Excepting the one hole-in-the-wall Vietnamese restaurant that served Pho soup, there was no entertainment or safe place to eat outside Advisory Team 51's compound in Bac Lieu. Even this restaurant was not safe. The enemy once exploded a bomb in the only hangout for Americans outside the wire. Several team members and Vietnamese were wounded and two were killed in the explosion.
Patty rats are large rodents common to the Mekong Delta's many rice fields and rumored to have been the main ingredient in the restaurant's Pho soup; however, it was wickedly good. As did so many of my friends, I overlooked the rodent ingredient possibility and frequented the Vietnamese restaurant once or twice a week. The Vietnamese bread we ate often had mealy bugs baked into it. I recall Mom throwing away any flour infested with bugs, but the Vietnamese saw no harm in these flour mealy bugs. I began eating the bug-infested Vietnamese bread after finding it a never-ending task to remove the bugs. They never hurt my appetite. I considered them added protein.
Entertainment inside the compound included Enlisted1 and NCO2 Clubs. I could use only the NCO club, and it became routine to eat dinner at the mess hall then drop by the NCO club for beer, popcorn and whatever TV shows the Armed Forces Radio & Television System deemed appropriate viewing. "Combat" with star favorite Vic Morrow was most popular back then. I had my fill of beer, became bored and decided to go to my hooch and write some letters. As I walked past the Enlisted Club, PFC Camp, my "McNamara hundred thousand"3 guard, was just entering the Enlisted Club. He asked me to have a beer with him. I told him I could not drink at the Enlisted Club. He insisted. I caved.
We talked about ways he could get out of the infantry field and reenlist in other less challenging fields. I suggested he try to reenlist as a cook. He kept insisting his aptitude scores were not high enough for anything but infantry. He whined. I listened. The NCO club and the Enlisted Club were the same building separated by a wall. He had heard the NCO club was much nicer. I offered to take him to the NCO club. He agreed.
We walked into the NCO club. It was dark, so no one noticed that he was not an NCO. We grabbed a table close to the TV and I walked up to the bar and ordered two beers. We were enjoying the cold beer, and I was playing my 'big brother' role listening to his whining when the bartender came over and told my 'hundred thousand' friend "Listen, you can't be in here. You have to take your business next door to the Enlisted Club."
"Wait one minute, bud. This man is my guest. I'm allowed to bring guests in here!" I replied.
"Guests are allowed only if they are NCO's," he countered.
"Well, we're not leaving! We are going to stay, and we are going to keep on drinking. Get us another round!" I ordered.
Bartender threatened "Look, both of you will be banned from the club if you don't comply. That's an automatic thirty day ban. You don't want to get banned!" At this point 'hundred thousand' started to leave, and I told him loud enough for bartender to hear, "Sit down, dammit! We're staying."
Bartender did not bring us our beers, so I asked a friend sitting close-by to buy us two beers. He agreed even when bartender threatened him with the dreaded thirty day ban.
Next morning I received word to report to the admin officer. I knew what was coming. The admin officer apologized "Look, Ojeda, there's not much to do around here after hours. The club system is a big part of our lives, but when we do not follow the rules, we pay the consequences. I heard about your incident last night. Do you want to tell me your side of the story and help me understand what happened?"
I had a bad hangover, was in no mood for a dialogue and certainly was not going to apologize. I replied simply "Just do the necessary, captain." He did. I was banned from the NCO club for thirty days. Leaving admin captain's office, I went directly to PFC Camp to help him come up with an acceptable lie in case he got called. I learned that PFC Camp had already been banned. That was to be the longest thirty days of our lives.
Because he was one of "McNamara's Hundred Thousand", I always afforded PFC Camp special consideration. There were two of McNamara's hundred thousand on our Advisory Team. PFC Camp was one of them and was on my guard shift.
PFC Camp and I walked over to the mess hall after our guard shift that next day. Camp was exploring ways we might get the ban lifted and believed a written apology to the club manager and to the admin officer might be a good start. I told him he was stupid if he thought they would ever let us back into the clubs. "Besides," I said, "There is no way, no how that I would ever craft an apology to that buttwipe club manager! I don't have a problem with the admin officer, but what that club managing troll needs is a fragging 4 after dark."
PFC Camp wisely changed the subject back to his wanting to stay in the Army but could not meet the standards to leave the infantry career field. We left the mess hall and were walking back to his hooch with me just listening and empathizing with him. We stopped at the PX, bought a case of beer and went back to his hooch. His hooch mates were on duty, so we lit up a joint while he whined, I listened. At one point we ran out of beer. I went to my hooch and grabbed a bottle of Jim Beam and a bottle of Don the Beachcomber mix. Ran out of mix, so we started mixing with kool-aid packets he had in his hooch. Ran out of Jim Beam well past midnight, but I knew where the PX warehouse manager slept. I woke him up, told him I needed him to open up the warehouse so I could get more Jim Beam. After cursing me out, he got dressed and took me to the PX warehouse. Locating the Jim Beam, I could not find any Don the Beachcomber mix but noticed cases and cases of orange soda. My drinking buddy and I went back to drinking Jim Beam with orange soda till we passed out. Next day the warehouse manager thanked me for the $30 tip I had given him in addition to paying for the merchandise. I had no reply, but I do hope he was joking.
It was at this point that I first started being concerned that I was becoming a hardcore alcoholic, but I kept telling myself there was always a purpose for the drinking. I never drank just for the fun of it. Besides, alcohol dulled the senses making life tolerable. I am certain that many an alcoholic has used that sick logic.
Some seven years after leaving Advisory Team 51, I was stationed in Germany. I was at a PX shoppette in Heidelberg when I ran into Sergeant Camp, my "Hundred Thousand" friend from Advisory Team 51. He was now a sergeant! He had been allowed to leave the infantry career field and reenlist as a cook, so he was thrilled to see me again. "Ojeda, I am so glad I had you to talk to back then," he said. "Life is very different for me now. I am married to my hometown sweetheart. I always talk about you, and I never forget how you got us banned from the club at Bac Lieu. That was a dark period in our lives. And you probably know that we were the only ones ever to get the thirty day ban from the club. We made history. We became legend after you left."
He was on his lunch break and did not have much time to chat. We shook hands. I wished him well, and we parted ways never even asking for his address or phone number for fear he would notice I was almost emotionally moved. It was a great feeling knowing that I had done some good for Camp, and he was able to make the Army the career he always wanted. For the first time in many years, I had felt a trace of emotional presence in my life.
1 Junior enlisted soldiers from Private (E-1) to Specialist Four (E-4).
2 Mid-grade to senior enlisted soldiers from Sergeant (E-5) to Sergeant Major (E-9).
3 A failed program of Johnson's Great Society giving training and opportunity to the uneducated and poor in a program sanctioned by Defense Sectrary Robert McNamara to increase the draft pool. They were actually classified as "New Standards Men". In reality most were underachievers and physically or mentally challenged.
4 A revenge tactic made popular during Vietnam era. Enlisted men would normally throw smoke grenades in NCO/Officer hooches. Actual hand grenades were used for a more serious revenge.
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