy round here now. Many VC!” At this moment – WHOOSH! BANG! Artillery overhead. “Choy Oi! (Oh God)” exclaimed the Muckle. “Choi Duc Oi! (Oh my God)” exclaimed the Captain, marvelling at Michael’s mastery of Vietnamese.
“No worry. It’s ours!” There was much giggling and staring from a few ARVN ‘grunts’ who had gathered around. No sooner had we started to eat lunch when I heard the loudest BAROOOM! I’d ever heard since Vung Tau. “Jesus, hit the deck Drummer,” I yelled. “No worry, that ours too. See out there. Howitzer. Very loud, eh?” said the Captain, pointing out the window of the mess tent.
After a very loud lunch, we headed off to Duc Hoa. When we arrived, Barry said, “Stay in the car you guys. There may be some booby traps. Safety catches off!” We sat in the car, pistols at the ready! Barry returned in about fifteen minutes and said, “All the serious injuries have been taken care of. We’ll just send them some food and medical supplies.” He then jabbered some Vietnamese to a country policeman (not a ‘White Mouse’, more a ‘Khaki Mouse’). Clack! went the pig. The policeman went for his gun. He stopped when he saw that it was only a camera. “Be careful with that thing,” said Barry, “That even sounded like a gun being cocked to me and these guys are really trigger happy.” I decided to be very careful with the “clacking pig” in future.
We had an
uneventful trip back to Seven Dang Dung. “Thanks, Baz, it was a very
interesting trip,” said
The next day, we went to Jimmy Mohan’s Tailors to pick up the suits he was making for us. He was giving us a special price of $35 but of course, we had to pay him in ‘green’ dollars. These were usually hard to get but as well as picking up our pay in ‘green’, we also managed to relieve the Beaumarks of all their spare US dollars. We told them that they were highly illegal and they would be shot if they were found with them.
There were only
a few more BOQs and BEQs left to play before we went home and one more show for
Bang at the Davis Station Club at
Saturday,
December 18, 1965 was our farewell party at Dang Dung. It was a rip-roaring
event. The villa was packed and so were our bags. We ceremoniously filled in
the last number on our short time calendars in front of Churchy, Andy, Mick,
Rats, Squizzy, Bushy, Lyn Summers, all the guys from Aussie HQ, and the
Beaumarks, who had become our friends even though they couldn’t wait to take
over our villa.
The Landrover,
with a trailer full of our gear, pulled out onto the
I said my final
“goodbye” to the little mud grovelling village, the real
At Butterworth
we took the ferry across to
Coming into
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1965,
************
5,257w