When I returned to Vietnam after a 30 day leave I saw a new girl at my post. I worked as a cook in a mess hall. Our engineer company did asphalt roads, built bridges an.jpg)
d put in culverts. These men needed good food and would be quick to tell you if the quality was substandard. A young Vietnamese woman working on our post returned some used coffee cups and silverware back to the mess hall. I asked another Vietnamese woman working as a KP in the kitchen who the young girl was. She replied: “That is Mai!” Mai smiled at me at that exact moment and noticed how I smiled right back at her. Mai's “alluring smile” worked and she set the hook really well. I could not get her off of my mind. I only had a little over four months to go in country and I would have become a single civilian living in America again. But each time I saw Mai we would talk too long and it began to be noticed by others in the company where I worked. Finally the officers and other soldiers just gave up trying to get our attention. I was counseled strongly not to inter marry by my company commander. He used every trick in the book trying to dissuade me from taking Mai as my wife. I listened respectfully, but held to my own opinions. I would have to struggle for nearly two years before all our paperwork would get completed. The Honorable Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon, put pressure on my company officers to assist me in whatever ways it would take to get my marriage documents completed. Mai and I married in 1968 and in 1969 we b.jpg)
ecame the parents of our first child, Doug Jr. He became a U.S, citizen when I reported his birth at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, now called Ho Chi Minh City. For Mai and I to accomplish all this, I had to extend my time in Vietnam for four additional tours of duty. I was in Vietnam three years and two months in total. All this happened at the time President Nixon was pulling the troops out of Vietnam. I was a soldier swimming against the U.S. exit strategy, trying as hard as I could to stay in Vietnam. I still had not secured the final paperwork to gain official permission for Mai and little Doug to immigrate to America. As it turned out, I could stay no longer and I had to leave ahead of my family. That was extremely difficult for me. I had done everything I could think of but I could not get the final permission for them to go with me. I had to let go of the reigns for a while. The photo on the left shows Mai and I in Saigon, Vietnam (now Ho Chi Minh City) as we tried to finish her paper work to imigrated to the U.S.
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d put in culverts. These men needed good food and would be quick to tell you if the quality was substandard. A young Vietnamese woman working on our post returned some used coffee cups and silverware back to the mess hall. I asked another Vietnamese woman working as a KP in the kitchen who the young girl was. She replied: “That is Mai!” Mai smiled at me at that exact moment and noticed how I smiled right back at her. Mai's “alluring smile” worked and she set the hook really well. I could not get her off of my mind. I only had a little over four months to go in country and I would have become a single civilian living in America again. But each time I saw Mai we would talk too long and it began to be noticed by others in the company where I worked. Finally the officers and other soldiers just gave up trying to get our attention. I was counseled strongly not to inter marry by my company commander. He used every trick in the book trying to dissuade me from taking Mai as my wife. I listened respectfully, but held to my own opinions. I would have to struggle for nearly two years before all our paperwork would get completed. The Honorable Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon, put pressure on my company officers to assist me in whatever ways it would take to get my marriage documents completed. Mai and I married in 1968 and in 1969 we b.jpg)
ecame the parents of our first child, Doug Jr. He became a U.S, citizen when I reported his birth at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, now called Ho Chi Minh City. For Mai and I to accomplish all this, I had to extend my time in Vietnam for four additional tours of duty. I was in Vietnam three years and two months in total. All this happened at the time President Nixon was pulling the troops out of Vietnam. I was a soldier swimming against the U.S. exit strategy, trying as hard as I could to stay in Vietnam. I still had not secured the final paperwork to gain official permission for Mai and little Doug to immigrate to America. As it turned out, I could stay no longer and I had to leave ahead of my family. That was extremely difficult for me. I had done everything I could think of but I could not get the final permission for them to go with me. I had to let go of the reigns for a while. The photo on the left shows Mai and I in Saigon, Vietnam (now Ho Chi Minh City) as we tried to finish her paper work to imigrated to the U.S.
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