Chapter 3

I was awakened again by Suenee shaking my shoulder. There was barely enough light to see in the room.

"You must return now," she said, when she saw that I was awake.

I reached out and pulled her to me. She offered no resistance and came into my arms for a long kiss - but not too long.

"Shower," she told me in a no-nonsense voice.

We adjourned to the shower again. I was better prepared this time, but that water was still cold. We both showered and dried off. When I came out of the shower, Suenee had my clothes laid out on the bed, ready for me. She watched as I dressed. She had on what I later learned was called a sarong. It covered her tightly from her breasts to her knees and was very brightly colored.

I was ready to put my shirt on, when Suenee spoke again.

"Bill, you must wear this," she told me and held up one of the charms or amulets that I had seen not just on the women but on many of the men since arriving in Thailand. When she saw the look of doubt on my face, she appeared to grow frantic.

"Please, Bill, Tee ruk ka. You must wear it for good luck. Please do this for me," she begged.

What could I say? It was only a small thing, about two inches long, in a triangular case of gold plated brass and plastic, I thought. It was hanging from what appeared to be a bootlace from a jungle boot. It was apparent that Suenee put great emphasis on this, and so I acquiesced and placed it around my neck with my dog-tags before putting my T-shirt on. Suenee seemed very pleased at this and came into my arms and kissed me passionately again.

"You will need baht for the baht bus to town," she said as I sat on the porch steps lacing up my jungle boots.

"Yes, I have money," I told her. Then thinking further, I asked, "Do you need any money?"

"No, I am fine," she assured me. "I will see you tonight," she added.

"I don't know if I'll be here tonight. We are supposed to leave for the camp today," I told her.

"I will see you outside the San-Ma-Kee tonight," she told me and seemed very confident about it.

Suenee took me out to the road when I was ready and waited with me for the next 'baht bus'. It turned out that a baht bus was a small pickup truck with bench seats on both sides of the bed and a roof over the bed. It could accommodate three Americans on a side or four or five Thais depending on how small they were. The fare was very low because of the number of people carried. The first one to pass us had been overcrowded.

As it was early morning, many people were on their way into town to shop or for work, and there were many baht buses on the road. The second one stopped when Suenee signaled it. She spoke to the driver and told him where I needed to go. I had wanted to kiss her before I got on the vehicle, but she had told me when we got to the road, that she couldn't do that, as it was not proper for Thai women to do that in public. I was a little confused by this, as she had certainly been passionate at the house.

We had both gotten a number of disapproving looks from some of the passengers when the vehicle stopped and I got on. The trip into town was pretty fast as the vehicle was loaded and didn't have room for any more passengers.

The vehicle stopped several times when we got into town, and the people who had signaled got off. It stopped for no apparent reason at a corner and the man riding in the cab with the driver got out and pointed at me, and then pointed up the street. The area certainly looked different in daylight than it had last night.

"Ha baht," he said, pointing at me. I just looked at him in confusion.

"Ha baht," he said again and held up five fingers. I got it right a way, and dug out a five baht note.

"Kawp Koon Mak, Khrap," I told him, meaning 'thank you very much'. He just smiled.

I set out up the street with the sun rising on my right. It only took me a few minutes to reach the Team House. There was a young soldier on guard at the entrance to the compound that the house was in.

"Howdy" I said, as I approached.

"You want something?" he asked, as he adjusted his new Green Beret.

"Yes, I'm with Master Sergeant Sawyer. He told me to be back early this morning."

"Oh, you're the newbie," he answered and let me in.

"Yes, I came in last night with Master Sergeant Sawyer," I answered.

"Baker," I heard a voice shout, as I came through the gate. "About time you got in. Go clean up and have breakfast. Meet me in operations after that."

"I don't envy you," the gate guard said quietly, when MSG Sawyer had disappeared. "The latrine is in the back of the building," he added.

"Any idea where my duffel bag went?" I asked.

"There's one upstairs in the first room on the left - my room," he told me.

"Thanks," I replied and hurried inside.

My bag was where he had told me, and I got my things ready and went down to the latrine. I was amazed when I got there and found out that they had hot water. There was another, older man, there at the time.

"You have HOT water!" I said in amazement.

"Yes, what's so unusual about that?" he asked.

"Nothing, but I took two cold showers in the last eight or nine hours," I told him.

"Serves you right for going downtown," he answered with a grin on his face.

After shaving, I returned to the room, got my large towel, soap and underwear together to head back down for a hot shower. God, it felt great after those two cold showers. I was headed back upstairs after showering, in my clean OD underwear, and wet shower shoes, with my towel over my shoulder when Sawyer passed me in the hall.

"Wow there, Troop," he said. "Lose that underwear. You'll rot out your crotch out if you wear that here. Even a T-shirt is too much a lot of the time."

"Thanks," I told him, as I continued up to the room to get dressed. I removed the drawers but retained the T-shirt for now.

