#hws vietnam (mentioned) | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

stirringwinds · 2 years

Text

Purgatory

Whumptober Day 8: Back from the dead

Summary: Vietnam, 1967. Marine Captain Alfred F. Jones, born on July 4th 1942, is killed in action at 0930 hours, twenty klicks from Quang Tri city. This is the aftermath.

Or: Alfred, through the eyes of one of his men. Because not every human’s experience coming face-to-face with their nation is a good one.

Notes: CW for violence, death, graphic injuries, war, depictions of PTSD, murder and Cold War-era imperialism. This fic leans hard on the darker side of ‘nations as creepy as hell eldritches and their relationship with war’; citizenship, loyalty and nationhood can cut many ways can’t it?

“VC” refers to the Viet Cong— the Vietnamese guerrillas who fought against both the US-backed South Vietnamese military and US forces. They were allied with, but distinct from the regular ARVN (aka, the North Vietnamese military). “Charlie” became a slang for the Viet Cong, because the NATO phonetic alphabet reads “V.C” as “Victor Charlie.” [3.2k words]

Read on AO3

One week after Jones dies, a VC sniper nails me twice in the right thigh on a night patrol, with all the suddenness and wrath of a prayer answered by the Almighty.

Maybe Charlie had been aiming for my balls and had missed, the helo pilot on the medevac chopper had guffawed. He’d seen people in worse shape than me, I’d live, so just sit tight and shut up.

It enters my leg at a diagonal, it hurts like a bitch, fractures my thigh bone, shreds a whole lot of muscle and nerve tissue, nicks a major artery; I lose buckets of blood. The surgeon at the field hospital in Khe Sanh who ties the artery, fishes out the bullet fragments and sews me back together tells me that at best, I’d walk with a painful limp all my life—if I even recover that much function. Then, I get a raging infection. I burn and I freeze; my temperature shoots to a hundred and four, I’m pumped with antibiotics, I’m told I nearly died—but I don’t give a shit.

I’m giddy, delirious and incoherent, hopped up on morphine and euphoria.

My war is over.

I’m packed off to the 700-bed Naval Support Activity hospital at Da Nang. The hospital’s on the strip of land in between the Han River and the South China Sea—which means unlimited ice-cream, lazing in bed all day, and miles and miles of golden sand and the gorgeous blue of the ocean. After seven months in the red mud, hell and mosquitoes that is Khe Sanh, Quang Tri province, this is heaven, as far as I’m concerned.

One night, I awake with a start. It’s my ninth day there.

At first, I think it’s because the air conditioning has broken down. The ward I share with eleven other guys is dark and quiet, the air oppressively still, sticky and humid. The corpsman’s station is empty—which often happened whenever there was a surge in casualties. Everyone else is either passed out or groaning in their sleep—unsurprisingly; I was the milder case in a ward full of grunts convalescing from amputations and head injuries.

I throw off the blankets. My hospital pajamas are soaked with sweat. I’d been doing well enough that they’d taken me off the IV. So I drag myself out of bed, reach for my newly acquired crutches. Maybe there’d be more of a breeze outside—they’d made a makeshift verandah of sorts. You could see the ocean from there, and they’d begun wheeling me out there in the day, like those photos of TB patients in the old days, to take in the fresh air.

I stagger outside, a pathetic figure shuffling on my crutches. I’m a long way off from my high school days on the track team.

Outside, the smell of salt hits my nose. It’s three twenty-five in the morning, according to the glowing hands of my watch. The air is warm, like an oven; back home, it’d be much cooler at this time of the year—but at least there’s a breeze, instead of the hot, still air inside.

A tall silhouette of a man. The waft of cigarette smoke. Someone else is already out there. My eyes are still adjusting to the dark, so I can’t make out his features. I’m weighing whether to greet this stranger, or to just shut the fuck up—but he takes the lead.

“You’re finally up, Corporal,” the stranger’s voice is low and nonchalant—and I can’t breathe. “I’ve been waiting.”

It’s like ice shooting through my veins—the cold, deeply awful dread that instantly surges up at the sound of the not-stranger’s voice, at the recognition that hits me.

I’m having a heart attack, it feels. It’s like getting shot again—not feeling anything, just numb for a few seconds and then the pain just exploding. There’s a clatter as one of my crutches falls to the ground. My fingers are gripping the wooden railing. It’s rough, unfinished, there are splinters digging into my palms. I’m going nuts. I’d been steadily losing it over the past seven months, but now I’m sure as hell over the edge.

That’s what it is, seeing a dead man in the flesh.

“There are only so many reasons for this kind of shit, so I can guess,” Jones strolls over nonchalantly, his distinctive features melting out of the shadows into the light of the moon with vivid, horrifying, mesmerising clarity, looking every bit as he did in life; the unmistakably gold glint of his hair, the intense blue of his eyes, the strong bronze angles of his face. That strikingly handsome, sharp and squared-away look; the exact damned way the Marine Corps liked its officers.

“But I’d still like to hear it in your own words,” Jones stops, keeping about a meter and a half between us. “So. Tell me. Why’d you do it?”

