Who Shot the Water Buffalo? by Ken Babbs

Author:Ken Babbs [BABBS, KEN]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC019000, FIC032000
ISBN: 9781590208885
Publisher: ABRAMS Books
Published: 2011-11-30T16:00:00+00:00

III

VIETNAM

September, October, November

1962

Da Nang The Mountains

“We came out like Hell’s Angels.”

Shu Fly pie and apple pan dowdy

Oh I never get enough of that wonderful stuff

12. What Lies Ahead

There’s a change in the weather, there’s a change in me … pack my bags … strike the tents … dismantle the portable ice machine … Da Nang looms in the offing … Da Nang … an ominous sound … like the clang of a dissonant gong struck in the hollowed skull of a vulture-picked, fly-cleansed water buffalo…

See me as the duty officer, Doc … sitting in the ready room, the tent billowing in the harsh wind … I’m drinking hot coffee to warm these bowels ere they burst before the long windhowl night ends … morn’s light brings Cochran to relieve me … he picks up the log book … turns to see the Hammer standing at the tent flap … grim-faced … sparks smoldering … he beckons with his finger … outside, in front of the ready room tent, the sign: HMM-188, THE HAMMERING EIGHTS with scarlet claw hammers and eggbeaterprops flying figure eights over a bright golden background … it lies flattened … splintered into plywood shreds … sand covers the remnants … it must be replaced … and replaced posthaste … the Hammer leaves it up to us … every officer knows how to handle these problematicals, Doc … pass them on down the line … Sergeant Soonto, front and center …

Da Nang … an echo like the memory of third-grade frolics … dropping the chalice with a clang … a costumed pageant that Momma cried over and Daddy snored through … we’re going to Da Nang and the soldiers are coming to Soc Trang … and in keeping with the spirit, the winds … the fickle tickle of the Capricorn highs and the sibilant sighs of the tropical lows … the winds will change, too …

The dry season arrives in the Delta. The wet Southwest Monsoon breeze turns into a hot humid wind, bringing steady heat and cloudless skies. Three months of sun, persistent as time, unbearable as fate. Hard-baked rice paddies and sticky skivvy drawers.

In Da Nang, low clouds cover the hills with mist and rain. The Northeast Monsoon, the mountain rainy season, is upon Da Nang. The Army will bring their heat and helicopters to Soc Trang. We will take our machines and wet weather to Da Nang.

But before the change, the Army had to finish a final job in Soc Trang. No canvas-tubbed, chemically cleaned, water purification system for the doggies. Their engineers dug a well, put up a water tower, stood back proudly and announced the changeover could now be made; flush toilets and hot-water showers are ready for use.

Two days before the move we wake up to discover the new aluminun painted water tower defaced with Army-baiting taunts. Across the front, a prankster has painted a Marine Corps globe and anchor. Beneath, in the same black paint, the letters: USMC. The decorators covered the rest of the water tower with taunting phrases: ARMY SUCKS.

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