I found the mess area on the first floor with out any trouble, as it was where most of the people here were at the time. They served a pretty good breakfast, but I noticed that I was the only one here in regular fatigues. I got a few strange and somewhat hostile looks.

After eating, I asked where Operations was and was directed down the hall. I found Sawyer there when I arrived. He didn't look any too happy.

"It looks like we won't be able to get out of here until at least tomorrow," he told me. "The supply chopper took fire yesterday at one of the camps and was lucky to make it back last night. They're working on it today and hope to have it ready to go tomorrow," he informed me, then paused.

"We could go by road, but that's a chancy thing and it's an eight hour ride at the best of times. Plus a single vehicle can be a sitting duck, especially an Army vehicle. Besides," he added, "my old bones don't need to be shaken up again this soon."

"Did you eat?" he asked next.

"Yes, the chow here is pretty good. Better than in Korat anyway," I answered.

"I'm sure the cook will be glad to hear that," the Operations Sergeant put in.

"This is Sergeant Kelley, the Operations Sergeant," Sawyer said, by way of introduction.

"If we're going to be here all day, I need to get you in a proper uniform," Sawyer told me next.

"Do we still have uniforms?" Sawyer asked the Operations Sergeant.

"Yes, check with Kelley in supply," he answered.

"Come on," Sawyer said, leading me out and down the hall.

"Do they have two Kelley's here?" I asked.

"Yes," was his only reply.

There was a small separate building in back of the main building with a sign that read 'Supply'. The Sergeant in there didn't look happy to see us.

"No, Sawyer. I don't have any," he said, as soon as we entered.

"You don't even know what I want yet," Sawyer answered.

"You always want my best stuff," the other Kelley answered, defensively.

"My new troop needs tigers, a ruck, LBE, and jungle boots. Oh, and a Beret if you have an extra one."

"I need orders assigning him here first," the Supply Sergeant replied. Sawyer pulled a set of orders out of his side pocket and handed them to the Supply Sergeant, who proceeded to read them very carefully.

"OK," he said after a time, "but what's this about a radio. Is it supposed to be added to our TO & E?"

"No," I answered, and dug out the plastic bag that I kept the orders assigning the radio to me in. I handed them to the Supply Sergeant. He spent several more minutes reading them before handing them back.

"Damn, fellow. If you lose that thing, you had better get lost with it. Otherwise, they'll throw the book at you and put you under the jail. As long as it isn't on my books, I don't care though," he finished.

"Let me see what I have," he said after that and went into the back of the building. He soon returned with uniforms, a ruck and LBE equipment. It took him longer to come up with two pair of jungle boots that fit me. Finally he produced an AK-47, a 45 pistol, magazines, ammunition, and finally, a Beret.

"You know that he isn't authorized this," the Supply Sergeant made a point of saying about the beret.

"Look at his shirt. He's been through enough shit to make it. Besides, where we're going, no one will care," Sawyer told him.

I had managed to get most of the stuff in the rucksack and we headed back to the other building. Sawyer had instructions for me on the way.

"Take this up to the room. Change clothes, load the magazines and leave the weapon in the rack there. Make sure that the LBE and ruck fit you. Fill the canteens from the potable water trailer. Make sure that everything is ready to go, just in case we have to bail out of here in a hurry," he told me. "There is a seamstress down the street. Get your patches and name-tag sewn on one set of tigers only. The others don't need them," he added. "Meet me in the club here when you're done," he finished.

I went back upstairs and did all of the things that I had been instructed to do. My roommate came in just as I was finishing. He was the man from the gate.

"Hi," he said, "I'm Mike.

"Hi," I answered, "Bill. Do you know where the seamstress is located?"

"Suzie?" he asked. "Sure. You headed there?"

"Yes. I need to get patches sewn on this shirt," I told him.

"Bring your other one," he told me "She may need the patches."

"Oh yes, bring your 45 also," he added. I saw him tuck his own 45 in his waistband and pull his shirt down over it after putting his AK in the rack.

"We're not supposed to have them visible, but everyone around here knows that we are carrying them," he told me.

"This place was like the wild west when they first got here, I heard," Mike told me on the way to the seamstress's shop but didn't elaborate.

"Hi, Suzie," he said when we came to a small open store front. I could see an older woman and a couple of small girls in there. There was a foot-powered sewing machine in the bright sunlight of the entrance next to a small glass counter, also.

"Sawutdee, Mike," the older woman replied.

"My friend needs sewing," Mike told her.

"Yes," she answered, and came over to look at the shirt I was holding. She studied it for a minute and finally pointed to the Path-Finder patch.

"Mai mee," she said.

"She doesn't have one of those patches," Mike told me.

"That's OK. She can sew this one on the new shirt," I told him. Suzie had the other patches in boxes in the glass counter. Most of them looked homemade, but were a pretty good job. She removed the Path-Finder patch and my name tag from my old shirt. I removed the new tiger stripe shirt, and she got busy sewing the patches on it.