Dully, I barely register the fact that he’s considerately picked up my crutch, setting it against the railing with a dull thud.

“Fuck. You’re not real.” You’re dead, is what I really want to say.

“Come on, man,” Jones raises a well-groomed brow, completely disregarding my weak protest. “This whole thing wasn’t just your idea, I know—but you did the honours, didn’t you?” His manner is dry, matter-of-fact. He speaks as though he were assigning latrine-cleaning duty or boredly ordering us to set up a night defense perimeter.

There’s no anger, no vengeful fury from this ghost. Whole thing. Describing his own murder with such nonchalance. Something vaguely unpleasant, but that ultimately had little lasting consequences.

“I was,” I echo uselessly, when I’m able to form words again. I’ve sunk down into one of the chairs they’d placed out there for us to enjoy the sea views. “It wasn’t personal.” Of course it was personal.

All those dangerous jungle patrols, deep into Viet Cong territory, the zealous, whole-hearted fanaticism with which Jones pushed us on with, his voice like the very command of God.

The way he’d held McLean’s hand as he bled out, just one month shy of his nineteenth birthday. McLean, who was just the latest in a long line of dog-tags and body bags. No, what was terrible wasn’t that Jones didn’t care. What was terrible was the sincerity with which he said you did good as McLean died, his unseeing eyes staring up at the remorselessly blue sky, as his blood seeped down into the soil of Vietnam. How he said how his sacrifice would be worth it, that he'd personally make sure of it.

The careful, sincere letters Jones always composed to the next-of-kin, not dashed off carelessly the way some other shitbags did it. He meant every word he wrote. Their sons and brothers had been brave and special. They had gone too soon. But for a worthy cause at the end of the day, for their nation, for the global cause of freedom and democracy and— And I suddenly saw it. How many other hands had my commanding officer held? An endless procession of poor motherfuckers like myself, led into the abyss to make the deaths of those before worth it. The weight of my M-16 rifle suddenly felt too much. Its strap was cutting into my neck, a noose—

In the present I shrug. I stick my hands into the pockets of my hospital-issued pajamas so he won’t see them shaking. Not that it matters—he’s probably already noticed, of course. I keep my eyes staring straight ahead at the inky darkness of the ocean—anything but the ghost standing beside me. Maybe this is what damnation is.

“You were going to get us all killed, sooner or later. You couldn’t be dissuaded.” I’m defending myself, justifying it, assuaging my conscience—whichever.

“And you decided to take on the burden, I suppose,” Jones remarks. On the surface, his expression is eerily placid, bereft of any vindictiveness. “A noncom like you, loyal not to his superior officer, but his men? Guess I can admit there’s something admirable about that, Corporal.”

I can’t tell whether he’s mocking me or not. He probably is.

“Admirable?” I feel sick. I could, of course, go along with this bullshit. Loftily and righteously say I did it because I owed it to the miserable fucks under my section, to the 14 teenaged Marines who were barely younger than I was, to save them from our commanding officer’s zealotry. But— what principle was there when it came down to it, when I looked the truth in the face? When the overwhelming feeling that had driven me was pure fear? The desperate fear that every next patrol Jones assigned me, further and further into the dangerous, mined jungle paths that the VCs knew like the back of their hand—it was their land after all—would be my last?

“Yes,” Jones drawls. There’s a southern twang in his voice; he’d always said he was born in Virginia. July 4th, 1942, of all dates— but as with all things to do with him, you don’t know when the truths end and the lies begin.

“Don’t get it fucking twisted up,” I breathe. Close my eyes. I feel the edges of hysteria creeping in—not now. Not fucking now of all times. “I just wanted to go home in one piece. And I sure as hell wasn’t gonna get my ticket punched before I can even get legally piss-drunk, not in that fucking shithole.”

Jones fixes his eyes on me. The gleam of his captain’s bars on his right collar catches the moonlight. He’s in a fresh and clean uniform, instead of the bloodied, shredded mess I’d last seen. My mind is filled with just two thoughts— of my knee hurting like a bitch in this incredibly realistic nightmare, and the way his stare feels like it’s gnawing on my very soul.

“And you won’t die for this?” Jones’ smile is curious and there’s something disconcertingly piercing in it. Mesmerising. “Not for this cause?” It’s a disarming smile, the same one he always flashed in life—that bullshit Hollywood smile that so easily wooed and won anyone over. A trap. He exhales a stream of smoke, his blue eyes dark and unblinking, his presence all at once relaxed and disarming, intense and oppressive. “Not even for me?”

Once, I would have followed him, until the end. I’d worshiped him, with the fervour of an idiotic boy fresh from dropping out of community college, beaten and broken down at Parris Island. He was magnetic, that way; always friendly and easy going— not one of those officers who looked at us grunts like we were lower than the shit in the latrines.

