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Please describe your initial posting to Vietnam
I graduated from high school in 1964 and came to Viet-
nam in 1965 as a radio operator in the US Marines. I came
by ship later than other soldiers who had flown. The trip
took 21 days from San Diego to Danang. There were over
2,000 people on the ship. At 19 I had not really picked up a
newspaper and read much so I really had no idea about the
war in Vietnam.
I didn’t think about the war, I didn’t think about what
I was going to do in Vietnam and didn’t think about what I
would see. The trip was a big turning point of my life
.
As a ra-
dio operator, one of our jobs was to clear land mines. One day
we had an accident when we went to a shady area to avoid
the summer heat. There was a mine there.
The man who stepped on it was killed instantly and my
leg was injured. Then I spent the next three months in hospi-
tals in Vietnam and Japan before coming back to the US.
How many photos did you take in Vietnam?
In 10 months in Vietnam, I took some between 500 –
1,000 photos. I took colour photos and sent the film back
home and my parents developed them. In terms of my black
and whites shots, I only have the prints because the negative
were lost when I was wounded.
When did you take photos?
I used to take a film camera with me during my missions
because I only actually worked for 5 minutes every hour. I
usually felt bored and homesick; I was a teenager. The rest
of time I talked to the kids and took photos. It may sound
strange but I felt safe in Vietnam -I did not feel I was in
danger. Sometimes I drove a jeep around and tried to get
into conversation with the kids - many of them were willing
to talk to me
Is there any one child you remember most?
One of the kids I talked to was An. She was 12 years old,
but she was much stronger and smarter than her age might
suggest, just like many other children who grew up in the
middle of that war. It was amazing to me that a girl at 12
could sit and talk to a foreign soldier who had a gun and be
so clear about what she felt.
timeout
38
American photojour-
nalist
Paul Davis
came
to Vietnam for the first
time in 1965 as a radio
operator in the US Ma-
rines. That trip was the
catalyst for change that
resulted in conversion
to Buddhism and a radi-
cally different take on
life. By
Hong Nhung
All
LIFE STYLE
change