It was 29 years since I've been back.
1965 6631 years.
Long time.
Yeah, there's a lot in my head, a lot,
a lot.
This can be quite
a,
quite a trip.
Hi,
how
you doing?
This group of disabled and able bodied Americans?
Many of them, Vietnam veterans are here to form a team with the Vietnamese
together.
They will undertake a challenging 1200 mile,
16 day bicycle journey from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City
right
now.
They're
leaving
a chair up there, making,
making Charlie boy here. Wait,
the team is being assembled by world team sports whose mission is to demonstrate
what people with different abilities and backgrounds
can accomplish by working together through sports.
The Vietnamese team members who will join the Americans
on the trip have been training for weeks.
Like the Americans,
many of them are disabled and some are also veterans of the Vietnam American war.
How's it turn, turn good.
The advanced staff has introduced the Vietnamese,
some of whom are world class wheelchair racers
to hand cycles.
That works.
Oh, Dan, start.
Hey, Dan,
if you look around, you can see if you just look in
people's
eyes, you can
tell.
Yes,
thank you.
Thank
you.
Kill another kid that way.
Come with me.
We chased the guy into a village.
The little girl came out carrying hand grenades.
I
killed her.
How fucked up? Things are good
here.
Welcome to Vietnam.
It's funny.
Funny. Right in
this
country, I'm looking at the flags and seeing the,
the gold star on the flags.
That was our enemy at the time.
Hey,
ma
slide open your window and take a smell.
Reality check.
All
power.
Let's see
if they
are.
You, you have a
right?
The whole team meets for the first time.
This is the largest and most disparate group
that world team has ever brought together.
They are separated, not only by abilities but also by age culture
and the memories of a bitter war.
Our parents
in the,
during the war. Your father.
Yeah. No, no.
Live here in Hanoi.
Looking
forward to having you come along with us. We'll, we'll be good friends.
Ah,
my name is Chen
Ban.
I'm 49 years old.
My name is Chen Ki. I will surpass
all of the distance from here to Ho Chi Minh City.
Mnf.
I,
well,
I hope along the way down
when we were riding together
we have many beautiful
and significant memories about one another.
And after the trip, we always remember to each other
people
that
after dinner,
team member, Tran Van
son invites us to his home in Hanoi.
This is my wife. I'm pleased to introduce her.
This is my eldest daughter
and these are my twin daughters,
the twin on the left
who was on the school chess team.
And on Sundays, the nephews usually come over to the house to play.
I entered the war in 1967
against the Americans.
Um
and in 1972
I was injure
and here you can see the results of my injury.
I was injured in both legs. Fortunately, I was able to keep my left leg.
However, it was also severely injured.
The United States air force bombed my house and
of my family members, seven people were killed
but I
took the
head line up
by
where
one.
Right.
Yeah,
you're good. You're good.
You're clear.
We're crazy.
The team has two days in Hanoi to get used to their bikes
and to begin the medical and educational outreach that is part of their mission.
Today. The team visits bak
my
hospital which was hit by American bombs during the war.
There are many of us here who remember and there are many others who have learned
about the terrible events that occurred here 25 years ago,
many people were killed
and this hospital was bombed. So today with the honor
those who died during the US Christmas bombing campaign of 1972
in 1972
Bob Connors was an air force weapons mechanic.
The bombs that were dropped on. That hospital could have been touched by me.
Of course, being on the ground and loading the bombs, the B 50 twos take off.
You've done your job. You kissed the bombs goodbye.
That didn't hit home until we went to b
my
hospital.
It was like a shot in my heart. I was the guiltiest guy in the world when that happened.
I wanted to go up to every
person in the hospital and apologize.
I
was sorry that I did that.
If we are going to complete
the Vietnam challenge 1200 miles of road. That is the road to reconciliation.
Let us begin at Bach
Ma.
It is our pleasure
to present this check for $200,000 for the creation
of our orthotics unit of world class standards here at
Bak Hospital.
It's 200,000
because it's so big.
So, I don't know.
Yeah.
Oh,
yes.
Could you take a picture?
Absolutely. I'd be delighted.
Yeah.
Oh,
lose
some of the Americans visit a prestigious girls school in Hanoi.
Think of the development of Vietnam society today before
you come in Vietnam. What do you think? What do you hear about Vietnam? Are
you
with
our four Vietnamese?
Uh
You were in Vietnam 30 years ago.
What was the, the most unforgettable memories of yours about Vietnam?
Um
The most
regrettable
experience I had
was
having deployed a rifle
that another young boy
and knowing that if I didn't kill him.
He was going to kill me.
I pulled the trigger on my rifle
and
I've had to live with the guilt
of killing other young boys whom I didn't even know.
And
that's,
I believe, been the pain of most Americans
for the last 30 years
is we were asked to come over here
to fight for freedom.
And once we got over here, we realized freedom had nothing to do with it.
You
know,
we are
and
I'm
always,
oh,
may I help
you
a
present for you?
I think you
just
to steer you.
You steer back and forth
and remember where the brake is?
Ok?
And just sort of pedal.
There you go.
East meets West and a hand. So
you giving
me so much? Oh, honey.
Oh,
honey. No, you've given
me so
much.
You
with
me.
You,
oh,
no, no, please
don't.
I
don't
regret.
I,
hey, brothers,
are we rocking and rolling
early morning just before the start of the ride,
the American veterans feel the need to meet by
themselves away from the rest of the group.
As long as everybody understands where we're coming from because we are a team.
We are a team and, and we're greater united than divided and we are a team.
But on the other hand, we also were veterans and veterans issues are different.
The Vietnamese government has invited the whole team to lay a
wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier in Hanoi.
But the vets worried about political misinterpretation,
want it limited to soldiers, honoring soldiers.
I want to
clarify
one thing though,
this will be veteran to veteran and the world
team staff won't be up to standing with us.