Before all this, I knew nothing of Vietnam, had the luxury of thinking nothing of Vietnam. When my draft notice came, my mother and older sister had begged me not to go, to run away and stay with our relatives in Guadalajara. Or our maternal granduncle, who was still living in Ireland. He’d take me in for sure. Didn’t I see the news? The casualties? This war was a bad one…I’d brushed them off, with all the conceit of an arrogant, stupid boy hungry for adventure—I wasn’t thinking. I’d never lived anywhere but home, I wasn’t about to cut and run forever. How bad could it be? Our late father had proudly won his medals in Europe, on the beaches of Normandy, hadn’t he? And so, I’d have eaten a hundred bullets for Jones, chewed miles of barbed wire, crawled through a fucking VC tunnel if he ordered it. Maybe I still would have, in the darkness of the thick jungle of Quang Tri province, away from the lively cities and towns, away from anything that reminded me that I was more than a warm body with a M-16 and Ka-bar knife.

It’s like exiting a fog, looking back at those moments and realising how deluded and detached from reality I’d become.

“No, I fucking wouldn’t,” I exhale, say the things I never dared to in the light of the day. “You’re just a man. A charismatic and delusional asshole, but blood and meat when it comes down to it.”

Jones takes this all in calmly and silently, with a sort of knowing and watchful patience. It’s like hurling pebbles into a vast lake and seeing no ripples. It’s utterly unsettling, this shade of him, this utter calm. Where is all that dark, vindictive fury our commanding officer had betrayed, in life? All that seething fanaticism that simmered underneath that effortlessly charming exterior of his—that something dark and dangerous, that showed in his eyes, whenever he spoke of the wretched tide of Soviet influence, polluting and fracturing the utopian world order that lay ahead, that was the reason rivers of American blood were being shed so far from home?

Here, in this night, the silence is punctuated only by the sound of the waves crashing against the shore.

“If that’s the way you see it then I guess I am.” Jones is staring at his own hand, the one free of the cigarette, his palm skywards, flexing his fingers experimentally. “Just a man. Nobody’s said that to me for a long time.”

“What else would you be?” The hair at the back of my neck stands. I can see the faint sweat beading on Jones’ brow because of the muggy heat, the same way it does on mine.

He’s human, I remind myself. And very much dead, and just a figment of my imagination, a remnant of the guilt that haunted me.

Jones shrugs. “Many other things.” Then, surreally—with an easy-going and gregarious smile—“Cigarette?”

“No, thanks.” I only just remember to silence the reflexive sir on the tip of my tongue. “The doc said I couldn’t, not so soon after getting cut up. Risk of infection or something.”

Jones nods. “You oughta take care, yeah.” He stashes his smokes back in his pocket. I brace myself, but for the next few minutes, he doesn’t say anything. He’s content to smoke and stare out at the inky darkness of the ocean in the distance, his blue eyes contemplative. It’s incredibly vivid, this nightmare, I think. Even the very slope of his shoulders, the way he leans against the verandah, the loose strand of blonde hair falling over his eyes—is true to life.

“What’s it like, on the other side?” The words slip out. I’m going along with this batshit dream, I guess. Maybe I need the reassurance. Día de Muertos and All Souls’ Day had been in the landscape of my childhood, but I’d never really believed in ghosts. Or the afterlife. At least not the way either of my grandmothers talked about it. “You’re one calm motherfucker for someone who is dead.”

Jones exhales another stream of smoke. The end of his cigarette is a burning ember in the darkness. Now, he’s not smiling. But his blue-grey eyes are still that unnerving, thoughtful calm.

“Am I, really?”

“You are,” I say to the ghost, who takes this news calmly. Maybe this was some screwed up way I sought closure. Some sort of fucked up confessional. The shrinks would have a field day with this, if I could ever talk about it. There was the chillingly routine murder of the enemy in the business of war, and then there was this shit sandwich on top of it. I murdered my commanding officer, and now the bastard shows up in my dream for a casual smoke and chat—

I continue. “You died. On a muddy trail in the middle of the jungle twenty klicks outside of Quang Tri city. It was Thursday, and it was nine-thirty in the morning. I pulled the pin. It was a Soviet-made NVA grenade I stole off a VC prisoner taken into custody. Back at base, I lied. We all lied. Said that we were ambushed by the enemy.”

Jones’ calm expression doesn’t flicker, as he stubs out his cigarette on the railing. He flicks a stray piece of ash off his sleeve, as he strolls over. I’m rooted to my chair, I wouldn’t have the energy to stand up even if I wanted to.

“Murdered by my own men,” he says ironically, with an almost bizarrely philosophical air. Jones exhales. “Lien would be having a good laugh about this, I suppose. ”

A Vietnamese name—A woman’s name isn’t it? I think vaguely. Nothing he says makes sense. There were more than a few of us who, after leave in Da Nang or Saigon, deluded ourselves into thinking a beautiful bargirl we'd met on a night out was our one true love, not a poor or desperate woman with few choices and trying her best to make ends meet. But Jones’ tone is bereft of such sentimentality, almost businesslike, the way he’d talk about a peer. “Who?”

“Someone I’ve known for a long time,” Jones says, with cryptic nonchalance.

His shadow falls across me. For a moment, I’m thinking that this is the moment where he’ll reach for his sidearm and blow my brains out, dream or not.

