so uh on tell us about what it was like growing up where did you grow up uh i was grow up in hanoi north of vietnam and uh my father decided to move the family to the south in 1954 now was that after after the french got beat yeah so did your father kind of recognize that bad things could happen yes and what what did your father do for a living uh did you mean before after 55 oh he has the uh some kind of business to cut the lumber like a lumber yeah okay and uh he he hired people to do it but he uh organized the the office and after 54 we moved down to the south and he worked for one of the uh french company oh he worked for a french company yeah oh okay after fortune 54 okay we moved to the south okay and what did you do how old were you when you moved to the south oh i was 11 11 years old yeah and my my my father’s and my cell and my brother my younger brother at uh that time he was 10 and to pry to the uh with one of the friends to the south now did you have any understanding of what was happening with the communists in north vietnam did you have any understanding of that yet oh uh before we go to uh we uh we went to the south then i remember i uh at night my i sit next to my my father and he was uh criticized people criticizing what she means because my uh oldest brother was killed in 45 when he was 17 okay yeah by the communists by the communists so once you got down to south vietnam now you’re 11 years old and what did what did you did you were you just going to school yes i did and since the uh we move around all the time from hanoi to haifang and then go to the south and [Music] i myself and my brother next to me we don’t try to make a too great in one year you try to make what in one year too great okay were you able to do it yeah okay we did nice nice and uh in the city 62 62 yeah i zoned the air force and my uh my brother he got the scholarship from usam and he went here too so 1962 is when you joined the air force yes and and um once you joined the air force did you know you were going to be a pilot yes okay but uh i didn’t believe it i would be because i couldn’t uh ride the car i couldn’t ride air train a course even an airplane a bus because every time i got in the car my storage can come up in yeah that’s not fun but eventually you were able to get over that yes the first time my ip he uh demonstrated the uh um as in quit all the oral translation and oh and i thought i i feel my my stomachs come up and i said oh my god how can flying but later on i get used with it right and i like it i know that they have something for american pilots and i don’t know if they made you do this they have something where if you get air sickness they have something i think it’s in texas it’s called spin and puke and they basically put you in this machine every day and it spins you around and makes you sick until you get used to it really yep so i guess you didn’t do that no you didn’t have to go to the spin and puke one auto rotation helped yeah so how long were you in the air force before you started training to become a pilot um when i joined in the air force in uh late 62 and and formerly it was on january 1st of 63 okay and i was have the basic military uh training in the niagara fall and also the esl for six months and uh in uh in uh july 63 i this uh i was sent here to get attorney so you came to america yeah and get the uh esl again training in australia in san antonio okay yeah so you so you go to san antonio to first to learn how to speak english oh in uh in vietnam oh okay when when i uh get the military uh military training and the uh esl english training for six months and then when i went to uh to the centennial texas of our another performance for uh esl english uh linguist after that i went to uh four waters in texas okay and and what was for waters for for the uh primary uh helicopter training okay it’s the uh s33 the s23 chopper h23 chopper small nugget that’s like the uh that’s like the bubble canopy right similar to that yes yeah different variation yeah he’s the old one and then so how long did you spend in america training to fly uh from uh [Music] from the uh uh first training i uh get the uh advanced training on the asa 23 2 and then after i finished it i went to alabama to get the training on the uh x-34 the king bee me and now what was your first impression of the king bee well it was big because it goes from 8 23 is a small one tiny and when i finished the training on the age 34 uh they i was transferred to uh i got the training on the uh he way at that time they only have the uh at the school they only have the uh a model it’s a weird this is a small one the a model huey yeah what did you like better what did you like better the huey or the king bee excuse me because they think they have about well at that time him about one thousand fifty hundred hospital okay but the healing moving a model have only 900 horsepower but the huey’s a lot smaller than the king b yes it is smaller and uh but did you feel like you had more power in the king b no no because it’s too easy it’s too easy to fly like what’s that one because on the uh 8 34 i got total about 100 hours how many hours 100 hours 100 hours wow total and uh but on the highway i only get the uh 900 hours okay and the pilot the captain pilot who checked my uh check me he said okay you stick you can’t stay home you don’t need to fly anymore you stay home so he can he can have more time to take other people other people don’t learn as quickly as he did got it so i was off for one weekend this week so then so is that is that what you got trained in you completed all that training um and then it was going back to vietnam yes in 64 around around july 64
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