Right. That's what I understand. It's
ok. It's
never a game with one generation of veterans. Turn it back on another
one of the generals in that Vietnam war with us made a couple of statements,
quote, quote, unquote,
we will not send any army unless the country back us,
commit the country before you commit the troops.
One thing to say, everybody, welcome home, brothers and sisters.
I
miss
you. I
miss time
somewhere
right
back.
So.
Mhm
It's incredible.
If anybody were to light a match here, it just blow up the whole place.
The energy is incredible.
It seems like half of Hanoi
is here to send us off and uh the people are excited. Everybody is so motivated.
Everybody's waving at us. It's just an incredible feeling.
This is, this is truly exciting. This is
like
a
during the war these people are doing for us now
on.
Yeah,
I
come
to
thanks.
Oh,
I gotta fly.
Huh?
Two miles into the ride, huh?
Darryl Kubek 24 years old is the youngest veteran on the team.
After serving in the Gulf War.
He was paralyzed in an accident at a stateside military base.
Among those who have come to Darryl's aid
is World Team Sports Board member Greg LeMond.
Three time winner of the Tour de France.
It's
very
interesting to have a man like Greg
LeMond pick you up off your hand cycle
when you've
had
a
is happening.
This
just a floor,
right?
We're gonna
catch up.
So
Chin
Tao.
Oh to
do
Chin
Chow. That's ok.
Chin
Chow
Hanoi. Come on, baby.
That's what we don't do.
He's OK. He's OK.
Those are the things that balance.
Yeah. see
balance. So when you, when you reach like this lean this way,
how are you?
Although new to hand cycles,
Chong Kong
Hung 32 is a professional athlete who has competed
in international wheelchair races in China and Japan.
He was injured as a teenager in a handgun accident.
Artie Guerrero, 54 is a national union leader and disabled rights activist.
His severe wounds in the war led to
the multiple sclerosis that put him in a wheelchair
leaving Hanoi behind the group continues down route one, Vietnam's main highway.
Their trip will take them through 19 provinces
and most of the country's major cities,
rivers and mountain passes.
This ride is the first official sporting event involving
American and Vietnamese veterans on the same team.
It includes 45 Americans, 20 Vietnamese support staff and coaches.
I got my first camera when I was in Vietnam.
No, I took hundreds and hundreds of slides but I threw them all away
when I came back.
Now, I wish I had them.
Dan Jensen is a professional photographer and triathlete
in 1968 he lost his leg to a land mine.
First couple of days I was freaking, I
had a panic attack. I've never had one of those. I guess that's what Dean called it.
I mean, pure paralysis. I, I was just,
the overload was just too much. I couldn't handle it.
I thought I was going to have to go home. Dean and I uh,
that was our first initial contact and he was wonderful.
Dean mckee is on the trip to help some of
the vets deal with their PTSD post traumatic stress disorder.
The last time we were here,
we were so stressed.
We're always constantly on guard
and now
there's no stress level at all
and we can enjoy it. Finally, it's great. It really is great.
I've looked into the face of innocence and I've found Vietnam just unbelievable.
Unbelievable.
Oh,
it's really unreal.
They can't believe they're here.
They can't believe they're on a bicycle.
They can't believe they're in Vietnam.
I
wish the air was a little cleaner.
A lot of dirt,
a
lot of exhaust fumes,
but it could be worse.
Somebody could be shooting.
Yeah.
Right.
The hotel is missing three room keys.
If anybody accidentally has their room key and has not returned it.
Can you check your fanny pack or your backpack, please?
You should all know that our destination this evening
was a site of much bombing during the Vietnam War,
there were over 100 American missions flown over to.
So there are very likely to be
residual emotions that are not too positive towards. Uh we folks,
we are doing our best to overcome what was done in the past, but
we may be met with some negativity
along the
way.
Uh Someone hasn't returned the keys,
the room keys, please.
So make sure that you return the room keys to the hotel.
That
uh excuse me, what do I have do
that?
We
see
the
and
please
return the keys to the hotel.
Otherwise the amount of
$50 will be charged.
Yeah.
Bad money.
Oh,
1970.
You
are.
They got a lot of construction material along.
Ed and Eric Wine
Mayer
are on one of three tandem bikes.
Eric, like the other back seaters is blind.
A high school history teacher.
He convinced his dad, a Vietnam vet to join him on the ride,
pottery, bike shop, magazine place, clothes,
sodas,
oriental chairs.
This is a mall.
Oh, even uh
I sold a Chicago Bulls sweatshirt.
They seem to, ah, rotate the rice.
You know,
you'll see one field that germinating and has all
the water and another one they're cultivating and then
they're harvesting.
I
let
me.
So
I,
I
happened,
there's actually steps coming down into this little pond over here.
It's over to our left
and it's full of leaves and lilies.
Usually you see them full of algae. And stuff and this one is full of,
uh,
I don't know what they're called.
You probably would remember them.
Looks like Wayne is, is giving something to the,
uh,
little shrine here.
We think that by nature, the Vietnamese people
are tolerant and forgiving people
still. I, I forgot memory of when Hanoi
was destroyed by us planes. The B 50 twos.
How,
but
I
think we're not
house.
Can I show you one other thing?
Um This,
yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Amen.
Yes.
Yeah.
I used to wonder
what part of that hill that we gonna get hit on, you know?
And I used to think, man, I wonder if it's going to be that first step and the next day,
but one of those little steps,
I'm gonna get hit, man.
II, I always wondered where and,
and I always try to progress and go to the next step for that and,
and hoping it didn't happen, man.
But not knowing that not knowing God, that was a killer, man. That was a killer.
I used to hate them.
I used to wonder, you know, if it's only from here to there, you know? But she go,
maybe you're not gonna make it to the other side of that damn hill.
Have to
memories, man. Yeah.
I guess we better,
let's hit the road for
it.