“Well, I suppose this is goodbye, Corporal.” The unmistakable, solid feeling of Jones’ fingers casually slapping my shoulder is a shock. “You take care and watch that leg of yours, yeah?” He says it, neither sarcastically nor backhandedly, but with a surreal, friendly sincerity that makes my skin crawl all the same— “And just so you know; I don’t take it personally.”

Then, he’s disappearing around the corner, and against my will, my eyes are closing, sinking underneath months and months of exhaustion.

I wake up to a nurse shaking me, her hand on my shoulder. There are the faintest pink streaks on the horizon. I ought not to be out there, she said, not unkindly—had I been there all night? The air-conditioning had been fixed. Maybe I ought to have some hot coffee.

In the bright light of the day, all of it seems unreal. The sky is an endless blue dome, the palm trees on the beach and the bougainvillea bushes lushly green and purple. No ghosts could wander here, in all that light and freshness.

The next few days, I find my breath catching whenever I catch sight of an officer. Maybe my dream was a premonition. Maybe they’d find out what I did. Maybe I’ll be arrested for murder. Maybe one of the guys still in the hell that is Quang Tri will break, will spill. Maybe I’ll be undone. That’s how it always happens, doesn’t it? Just right when freedom is around the corner.

But nobody accosts me, nobody asks me any questions, nobody says a single word about Jones.

I spend another two weeks at the Naval Hospital in Da Nang. Then, I’m handed my medical discharge papers. I’m going home

The remaining days pass, easy and languid in the eternal summer of Da Nang, all the way until I board my flight home to America, my citation for a Purple Heart in hand, sick with relief and exhaustion, the bloody wheel of the war grinding on—but behind me, for good.

Notes:

1. ‘Fragging’: the attempted or successful murder of (usually higher-ranking) military personnel by fellow troops— occurred amongst US forces during the Vietnam War, due to the war’s unpopularity, usage of young draftees and the breakdown of morale. The term comes from how a fragmentation grenade was the weapon of choice used at times. There were close to an estimated 900 incidents recorded.

2. Parris Island: the Marine Corps recruit depot in South Carolina. A Purple Heart is a decoration awarded to US military personnel wounded or killed in action.

3. Lien is of course, Vietnam herself. Vietnam was partitioned in 1954; after Vietnamese forces successfully defeated the French attempt to re-establish its colonial presence. US foreign intervention in Vietnam was publicly justified by American politicians on the basis that Northern Vietnamese forces were communist puppets of larger powers like the USSR or China. Many US policymakers subscribed to the “domino theory”: that the “fall” of another country to Communism would lead to it spreading throughout Asia. But a more accurate appreciation of the situation might have recognised the nationalist motivations of the Viet Cong and regular Northern Vietnamese forces, whose end goal was to reunite their country and rid it of what was for them a long line of foreign imperialism; French, Japanese and now American. And therefore, the limits of American hard power, especially in propping up a Southern Vietnamese regime that was unpopular with the population for multiple reasons.

#hetalia #hws america #my writing #alfred f jones #death #blood #violence #depictions of PTSD #injury mention #whumptober #long post #hws vietnam (mentioned)#human pov fic #a day late #pls heed the content warnings #this is def one of the darker fics i've written

146 notes · View notes

teh-inggris · 8 months

Text

Seatalia dtiys !!

template by qis_hws

#senart #hws philippines #hws malaysia #hws indonesia #hws singapore #hws vietnam #hws thailand #Aughhh the quality is so ass sowwyy #Also i realised halfway into making this that i drew them w white pupils bcus of tejennnn's art #idk i just thought i should mention that for some reason

19 notes · View notes

autistichwsamerica · 3 years

Conversation

HWS Russia: He died from natural causes.

HWS Vietnam: You pushed him off the roof.

HWS Russia: Gravity is natural.

#hetalia #incorrect quotes #rusviet #otp #vietrus #hws russia #ivan braginsky #hws vietnam #murder mention tw #source: tumblr

87 notes · View notes

badlydrawndrawnings · 3 years

Text

oh wow

I can’t believe in the year 2021, I would be talking about Hetalia despite leaving the fandom long, long, long ago...because honestly speaking, Himaruya adding the rest of the Southeast Asian nations is something I can recall back in the hey-days as one of the biggest requests. Ever. I can’t believe it’s been 84 years.

After some digging into the fandom, especially the old fandom days I forgot how terrible it can be I can say the following predictions for the remaining not-yet introduced ASEAN characters (under read more to not clog up the tags/force my followers to see a big block of text of something they most likely don’t know/dislike greatly):

As most of the ASEAN characters introduced are Maritime Southeast Asia countries (and from what I re-discovered of the old fandom days, the most requested), Brunei will be introduced next (if not, given the second introduction).

While not part of ASEAN, Timor-Leste will get introduced; possibly by crashing an ASEAN meeting (due to country’s still pending status of being the eleventh member) with chaos ensure not long afterwards.

I don’t know why, but I picture Timor-Leste being small in stature.

As Vietnam is the only female of ASEAN, Himaruya will add another female character; the other female ASEAN will be Cambodia or Laos. Since Himaruya drawn more male characters than female characters in the Hetalia-verse, it’s likely he would make Cambodia or Laos female, and the other male.

