Vietnam Veteran meets his Vietnamese son after 40 years
18 replies, posted
[quote][t]http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/74445000/jpg/_74445659_jerry-and-brandy.jpg[/t]
[I]Jerry and his girlfriend, Brandy, before they were parted[/I]
[t]http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/74445000/jpg/_74445660_jerry-adn-garry.jpg[/t]
[I]Jerry united with his son Gary after 40 years[/I][/quote]
[quote]
[B]Thousands of children were fathered by American servicemen during the Vietnam war. Now in their 60s and 70s, some veterans are desperate to find the sons and daughters they have never known.[/B]A tall, thin American wearing a straw hat wanders through the narrow streets of Ho Chi Minh City, clutching a photo album. At his side is a Vietnamese interpreter and fixer, Hung Phan, who has helped dozens of former American soldiers locate their long-lost children over the last 20 years. His latest client, the American under the straw hat, is Jerry Quinn. He has come to Vietnam to find his son.
"I know we lived at number 40," says Quinn, looking down the street for the house he used to share with his Vietnamese girlfriend. But there is no number 40.
A small crowd gathers. An elderly man, emerging from his house, explains that when the Vietcong entered Saigon in 1975, they didn't stop at changing the name of the city to Ho Chi Minh City - they also changed all the street names, and even the numbers.
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Jerry Quinn is one of two million American soldiers sent to support the South Vietnamese army in the war against the North. During that conflict, it's thought about 100,000 children were born from relationships between local women and American soldiers. Those soldiers are now getting old, and some are guilt-ridden, or just curious to find out what happened to their children.
"But some fathers just don't want to know," says Brian Hjort. Together with Hung Phan, he runs Fathers Founded, a not-for-profit organisation that puts fathers together with their "Amerasian" children. Hjort, a Dane, was just another European backpacker travelling through Vietnam in the 1980s when he came across the Amerasian children. "They were in the street, begging for food and for help," he recalls. "The Vietnamese treated them cruelly - they were the children of the enemy."
Some had photos and knew the names of their fathers. Since the US Government keeps meticulous records of soldiers and veterans, Hjort was soon able to link dozens of children with their fathers - but he was sometimes horrified by the response he received.
"They would yell at me: 'Why are you calling? What do you want? Why are you talking about Vietnam? I don't want to have anything to do with that bastard. He's not my son. She's not my daughter. Stop calling me!'"
But Jerry Quinn, a missionary who lives and works in Taiwan, is anxious to find his son. He says that when he was sent to work in the Far East, he thought it was God's way of telling him to make amends for the past. "I suppose I am here out of guilt," he says. "And to try and do my duty as a father."
In 1973, his Vietnamese girlfriend, Brandy, was pregnant and they were negotiating their way through the bureaucracy required to get married. But at the same time, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger was negotiating a "peace with honour" with the North Vietnamese leaders. The final agreement demanded that US troops leave immediately and Jerry Quinn found himself on a plane home.
"I tried to keep in touch," he says. "I sent her a hundred bucks every month for a year. I never knew whether she got it." Brandy sent him three photos which, 40 years later, he shows to everyone he meets in the streets of Ho Chi Minh City. There are three pictures. A portrait of Brandy, a tall, beautiful Vietnamese girl in her 20s; a picture of her with their baby boy; and a picture of her standing next to a woman in a white coat.
By his third day in the city, Jerry is getting desperate. He and Hung Phan ask for help from the owner of a noodle bar close to the house where Jerry and Brandy once lived together. The owner sits on a stool, turning the pages of the photo album, and when she gets to the picture of Brandy and the woman in the white coat, she stops. "She was the midwife around here," she says. "She now lives in America but they haven't forgotten us and they sometimes come back to visit. In fact her daughter popped in for a bowl of noodles yesterday." Jerry begs the owner to get in touch with the woman, and she obliges.
Kim arrives the next day. An elegant middle-aged woman, she is staying in a smart hotel in the centre of Ho Chi Minh City with her Californian doctor husband. She takes the album, points a perfectly manicured finger at the photo of Brandy and calls out in excitement: "I remember her! We were good friends and I helped deliver your baby."
Kim identifies Brandy's Vietnamese name on the back of one of the photos - Bui. But she can't help Jerry discover his son's first name. When the Vietcong entered the city, she explains, they threatened to kill all those who had had any association with the enemy. "My mother made a huge bonfire and burned everything that might associate us with America." All the carefully kept records of the births were destroyed.[/quote]
[url=http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-27159697]BBC[/url]
Jerry Aged well.
[QUOTE=theevilldeadII;44663756]Jerry Aged well.[/QUOTE]
Jerry's got a kickass mustache too.
Ouch. Gary was abandoned by his mom as she fled for her life. Growing up without your parents must've been hell, especially before he was taken to America and forced to live in the jungle to avoid the witch-hunts.
I can only imagine how many other Vietnamese-American children suffered the same if not worse fate.
[quote] Since the US Government keeps meticulous records of soldiers and veterans, Hjort was soon able to link dozens of children with their fathers - but he was sometimes horrified by the response he received.
"They would yell at me: 'Why are you calling? What do you want? Why are you talking about Vietnam? I don't want to have anything to do with that bastard. He's not my son. She's not my daughter. Stop calling me!'"[/quote]
That's a bit depressing.
10/10
Would flee Saigon again
[QUOTE]Looking on are Jerry's two newly-discovered grandchildren.[/QUOTE]
A son and grandkids, better late than never.
Makes me wonder how much of a problem this will be when we pull out of Afghanistan.
Probably not as much, seeing as it's planned.
[QUOTE=Psychokitten;44664231]Makes me wonder how much of a problem this will be when we pull out of Afghanistan.
Probably not as much, seeing as it's planned.[/QUOTE]
I have a feeling there won't be a ton of Afghan women left pregnant by Americans.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;44664285]I have a feeling there won't be a ton of Afghan women left pregnant by Americans.[/QUOTE]
I haven't heard anything about US soldiers banging the natives but I did see a photo several years ago of 2 US soldiers banging some fine ass Iraqi bitches
My neighbor met his wife in Vietnam and just recently showed me pictures of when they were first together(She was about 17 and he was 30, she was smokin' hot, but there was a very long awkward silence when I asked how old she was in the pictures).
My uncle was one of these veterans, don't think he ever went back to find his child though. It never made much sense to me because when he came back to America he also came out of the closet.
Feels odd knowing I have a half Vietnamese cousin who I've never met, maybe I'll try to track them down one day
[QUOTE=Psychokitten;44664231] when we pull out of Afghanistan.[/QUOTE]
hau uehau haee
[QUOTE=Psychokitten;44664231]Makes me wonder how much of a problem this will be when we pull out of Afghanistan.
Probably not as much, seeing as it's planned.[/QUOTE]
Probably nowhere as many. In part because the US handles it better now then during Vietnam.
[img]http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/74445000/jpg/_74445659_jerry-and-brandy.jpg[/img]
This photo could have been taken yesterday. The Vietnam war ended 40 years ago. It's so recent and yet so long ago.
[QUOTE=lazyguy;44665875][img]http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/74445000/jpg/_74445659_jerry-and-brandy.jpg[/img]
This photo could have been taken yesterday. The Vietnam war ended 40 years ago. It's so recent and yet so long ago.[/QUOTE]
Where's the DEEP rating