I'll make you my therapist
later in the day. George Brummell
leaves the group to visit the Association for the blind in the village of
the
Veteran
for about 30% of the
people here.
Is it clear to him that I work for the Blind Veterans Association
in Washington DC.
He want to offer you some traditional
massage
you want?
Uh,
I don't have to take my clothes off.
Feel good.
He has rhythm too,
would you ask him? Huh. He lost his eyesight.
Uh,
uh, I was blinded near
Kuchi in 66 by a mind explosion.
And now because of the bombing, he lost his eyesight.
Whoever would have thought that he would be here giving me a Messiah?
You're getting the
$5 treatment.
Never, never,
never,
never.
What
is
that?
You
and I gave her a pen. I'll put your son
to remember the women,
the Vietnam women's memorial
in USA
in Washington DC.
Thank you.
Here we go. Here we go. All right.
Huh? Look at, look at, see,
those are mine.
Those are my kids. They just like you
just like you.
Hey,
these are my Children.
Thank you.
God
bless you.
Goodbye to my new friends.
I
think that what I've got going is that I came here 30 years ago
and I filled up my,
my cup with hatred and pain and so forth
and it started to overflow.
But now that I'm pushing it in with happiness,
that hatred and pain is coming out
and it's getting filled up with happiness, brother
as the team nears the town of than
at the end of the day, they are met by a cycling team of seniors.
You know, where else could we get an escort of
the officials of the village that we once bombed?
Welcoming us.
Thank
you too.
Thank you. Goodbye.
We were selected
to be members of this team
because we were veterans
of the Vietnam war.
But
we now think of ourselves as friends of the Vietnamese people.
No.
Bye,
Vietnam. Your home.
That's my home.
That's my home, my home.
Bye bye.
I don't know,
six,
the
first team meeting on the road.
And
you'd like
to
share.
I noticed that there were two or three veterans today that took their
moments.
What you're seeing now is the type of terrain that a lot of American soldiers
would actually experience. You'd see the long
rice paddies out there with the people working.
Imagine what American soldiers were going through
because they would walk across and they
would know that there were hundreds or maybe thousands of the Viet Cong were
in the mountains looking at us and waiting for us to just open up on a, on a firefight.
So picture it,
picture a bunch of 19 or 20 year old guys
enough.
I'd like to meet the person who threw the hand grenade at me
like to shake the hand.
Um
because he,
he closed one door and opened up a lot more,
but we're here to heal and heal,
heal the veterans. And
so it is a healing
oh
12
is going to be hell
yes.
Oh, fuck
you love her.
Uh
oh
shit. Just shut up my stuff.
Bring a real sense of marrying. Now
when we go tomorrow and we start to ride the rest of the way.
There's a few of us that have some real sensitive places
and we need you.
The smells and sounds are going to be more familiar
and so if we could all share our ptsd can be brought out.
I
got
you.
Ok.
I,
in Vietnam it rained harder than any place that I have been in the world.
Sleeping in the rain and the
mud, uh, digging foxholes, uh,
rained real hard for
hour or two and then
you'd dry out with the hot sun
and then you'd be just as wet with the sweat.
It was miserable. The big red ants just swarming all over trees. I mean, there's
millions of ants. They were climbing all over me when I, when I got injured, ah,
I remember my buddies, ah, saying,
take those red ants off of them, you know? But
I was numb.
So, have you guys seen any of the red ass around here?
I,
on this bridge, please keep it tight. Or
I'm not sure if it's the weather
or
because we're going south or because of the terrain,
but suddenly I'm not feeling very good,
getting a little emotional.
I think it's fear, bro.
I don't know what it is. We're gonna work on it.
It's not gonna get us down.
I was thinking of how to get home.
I was trying to figure out how do I get my ass out of here and go home?
But I don't wanna do that.
It's, it's coming back.
Villagers are getting smaller,
starting to see trails off the villages
and trying to explain to people what it's like to reach down the rice patty and
fill your helmet with water
and drink that water
with animal waste.
You have a waste. Yeah.
How can you do that?
I was thirsty.
There's no other water around.
Thank you.
Can't we look out the fucking window anymore, man? I swear to
God.
But goddamn don't make me fucking cry.
I don't make you cry, brother, your heart makes you cry,
your memories, make you cry.
The insides make you cry.
You know
this is our Vietnam war.
How come it's so fresh? How come it seems like years
I go by, I see the scenery. I don't see the scenery.
I
see them. The same young men and women just
you know
who
go, who come back. Some of the motherfuckers are still there
for the hand man.
When is it gonna end though?
I think I wanna go home.
Yeah.
When you sell it
here
eyebrow
and I want you people
to take and realize
some of the fear that we have and, and, and
all that innocence isn't innocence to us.
I mean,
I was really irritated myself the other day for crying
and I'm doing my damn just not to do it anymore because I
don't want to be a goddamn white son of a bitch anymore.
And
it's hell. But
I don't know if I'm gonna be the stupid asshole to make a fool out of myself or what.
I just
want you to know to see.
We want
to be here for you.
But
that's
it like,
right. So it's,
it's getting real.
We
understand that we have been very well.
Just
wait
any longer.
He's,
he's having a difficult time
getting.
He was a pa,
no,
he was a marine. He was on the ground.
I think the, ah, countryside is just triggering
his emotions.
And I thank you for having patience with us.
That child.
How old are you?
Me,
I was born in 1963. So, nearly 35 years old. So you were here? You were,
you were
during the
war?
I was 10 or 12 years old
and I
myself very young, but
I have to leave Hanoi
30 kilometers
far away from Hanoi in order to avoid the bomber.
So, every night I can see,
you can see,
I can see how warm and how the, uh,
from Hanoi.
That would be terrible.
It's terrible.
It's
terrible.
It's
terrible.
We,
we always fight.
We
see, because he feels comfortable
to lay on me.
That makes me feel good.