If I have to make a clearer prediction, Cambodia will be male, and Laos will be female. As Greece has his mother Ancient Greece and Egypt has his mother Ancient Egypt, this pattern will continue. Cambodia is the son of Kambuja (though to the rest of the nations/world, Kambuja is better known as the Khmer Empire/Angkorian Empire).

Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos made up the former French Indochina. From what I dug up into the old fandom days, the three would be siblings, but they are not blood relatives.

Vietnam will be the oldest, Cambodia is the middle child, and Laos is the youngest.

Thailand and Vietnam are dislike by Cambodia and Laos (more Cambodia than Laos). Of course, they all get along fairly well (they’re not close, but they’re polite and civil with one another).

Going by my clearer prediction of Cambodia will be male and Laos will be female, Cambodia will be more visibly hostile towards Vietnam and Thailand, to where it almost gets physically (mainly to Thailand).

Laos is the one who make sure brawls don’t occur. It’s not to say she can’t be hostile, but Laos would prefer to do it verbally than physically.

Cambodia actually gets along better with Thailand due to their similar cultures. Marginally, because sometimes Thailand likes to provoke Cambodia into being hostile (why? Because it’s fun).

Laos has a habit of drinking due to Thailand and Cambodia shenanigan's, and finds herself be close with Vietnam because she’s very level-head in comparison.

This is more of me digging around online and reading up on Cambodian-American and Laotian-American experiences/something that happened IRL and should have no bearing but it’s interesting none the less to make it a prediction: Cambodia and Laos tend to be forgotten by the other nations (excluding their fellow ASEAN members and France), and they bond over their experience. They’re the Canada of ASEAN, only they don’t get mistaken for other ASEAN members, like how Canada gets mistaken for America.

That said, this will be funnier (or not) depending how Himaruya designs them; Himaruya I love your art style and designs, but even I have to admit characters are drawn so similar to one another).

And that’s all I got.

#hetalia #hetalia world stars #hws #hws vietnam #hws thailand #this is a text post #okay so apparently when leaving the fandom #i missed out on the fact hetalia has a new name #that's nice #and the focus shift from ww2 to other periods (mostly modern times)#anyway tagging vietnam and thailand because i mention them in the post

16 notes · View notes

truonghoc · 3 years

Text

also sorry for the lack of language content on here recently everyone !! i just haven't been finding any resources here on tunglr >u< i HAVE been studying languages still though - i apparently learned enough spanish from one semester class to skip like three semesters ??? so THAT'S KINDA COOL and also i've been learning lots of japanese through duolingo :3 i was v inspired after i watched sailor moon and i realized i could understand some of the eps and i was like omg... i need to cultivate this

i haven't been studying the target languages listed in my bio though :/ >u< i haven't really been motivated to learn korean but i might try to pick it up again - especially if i watch squid game hehe! i haven't really been studying mandarin or cantonese either >.< and do i have french listed?? i legit haven't touched french in years

and i haven't been actively studying vietnamese because it's honestly just super hard guys... none of the resources i could find online are in my accent (hue) or particularly good/clear tbh :/ but i have been practicing informally bc i've been speaking a lot more viet recently since a family member came over from vietnam!

also i tried taking uni spanish but honestly it just wasn't fun :/ we were expected to do this "backwards learning" process where we watched the ABSOLUTELY MOST BORING videos before each class and we would just do practice sentences in class and then get like three hw assignments every day :/ like dude there are better ways to teach a language than this... not to mention the dumb projects and draconian attendance rules sigh honestly i didn't think it was possible to ruin a spanish course but i understand now... yikes

anyway, i'm focusing mostly nowadays on the actual courses i'm taking!

- physics (is my main priority because it's my heaviest workload - i'm enjoying it so far! it can be really frustrating and hard sometimes but that's the nature of physics i guess >u<)

- calculus (tbh i haven't done any of the homework... i just start the assignments and hope for the best)

- anthropology (this one can sometimes be interesting and sometimes be boring! it's not too much work overall but certain weeks it can get stressful.... and i have to get started on my essay)

- nazi germany (this is a night class so i'm always SO TIRED during the lecture... but the prof is good and super engaging! so i enjoy it ^_^)

and i've been sitting in on an orgo course! so fun!

#text #personal #studyblr

3 notes · View notes

mysticalmusicwhispers · 3 years

Note

👻 for vietnam please?

Oof the first ask of the batch—sorry for keeping you anon! And if you’d like a better explanation or more detail I’d rec @cupofkey!!! She’s very nice and gives God Tier Headcanons about hws Vietnam and SEA and all the helltalia nations in general. Highly recommended.

TW: I mention/talk about the Vietnam War briefly; nothing even remotely graphic but just a heads up.

Emoji asks!

👻: do they believe in the supernatural? Are they scared?

I think she does—she isn’t scared though, not normally. (Edit: the prompt said “supernatural” but I read “ghosts”, so mostly this is about ghosts...)

Seeing as nations are reps of the people, I think Vietnam believes in the Vietnamese folk religion that about 45% (according to wikipedia) of people practice. However, even if she doesn’t, ghosts are almost like an accepted fact in Vietnam (with a lot of ghost stories on the regular and people seeing monks and exorcists for advice on how to remove them), so just because it’s such an ingrained ig part of her culture, I think she does believe in ghosts.

So, ghosts in Vietnam: one becomes a ghost when one dies in an unpeaceful/violent way, isn’t surrounded by family at death, is neglected, doesn’t get a proper burial/funeral/rituals performed after death to help one pass on, or isn’t included in ancestor worship after death. Ancestor spirits who died good deaths can be called back to give advice, or just be helpful and benevolent guides to future generations. Ghosts with bad deaths often cause bad luck and trouble, and there is a feast in the seventh lunar month to feed lost souls and try to appease them and stop them from bugging/eating things humans find valuable as well as trying to help them and relieve their suffering a little; Buddhist monks will pray and ask Buddha to forgive the sins of ghosts and allow them to peacefully pass on. The festival is also for honoring deceased family and ancestors.

Another part of this is the amount of ghosts of people who died in the Vietnam War. There are a lot of unmarked graves and a push to find missing soldiers and bring them back to their hometowns so they can receive proper burials. There are also ghosts of civilians killed in the war, as well as foreign soldiers; there are 2 Americans and 1 Asian soldier, suspected to be a South Korean, in Ha My, the site of the Ha My Massacre.

So yeah. With the amount of ghost stories, belief in ghosts, and the remnants of war still very present, I’m pretty sure Vietnam would believe in ghosts, even if it’s only because she herself as an almost supernatural being exists, so why can’t ghosts? She tries to help any ghosts she finds; again, she’s not really /scared/ of ghosts. I think she’d feel more sad and sympathetic than anything; they were once her citizens, and sort of still are, and she feels she has an... obligation? To try and help them to achieve rest? So. I think she’d put out offerings a lot, esp on the ghost ceremony—trying to help them a little bit and ease their suffering for a while. Also just praying and lighting incense and stuff, intended specifically for ghosts who don’t really have family left and have died alone; soldiers and just civilians who’ve been killed brutally, and forgotten. She sometimes thinks that maybe she’s failed them somehow; there always seem to be so many—so many people she’s lost in cruel ways. She also asks /ancestors/ aka spirits of her past leaders how to settle things,,, how should she bring these people rest. Just. trying to help lost and/or trapped spirits in any way she can.

As for other supernatural beings, I’m not... entirely aware of many.... I think that again, she believes in the Vietnamese folk religion, so there’s the whole package of /ancestor/ (aka past citizen) worship, spirits/deities, ghosts, all that stuff. Not sure if that counts as supernatural but yeah. Most of the spirits from what I’ve read seem to be nature-related or ancestor/deified figures from folk legend; I think she definitely encountered at least the figures from folk legend in her lifetime somewhere. Perhaps they came to give her advice or just hung around,,, idk. But whether or not they actually had interaction with her, she definitely believes in them. And as I said before, I think she’s not scared; I’m not sure what angry spirits would be able to do, but seeing as she’s a nation, and their nation, I think the most any spirits would do is talk to her, but they wouldn’t try to hurt her.

also, key, please add on; I did a heck ton of research but this... doesn’t feel like something you can get to know just by doing research...

#also anon I AM SO SORRY for keeping you;;;; hope this is an ok response o - o #aph vietnam #hws vietnam #aph vietnam headcanons #emoji asks #answered #anon ask #musings #ask musings #headcanon musings #hws vietnam headcanons #aph #hetalia #hws #hetalia headcanons #aph vietnam musings

27 notes · View notes

cupofkey · 3 years

Text

hws vietnam’s name

so I mentioned it a few times but my name for Vietnam is Nguyễn Kiều Linh and I figured it was high time to make a post actually like. explaining my thoughts? hopefully this is somewhat interesting/informative :)

firstly, the last name Nguyễn [ŋwiən˦ˀ˥]/[ŋwiəŋ˨˩˦]. as I’m sure many of you know, this is the most common Vietnamese last name, with about 40% of the population having it. this stems from several instances in the past where people adopted it as last name because of the dynasty/political situation/etc, although it stems from the Chinese character/surname 阮, and thus Cantonese/Mandarin cognates are Yuen and Ruan respectively.

I chose this bc, well, it’s the most common Viet last name lol. I just think it works. I like it. I hc nations as each having their own reasons for their human names, and for Vietnam I think this is just something that came naturally to her. the Nguyen dynasty was the last Vietnamese dynasty and was responsible for uniting much of what we consider to be modern Vietnam... I don’t think that’s the reason why (she was Problematique), but I think it shows just how uniquely Vietnamese this name is. other big Viet last names are less recognizable/closer to their Chinese cognates imo, basically I just like Nguyen a lot :)

the middle name Kiều [kiəw˨˩]/[kiw˨˩] is an interesting choice on my part... for several reasons. firstly, it’s usually a surname or a male given name in Vietnamese these days. secondly, I took it from what’s regarded as the most significant piece of Vietnamese literature ever written, an epic poem published in the early 19th century called The Tale Of Kieu/Truyện Kieu. this was written during the Nguyen era; some people consider it a critical allegory about the Nguyen dynasty.