That's what it's like
seeing the transfers going.
Ok.
In January of 1994
I decided to end my life.
And uh
thanks to God, I'm here today
to share what I, what I'm sharing with, with his new family that I found
yesterday at the breakfast table,
I was sitting with three blind men
and I came to realize that the one that couldn't see
was me.
So my message to you today
and if we feel confused, simply look up to the heavens
and he will guide us all.
Doc gave me some ammonium pills this morning or something.
Thank you, Kath.
Are those launches there or are those
are those with lunches
who's directly behind you?
You go on the other side of this
bus,
6
ft.
Could you move closer so that we
have
of
the
people.
It's a frag grenades
to work too hand grenade,
American made
and who could detonate
if you were disturbed?
There are some mortar rounds and there are some bombs over there
right in their front yard.
All
right,
thanks. Ready
go.
Ok.
You've been covered
just like you were.
The team approaches the 17th parallel site of the former DMZ
from 1954 to 1975.
This was the border that divided the country into North and South Vietnam.
A monument to the reunification of Vietnam now marks the site
I'm not gonna go vegan because
I'm not in, not just
not in.
Yeah.
Word of paradise.
Tran van
so
was stationed here near the former DMZ for a year during the war.
The guy
you
talking about,
wait,
just hold today. If I
didn't know
which I'm
not.
We wore the same clothes day after day
until the damn things fell off.
Uh
The
adrenaline that flew,
drove,
put it through the body when we had a firefight.
That was life.
Everything else just walking through. I don't know, I
never felt so much alive as
I was scared to death.
Bob Marris is another vet who in reaching the
former DMZ is forced to revisit his ghosts.
If you don't get it out,
it's going to be like a cancer to just eat away at you and eat away.
That's what it did to me. When I, when I tried to off myself, I took a
gerger and put it in my mouth in the trigger, squeezed it and the bull jammed.
Second one was a drug overdose that prescription drugs from
the va I just popped the whole bottle of pills.
Woke up a couple of days later in the hospital with all kinds of tubes in me. And
I think it was just God's way of saying, hey, I'm not ready for you yet.
I started to think that I can't leave this world with
my kids and have them knowing that their father committed suicide that
I want to leave, knowing that I did something I left a legacy for them to follow.
They just get out. It's just
a shame.
I want you guys to take close,
close up shots of the water buffalo on either side of the bridge.
And if you look very closely, you will see that the ones on this side,
the northern side are communist
and the ones on the other side are capitalist.
And that's why we were fighting that war.
Well, I wasn't gonna ride this afternoon. I'm feeling a little weak but
there's some significance about this. So I,
I've got to go, I gotta ride across the bridge the 17th parallel, the DMZ.
I want to go back on the side that I was on when I was here the last time.
Good speech this morning, Jose,
which is the question of being a pathfinder, finding the
path to travel for the rest of the guys to come down and make sure it's clear
that's what we gotta do to get a message out to us.
So the guys don't want to do what we try to do and succeeding.
Gotta make sure that there are no more attempts,
love you.
That's why it's
really love you.
And
OK,
no,
some of the American vets feel the need to meet again. Apart from the group,
your particular trauma and your particular experience is no more,
less valid than mine or anybody else
who sat in a fighting hole
and saw horrible trauma.
But I'm a little concerned about the mea
culpa
aspect that I see coming into this process.
I have no shame
and I have no guilt
about what the United States did in Vietnam.
I, I know who I am and I know how I feel
and uh
I can't kick that under the rug.
What troubled me was the way we treated
pows.
What troubled me was the was the way we treated their dead.
We, we, we shot a kid who stumbled in over the perimeter
and he was dead.
He was, and,
and they dragged him around all fucking day and threw him
over the top of a Jeep and took pictures of him.
I said, you got to bury him.
He's dead.
That's all I can say. Now,
I just don't want to feel that uh
you know, that, that great service and that great honor that I had to serve my country
is sullied in any way I
just ever
sully
your service or anybody else's because I know what guys went through.
You know, the first week I was there,
uh
We lost a half a dozen guys and I had to take them to, to Tan
San
and, and watch the, the metal boxes be flown out.
So
you don't have to worry about me.
Well, my judgment is that we fought the Vietnam War once.
We don't need to fight it again. Sure, we have different perspectives and so on.
But for Christ's sake, I do think we can move along
you know, maybe by looking at Vietnam's present and its future,
we can focus better on our presents,
our futures as well.
I was a grunt and, ah,
I was scared
and
when I stepped on a land mine,
um,
I was glad
I'm out of here,
you know, because I'll tell you, I was scared. I, I was in a few experiences and I
see, I didn't, I was thinking about shooting myself because I was so scared
when I came back from the war,
I had nothing to do with veterans and I never have.
And so I'm here and it's like
first time in my life,
I have fellow
veterans.
I mean, I feel like a veteran for so long. I didn't feel like a veteran. I was there.
I was shooting my weapon. I lived in hell. People were dying around me but
I wasn't there.
Yeah,
I um,
oh,
I stayed, I stayed a full year, um, wounded twice.
The thing about being a medic is, um
you become alienated
in a combat zone
when it comes time for the battle with rifles. Everybody participates
when it comes time to the battle with life and death,
you're alone.
Everybody walks away. They may drag the wounded Betty,
but they leave you alone to work.
Uh wrapping up people like,
like Dan Dwayne and
Ponchos um
and trying to send them back. Uh They weren't
ready for the plastic bag
but real close.
It was terrible. For a young boy with 10 weeks of training
and a kit
and 19 years of age,
it was terrible and you make the decision, which I can empathize with Jose
and triaging.
Basically, what you're doing is making the decision who lives and who dies and
do
initially really well at it. Um
because I
couldn't decide who was supposed to live and who would die.
So I
was trying to resuscitate
someone that
I don't, I, I mean, I've lost track but I just remember that
his brains fell out of my head hurt in my hands.
On the very first day I got home. I was a liar.
Where were you? I was in Germany. What did you do? Nothing.
That's what it was for five years. It was total denial.
My family asked me, how are you, how you feel? I was fine and dandy
did I have nightmares? Hell, no, I don't have any of those things.
I've kept so many emotions in
and,
you know, I'm, I'm seeing people that,
uh,
that are strong people
letting their feelings out
and,
you know, that,
that's something that I'm thinking about because I really haven't done that.
Uh, you know, before I came, came here.
I'm just confused as hell. No, I didn't think I had any problems. I really didn't.
It's just
you guys make a big deal because I'm a double edged amputee.
Uh,
the thing that upsets me the most,
it's not my legs. It's going bald.
I've never
taken part in anything like this before in my life.
Ah, I thought it was a crack of shit.
I'm just a white guy with black legs who rides a bike.
He's another suspicion of line.
You're sitting there lying through your teeth,
you know? II, I don't know.
I don't know when your facade is gonna go away, brother. But
you know, this, this,
this big face in the front and all this crap
today,
you know, the emotions that have come out.
Have you ever done that before? No, I don't believe you have.
Um,
it just
one part of me says I'm proud and at the time it says I'm ashamed
and you can be boss,
sorry, you can do both.
You know,
like
maybe it's the place or whatever. But
I actually,
it's like, I imagine machine gun
fire.
I keep starting to think about my experiences
and they don't flow as easily as I thought that they would.
And I think it's because of my role and I think it's because
I needed
my role and my job is my responsibilities to,
to help support other
phone.
You know, just, just little bits of history stick and strange crania in my mind
down in the South, we'd say
we're hooking them faster than we can string them.
I understand that
Vietnam is
a,
it's affected me and I guess I'm the,
I'm the second generation of, of veterans that
were too young to experience the war directly.
And at the same time, you know, I, I can't escape it. I take the war on and off every day.
You know, I go to bed, I take my leg off and that's,
that was the, the war for me. I guess
a lot of Children of Vietnam vets were born with congenital birth defects.
I honestly believe that my dad's involvement in the Vietnam war
and his exposure to agent orange caused my birth defect.
He probably
tries not to remember the war.
I mean, he's,
he's told me that Vietnam is all put away and he's not ready to bring it out
and yet every time he probably sees me in a pair of shorts, you know, he,
how can he not
cross his mind?
It tastes a lot better than it smells. Yeah.
Mhm.
Yeah.
I think in their culture it's even more important than ours that,
you know, where your, your ancestors lie.
What is the significance of cutting it off here?
Just leaving another piece of me behind? Except just time in
peace time instead of warm. I left a piece of my body here.
You get a picture of the one leg. You guys,
you want to kick your leg
out,
Dan and dry are joined by the cemetery's care taker.
Yeah.
He lost his leg in the war fighting for the South.
Well, you did the marathon twice in 9697.
Well, maybe 98. I'll do it with
you.
I'll run with you.
Maybe you get your new leg then or something.
You run with this leg. 2nd,
15 100 m in 15 seconds.
102nd.
Excellent,
excellent.
Faster than I can run it.
Oh, he wants to run.
Here
we go.
Here. He's an amputee. He's my age
and I mean, we were enemies.
We just kind of connected out of all the people that were there.
We just kind of connected.
Francis Loeb tries to connect by returning to the village where he
was wounded and where he later served as a civil affairs officer,
he visits a school, he helped build here, students
in the United States made booklets to describe what
it's like to live in the United States.
We have some supplies so that your students can make the books themselves.
No,
Francis has also brought photos in the hope of finding people he knew during the war.
That's him.
So, very nice to see you again.
Nice to see you again.
They
are not,
I don't know
right now. We don't know
his grandma.
Oh, yes.
Yeah, exactly.
The same. Huh?
Very good.
You weren't supposed to stay on the roads
because that's where the mines were.
So, you'd have to spend a lot of time crossing the patties and if you had equipment,
ah, you'd be almost to the point where you get stuck.
The mud was just part of being here,
this is, it,
you can smell it
off to my knees.
Yeah. Ok.
The smell is what, uh,
what brought it back? Really? You
saw the sultry
sultry
smell? Ah,
come on, come on.
Yeah,
it's just part of the trip that I've been wanting to do just so I could get a,
get a sense of what it, what it was like when I was here 30 years ago
I can do that.
The team is looking forward to their arrival in way
where they'll have their first day off since leaving Hanoi
$1 for it. Ok.
It's a street like so many streets.
They're big French style buildings on our left and right.
It's really pretty nice.
It would be really interesting if you could franchise
this kind of business back in the United States.
I think it would go over big.
See, that's interesting.
That
takes
me back to my days on the farm in Kansas.
Ok.
Come
here.
Yeah.
Today, the team will face the most physical test so far. The high van pass
to reach the summit, they must climb 3000 ft in six miles.
This is going to be a challenge.
See, that mountain, that mountain looks as
dangerous as it was
going up right there.
Now,
there's gonna be some, um,
some slow hand cyclists and hopefully we can get them up there, but
I don't know.
Watch out.
Well,
the Vietnamese officials felt the pass was too dangerous to ride,
but the team fought them on this and at the last minute, the officials relented.
I,
in
case we get ready, baby
stable,
all
ready for the hills. Let's go
in the hand cycle. You have such a small muscle mass. So you collect lactic acid
at a much greater rate and so you have to pace yourself and there's
a, you have to train really,
really
uh with discipline to get that accomplished.
We have not yet quite reached
the dreaded high van pass.
It will be about five times the length of any of our previous climbs. It's steep
and there are numerous switchbacks.
There are some pull outs on the way up.
We will have our vans with water stopping at those pullouts.
Please keep the stops as brief as you can.
We are climbing this at the hottest part of the day.
You should be getting your water bottle all the time and dousing yourself,
drinking a lot of water all the way up.