you can go check out the full synopsis, but basically it’s about a woman (named Kieu) who’s incredibly gifted but suffers greatly for the sake of her family. filial piety and all that. super fucking depressing. anyways, it’s a really significant cultural thing for Vietnamese people; many people have parts memorized (like my mom can recite half of the thing), and I think there’s a kind of national identification with the protagonist and her plight? Kieu is forced under the predicaments of her father and brother (and by extension the role women are forced to play), the motivations of the morally corrupt people around her, and the trappings of society in general. if you’ve read my post on Viet history, you know the theme of subjugation and struggle against all of those things is super common.

anyways, I think this is a name that Linh adopted during the onset of colonization in the late 1800s, as she felt more and more trapped under the conflicting pressures of her people (warring families, and later ideological splits), the motivations of the nations trying to stake some claim on her land, all of that stuff... Kieu gets a happy ending, somewhat, although it’s questionable whether it can even begin to alleviate all the suffering she endured. fate is a cruel thing in this story. I think Linh finds herself relating to that more and more, and she’s been hoping for that happy ending for a long, long time as things just keep spiraling out of control. it seems like the moment something bad ends, an even worse thing comes to take its place...

nowadays, she looks back on the name with a kind of bittersweet feeling. it’s a very central part of her, though, and she can still recite most if not all sections of the poem by heart.

I wrote a translation of the first six lines forever ago for a fic and I figured I’d share, because I think they perfectly illustrate what The Tale of Kieu is all about, and also because I don’t like any of the main translations lol. here’s the original then my translation:

Trăm năm trong cõi người ta, Chữ tài chữ mệnh khéo là ghét nhau. Trải qua một cuộc bể dâu, Những điều trông thấy mà đau đớn lòng. Lạ gì bỉ sắc tư phong, Trời xanh quen thói má hồng đánh ghen.

In the one hundred years of a human life, Prodigy and fate never cease their conflict. Enduring an overgrown ocean of sorrow, Those harrowing sights are enough to pain one’s soul. And yet there is no surprise in finding the good with the bad, And in Heaven’s stricken envy of a maiden’s rosy cheeks.

I’m an American but even I have those first six lines memorized lol. they’re very very famous. let me know if you’d like to hear more about Truyen Kieu. maybe I’ll read you some (the meter/rhyming scheme is wonderful, but all of the videos I can find have a really thick southern accent. which is cool except Linh is a northerner in my head!! I gotta read it in my northern accent! anyways!!)

finally, the first name Linh [lïŋ˧˧]/[lɨn˧˧] is one I think was given to her, like she was called that by others and it just stuck. it means spirit or soul: I’d like to think she’s, ya know, the soul of Vietnam, so they call her that. also just in general it’s quite a simple, common name for women. I have a family friend and a couple of relatives named Linh. it’s not too flowery nor grand, and so I think it’s perfect for her! this is the shortest section lol but I seriously just felt... this sounds right. this fits her. there’s Linh!

final side note, the IPA is all in the Hanoi dialect first (once again, the dialect I hc her to speak) then the Saigon dialect, for any of the linguistics nerds out there who are interested in those minute differences lol. let me know if you’d like me to talk more about those dialectal differences too!

anyways! let me know what you think! I would love to chat more about names, and I really wanted to explain myself a bit. thanks for getting this far!

#hetalia #hws #aph #hws vietnam #my hcs #my thoughts

25 notes · View notes

sillymarils · 7 years

Text

it’s incredible how, from a historical standpoint, girls were always politically involved, always ready to take a stand to bring about social justice. that’s kinda beautiful

#don't mind me i'm just thinking over these past few weeks #and as it was womens history month we watched a movie about Lucy Burns and Alice Paul in womens studies #and they were kickass!!#and i realized when we were watching a documentary about the 60s #that 6 out of the Little Rock Nine were girls!!!!#my textbook literally never mentioned them black girls getting erased from history once again smh #and now im doing government hw and i realized that hell!! lady liberty the very epitome of justice is a woman #and that girl statue they put in front of the bull on wall street like god bless now can we please have a woman president now thanks #oh and NOT TO MENTION women's participation in non specifically feminist movements like the gay liberation movement #or protesting the Vietnam war #ugh I'm getting emotional over history #and yes I am aware that I'm speaking in very American centric terms #Sara talks #*rants #feminism