Here's the real Vietnam challenge for
you.
Here it is.
So we'll meet it like we met the last one.
Head on.
Spirits are high as the team begins the ascent.
But soon after entering the first series of switchbacks,
it's already apparent. The hand cyclists are struggling
you
what
he doesn't want to climb on my back.
Holy mother guy,
a handle
a third of the way to the summit dehydration becomes a serious concern.
The temperature is close to 100 degrees
but
Pham Min
Kwan like most of the Vietnamese cyclists will not drink along the way.
Alright, thank you.
They don't think they think water is bad
exercise.
Uh
No, no good
seven
chicken
you've got
I
wanna get underneath that waterfall right there.
That's what I want.
I don't care if I have to cross at the top,
I'm gonna make the top.
I'm going
after a tough two hour climb. The fastest cyclists reach the,
that's it up there and we see it, we see it man
up.
You picked the old Manhattan? Did you
head and sucker.
I'll tell you what's getting me is these goddamn bunkers?
Oh, it is because someone's pushing, somebody's pushing now.
30.
We
congratulations.
Oh,
I think this is the highlight. Jeez,
I really, really feel good about it,
but I also feel good that we all got here and in some respects, even the people,
even the people in, even we all made it across the past
Mr
Z.
The police captain came up and said,
I now know because I've seen happiness in your face and why this was so
important.
Looking down
into.
Dang.
It really excites me because that's where I was. And now we're going down in there
just
good morning Vietnam.
I can hear the ocean. The ocean is blowing over.
The lifeguard is waving Diane and Nayed in.
She's a lady that swam from Florida to Cuba.
Wow, they're magnificent.
So this is China Beach. Huh? This is the famous China Beach.
Unfortunately, about 10 years from now, it'll be all overrun with.
That's
right.
Resorts and condos, but it sure is special to be here. Now. It is.
Yeah, it is.
Take a summer China beach back with me.
Later that evening, the team broke into small groups for discussion,
assisted by translators.
He went into the army
um when he was a young man because his country asked him to
and
he was wounded, he was a warrior. And so he could handle losing
his leg.
He understands that in war things are bad and warriors lose their lives.
But it's even harder when it happens to families and mothers
and you still have the effects of war
in your homeland. So far afterwards,
when I was in Vietnam
30 years ago, as a young army nurse, I was afraid, I was afraid of you.
I was afraid of these people,
the fears that
were well founded because we were
in a war zone.
And I had a lot of fears of coming back to Vietnam.
There was a lot of mistrust. We didn't trust the Vietnamese.
When we were here, we didn't trust our government. We didn't trust our superiors.
We went home to America and,
and um people there we thought we could trust,
betrayed us.
The reason we've had so many problems as veterans
is because we feel
we did something very,
very bad
here in Vietnam.
But we did what our government asked us to do.
No, no.
Go
on, go
on.
This group is clicking,
really pulled together very well in a very short time.
Makes you wonder why
the
PM? Mmm.
Mh.
And,
and with him.
Hello.
Right.
Um,
we can speed up a little.
Oh,
wow.
Start
for
I landed.
Ok. I mean, I, I didn't do too much
Eric. I think he got a little worse but, I mean,
I was waiting for a bike to run over me. I couldn't
feel it.
All I know is that
we hit and then we were over.
Are they awarding purple hearts?
They might,
we just came by shoe
light.
That's where Sharon Lane was killed.
It's
all right.
Was it June of 1969
through
Friday?
And I was
on duty to play coop.
She was taking care of the Viet
Cong.
Viet Cong unit at
the hospital
and the Viet Cong infiltrated the perimeter of Shuai
that night
and there were a lot of sniper attacks.
There were rockets and mortars coming in and Sharon
Lane took a piece of shrapnel in her neck.
I'm from
Dimonte
girl,
tell my
time will come. Now
I can go
and now
they come
down,
you wanna live for dinner?
Whatever.
Never.
A
lot of people hurting from heat exhaustion. We had a lot of people quit
trying to get them in the vans before we get too far behind.
I need you to open just as many water bottles as fast as you can
vaccine
here.
Now, car it feels like when it overheats
start seeing stars man.
Near the end of the day,
the team is pulled off highway one by their Vietnamese hosts
and taken nine kilometers out of their way to visit the Mi
Lai memorial.
So
LA
was the site of the war's worst
massacre of Vietnamese civilians by American troops.
I would like to introduce to you some history
in four hours.
On the early morning. On March 16th, 1968
the American army killed 504 people.
Among them,
there were 182 women,
123
Children,
133
babies.
This
was designed by the structure
and
the
visit temporarily divides the Americans on the team
while some visit the memorial.
Others, mostly American vets have decided to wait outside in the parking lot.
I'm here to celebrate life and I'm here to celebrate the
students and I'll go visit the hospital and the injured.
But I don't wanna, I don't wanna pay no homage no more to the dead.
The dead are dead, the dead are gone.
And, uh,
ah, they're in God's hands. They're out of my hands.
The North Vietnamese routinely destroyed every village I was in the South
and they destroyed friends of mine Children that I cared for women. I cared for
callously pure terrorism. As a matter of course,
this is one horrible incident
and they make a monument to it. That's ok.
But I'm not going to go in and play the propaganda game.
I'm not going to play in this hypocrisy. I'm not going to be a tool.
I
remains from the
master
on March 16th, 1958.
But they, they
link to her. No,
she live with
me.
Yeah,
I
didn't
know,
but the
only
can get back,
come
to
ZFJ
there.
I
don't know. I think I
have,
that's where they threw the bodies.
I
think it could ever happen again.
Absolutely not. I would imagine. But
in,
you know, and
I'm sure they just went nuts, you know,
scared to death.
But
I don't know
that, I think a lot of things had to
be going wrong at one time
for that to happen. I, I can't,
I can't imagine myself
when I know being a part of
something like that. That's why for that matter, my dad,
like,
for him to be here and be a part of that.
It must have just been
something that I couldn't understand
to kill 500 people,
women and Children. It just doesn't seem like
it doesn't seem like it, it could ever happen.
It doesn't seem possible.
But I, I mean, I guess, I guess it did.
Yeah.
I don't know any veteran who wants to be here.
Certainly not something,
there's a program in school. Yeah.
I can,
I can tell you though. That it's called facing history and ourselves. It's a
program where you look at
sort of uncomfortable moments in history where human beings kind of went astray and
committed atrocities.
Um,
and it's to kind of help kids
understand that we have some scary parts within us that we have to
make sure that we're always able to,
you know, keep a handle on in society. I mean, this was clearly an isolated
awful incident
and so I would hope it would never be
taught as any kind of pattern.
War is ugly enough. But, ah, I mean, this just was 11 event which, ah,
it was kind of a disgrace to our country.
It's understandable. Actually, if you were out here on the battlefield
and had seen
many of you, your men perhaps
slaughtered or,
but it's certainly not excusable.
Do you have any bitterness over your time in the army?
You know, I feel
privileged to have had
an opportunity to serve my country at a point in time. I mean,
ah, serving in peace time is one thing but,
ah, you know, I had the privilege and that's the way I really view it.
I mean, it wasn't
a,
it wasn't a high moment in a way but, ah,
it was an important moment in my life. I'm glad I had the opportunity.
Uh,
I
don't
know.
Don't appreciate it.
Bye.
That the
second
and
that
we got
there
fast
we
back.
It was important for me
as a former soldier,
an American to
join my Vietnamese teammate
who went to the
memorial at Mi
Lai
and I joined them in brotherhood.
And while I'm pleased to be here, it's a pity
that we come 10,000 miles to reconcile with the Vietnamese
and yet we need
and have reconciliation to do at home.
This kind of ride should be done by white
and black Americans and Native Americans and Hispanics.
There should be
some coming together of the races in America.
We have been practicing, working together without using common language
without using your hands at all.
You must pass this,
this or
to the person on your right.
I
love
you.
What?
Oh,
can we make orange juice?
No,
I,
I don't know what to do.
Can work.
You have a boyfriend
and
back
home?
No,
when she had the accident.
Yes.
Her boyfriend
ran away. He ran away after your accident.
So you say
no good,
no good.
Who needs them?
And now I
ask
you,
are you married?
Am I married? I am not yet married.
How are you?
How old am I?
I am 3747.
How
old
am I older than you?
No, I have 4141.
So would you tell I, I am not
yet
and
I am 37
years
old
and I think I'm
old.
Hello? My character,
come on.
I like your character.
You
have to
go
to
while the team heads south down the coast.
Artie and Heidi head inland to visit a few of the places where they had served.
Welcome to the central islands.
So
ugly brown there. See, now, look at the vege
vegetation here,
some of that area up to is still recovering from agent orange right there.
The sun cake.
The city is the same.
We're here. It's got to be so close. We
probably
that's
it.
That's
it.
That's where
it
was.
See, the road curves right on into it.
There were
like 13,000 men assigned to that post right there.
13,000 men of the first cav,
that whole white fence was the perimeter going around.
But that, that was the key point right there. That,
ah,
yes,
April 22nd,
we just started getting mortars coming in and then the morning of the 23rd,
April 23rd, 1967 they just
beat us to the ambush and
that's when they hit us.
Yeah,
I never thought I'd come back here.
Yeah.
Wait, hold on, wait here.
I,
ok.
So we finally,
well, this is the hospital I entered when I first came in country.
That's where I learned what war was all about.
That's where I saw my first casualty
and the morgue was in back somewhere.
Um,
so
that's tough.
And then, uh, after a while I just
stopped crying
and then I, that's when I started to just numb out,
you know, I would rarely have any emotion
on her days off from the hospital.
Heidi did volunteer work at a leprosarium on the coast.
Nobody came here.
Americans didn't bother to come here because the VC wouldn't come here.
The North Vietnamese wouldn't come here
because they're all afraid of getting leprosy
after we did surgery. We'd have the afternoon. They'd let us stay here.
We'd just lay here in the sun and have the, and play in the water.
The whole afternoon
out there was the war and you came here and it was,
the people were friendly. Everybody was thankful you were here. It was,
it was incredible.
Capital D
318.
That's a lucky number. Yeah,
that's our third floor. Back
in
the
back of the bus. We got nine days to work on this shit. You know,
and we're gonna start today, we're gonna be roomies, we're gonna be working,
we're gonna be working real hard, man.
What we gotta do
sometimes it's hard to cut through your own bullshit. That's the hardest.
We packed the bullshit. Hard brother. We packed it for a long time.
I cheated my family.
I cheated myself, man,
losing my material possessions because because of the illness,
uh denying myself drinking all these years.
That's the tragedy. It wasn't because of the guys.
I live in the pits and, and holding a 19 year old man's brains in my hand.
Those are traumas. They're terrible traumas, ok?
But you gotta stop looking at the word traumas. Look, what it's done to your life.
We're only human but we don't allow ourselves to be open because we're afraid
of pain and hurt like I was gonna do with this leaving Vietnam early.
It was the same thing I was trying to save myself the pain. You know what life is? Life.
It's not good. It's not bad. It's just life.
I'm scared. They'd be a crippled.
That's my whole problem.
I don't want to be crippled. I don't want people to see me as crippled. That's it.
That's the fucking bottom line.
Here's
how
emotional cripple.
I can add that. I'm not
keyword. What did you say?
I'm not. No. What did you say first?
I'm fucked up.
I
can hide that.
I can hide that quick. See
up
there,
there it is. That's the
problem.
But what's, what's so bad about it?
Are you complete?
You know what?
Missing your legs or missing your soul is the same damn thing, bro.
What's the soul? What's the emotion? I don't,
it's,
it's not that much,
it's not that much.
So
I tell you the big bill,
you know something when the brakes go off,
I was looking at you
and just seeing Nora around you
and
I see you as a whole person.
That's what I'd like to be. But I, I can't,
I
trust
breaking
camp.
You said you were you contradicting yourself? You, I know
but I mean,
I don't see myself as a whole person that's why I have to put on this whole ship of,
I can do this.
I can do that.
I can jump out of an airplane
and,
and that the
not a bad guy.
And
that's the other thing I'm trying to prove is I'm not a bad guy.
Chicken up.
Hello?
How much
the next time you get legs and no legs
like
it's not, you maybe go talk to you, maybe you wanna talk to a white guy.
Yeah.
Oh OK. Thank you.
See that you dumb ass
fucking Mexican can't understand Vietnamese
for
being page. Are
you excited?
Try not to be.
Hey, man, I'm, I'm excited.
This has been a,
this has been a life changing event
to
cheer
me.
OK?
Well,
that,
you know, I can't get any of the Vietnamese guys to call me Jose.
J comes out
Jose and I keep telling him it's Jose and they say Jose. Yeah, it's Jose.
That's not it.
Yeah, it's cool in here. You got to feel it outside.
I think
J
maybe
now
go
ahead.
They,
I
uh M
bang and I
uh
take K
BT
la la
kang
yu
yy
Tang.
Uh
You wanna try one of those?
Then it won't, we won't do that.
Feel. Feels better.
Yeah. Better. Not change. Now with 100 miles though, I might
Yeah,
it's
a bit high.
Come
in
on the next to the last day of the trip.
The team struggles to complete their longest ride.
120 miles.
What happened?
What?
Right.
So you relax so we can get going here? Ok.
Ok.
Shut up and listen,
he
was,
he was
ok.
Let's get a van and we'll
send him in the van.
Ah. Oh,
you always think we're ok when we first go down,
that's why these guys got sheepskins. That's why they have them hanging on the wall.
They know what the hell they're doing,
get it
ready.
We're sure he's gonna make millions of dollars doing helmet commercials.
We need to send Dwayne for an X ray of his hip.
It's probably just a strained groin muscle, but he does
have some pain, internal rotation of that right hip. So we need to check it out.
Are you sure about his head? That everything's
ok?
I've never been sure about Dwayne's head, but I think it's pretty much status quo,
right?
Dwayne
Dwayne is back.
Moment
where?
Ok.
In
Vung Tao,
the writers are welcomed by Pete Peterson, the new US ambassador to Vietnam,
who was a prisoner of war in Hanoi for
6.5 years and by Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts,
also a Vietnam vet.
Thanks for everything you did to make this a reality
a great,
sorry,
I couldn't kick you up.
The two men will join the team on bicycles for the final day's ride to Ho Chi Minh City.
I see the courage in all the eyes of the writers here today
and it makes me very proud to be a part of this.
You in fact have been riding across a huge bridge all the way from Hanoi
Toria.
This is a bridge of healing, a
bridge of compassion, a
bridge of forgiveness
and a bridge to the future.
For 16 days,
the riders have confronted personal challenges and reached out to others.
Team members have taken turns posting their thoughts and
reflections on an internet page throughout the trip.
Through the passage of time,
we've begun the process of breaking down the walls that existed
and come together as a team,
Vietnamese and American.
It no longer matters who's from where only that one
writer needs help and others are there to give.
The war is over the war within my heart is now over. Vietnam is not a war.
It's a country,
it's a beautiful country with beautiful people
beyond the insights
beyond even the sense of accomplishment.
While riding across Vietnam on a tandem bike.
I got to know my father,
we had fears,
we had tears, we had sleeplessness.
I
had anxiety to the max,
but everybody made it what America could not give me in 30 years.
I have found in Vietnam in a matter of days
my message to you,
my younger brothers and sisters of the world is to love your country.
But beware,
give God your heart and let your conscience be
regarded.
I had remembered Vietnam in primarily dark colors because of the emotions I felt.
I now remember Vietnam as a beautiful, colorful place
with peace.
We're in the home stretch.
Amazing.
Kept this whole Marley crew together all the way down the road.
It's a whole lot different way to go into the city this time.
Head held high.
Heart feels full.
Mine's complete brother going home and I earn the right to be here.
What
you
have.
They go
about
a man
that
be
and
it's not champagne but guess what?
You come
the
to
Yeah.
Oh,
babies
up
top.
Lovely brother, man.
Wait,
this ride
is a ride about the art of the possible about our ability to overcome
all kinds of differences and disabilities
and come together as human beings and make things work.
And my prayer is that those who still
have a sense of reservation about that possibility
will understand the real meaning of this ride
is that we can do anything when we put our minds to it.
And I thank all those who helped to prove that point to the world.
There is this.
Yeah.
Oh my God.
He cares.
I
tell
you.
See you
glad you made it.
Hello.
Welcome to Sioux
Falls
IKM.
I like soup
getting to
Ultron and
I at one time said
I need to get you a new leg. I would love to get you a a real leg.
You know, we're going to trace trans
limb
and it's going to transfer onto the the computer and we're going
to end up with a file with the exact duplication of trans
limb from that we're going to make the socket.
Sure.
I have to be
so
that
you're gonna really like that come
to.
He said, you know, before the Vietnam war end,
he hate every one of you
because, you know, he got seven relative died by the bombing from the US.
But now
he changed
when the peace time come,
he had a chance to meet American.
And he really realized, hey, they are human too
now, time to build a new future
and to work together as a human.
Ah,
we are cooking with Petra
O.
You,
I will ride along.
Oh,
I'm just excited for him. I got so much. I want to tell him, you know?
Oh,
um,
where somebody waits for me.
Time. Stand still on,
um,
go
one.