0 notes

bharatiyamedia-blog · 5 years

Text

Donald Trump turns into first sitting US President to go to North Korea, agrees to revive talks with Kim Jong-un on Pyongyang's nuclear program

http://tinyurl.com/y5z6wlgn Panmunjom: With vast grins and a historic handshake, US President Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un met on the closely fortified Demilitarized Zone on Sunday and agreed to revive talks on the pariah nation’s nuclear program. Trump, urgent his bid for a legacy-defining accord, grew to become the primary sitting American chief to stroll with Kim into North Korea. The assembly, one other historic first within the year-long rapprochement between the 2 technically warring nations, marks a return to face-to-face contact between the leaders since talks broke down throughout a summit in Vietnam in February. Trump introduced after the assembly that the 2 nations had agreed to renew discussions within the coming weeks. However vital doubts stay about the way forward for the negotiations and the North’s willingness to surrender its stockpile of nuclear weapons. Trump’s transient crossing into North Korean territory marked the newest milestone in two years of roller-coaster diplomacy between the 2 nations, as private taunts of “Little Rocket Man” and threats to destroy the opposite have been ushered out by on-again, off-again talks, professions of affection and flowery letters. “I used to be proud to step over the road,” Trump informed Kim as they met in a constructing generally known as “Freedom Home” on the South Korean facet of the truce village of Panmunjom. “It’s a nice day for the world.” Kim hailed the second, saying of Trump, “I imagine that is an expression of his willingness to remove all of the unlucky previous and open a brand new future.” He added that he was “stunned” when Trump invited to fulfill by a tweet on Saturday. What was initially anticipated to be a quick change of pleasantries over the raised line of concrete marking the border between North and South – Trump had stated it will final “two minutes” – was personal talks stretching about 50 minutes. Trump was joined within the Freedom Home dialog with Kim by his daughter and son-in-law, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, each senior White Home advisers. As he introduced the resumptions of talks, Trump informed reporters “we’re not in search of velocity. We’re trying to get it proper.” He added that financial sanctions on the North would stay, however appeared to maneuver off the administration’s earlier rejection of cutting down sanctions in return for North Korean concessions, saying, “Sooner or later in the course of the negotiation issues can occur.” Peering into North Korea from atop Remark Put up Ouellette, Trump informed reporters earlier than greeting Kim that there was “great” enchancment since his first assembly with North Korea’s chief in Singapore final yr. US President Donald Trump meets with North Korean chief Kim Jong-un on the border village of Panmunjom within the Demilitarized Zone, South Korea, Sunday, June 30, 2019. (AP Photograph/Susan Walsh) Trump claimed the state of affairs was marked by “great hazard” however “after our first summit, all the hazard went away.” However North Korea has but to offer an accounting of its nuclear stockpile, not to mention start the method of dismantling its arsenal. The assembly represented a hanging acknowledgement by Trump of the authoritarian Kim’s legitimacy over a nation with an abysmal human rights file. Trump informed reporters he invited the North Korean chief to the US, doubtlessly even to the White Home. “I might invite him proper now,” Trump stated, standing subsequent to Kim, who talking via a translator, reciprocated that it will be an “honor” to ask Trump to the North Korean capital of Pyongyang “on the proper time.” Trump’s summit with Kim in Vietnam earlier this yr collapsed with out an settlement for denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. He grew to become the primary sitting US president to fulfill with the chief of the remoted nation final yr, after they signed an settlement in Singapore to carry the North towards denuclearization. North Korea’s nuclear menace has not been contained, Richard Haas, president of the New York-based Council on International Relations, tweeted Sunday. Haas added that the specter of battle has subsided solely as a result of “the Trump administration has determined it might probably dwell (with) a (North Korean) nuclear program whereas it pursues the chimera of denuclearization.” Substantive talks between the nations have largely damaged down for the reason that Vietnam summit. North Korea has balked at Trump’s insistence that it hand over its weapons earlier than it sees reduction from crushing worldwide sanctions. The US has stated the North should undergo “full, verifiable and irreversible denuclearisation” earlier than sanctions are lifted. Each president since Ronald Reagan has visited the 1953 armistice line, apart from George HW Bush, who visited when he was vice chairman. The present of bravado and help for South Korea, one in all America’s closest navy allies, has advanced over time to incorporate binoculars and bomber jackets. Trump stored to his blue go well with and purple tie, however ever the showman, sought to one-up his predecessors with a Kim assembly. The leaders met at a time of escalating tensions. Whereas North Korea has not just lately examined a long-range missile that would attain the US, final month it fired off a collection of short-range missiles. Trump has disregarded the importance of these assessments, at the same time as his personal nationwide safety adviser, John Bolton, has stated they violated UN Safety Council resolutions. Your information to the newest cricket World Cup tales, evaluation, reviews, opinions, dwell updates and scores on https://www.firstpost.com/firstcricket/series/icc-cricket-world-cup-2019.html. Comply with us on Twitter and Instagram or like our Facebook web page for updates all through the continuing occasion in England and Wales. !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s) {if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function() {n.callMethod? n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)} ; if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0'; n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0; t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,document,'script', 'https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js'); fbq('init', '259288058299626'); fbq('track', 'PageView'); (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_GB/all.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.9&appId=1117108234997285"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); window.fbAsyncInit = function () { FB.init({appId: '1117108234997285', version: 2.4, xfbml: true}); // *** here is my code *** if (typeof facebookInit == 'function') { facebookInit(); } }; (function () { var e = document.createElement('script'); e.src = document.location.protocol + '//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js'; e.async = true; document.getElementById('fb-root').appendChild(e); }()); function facebookInit() { console.log('Found FB: Loading comments.'); FB.XFBML.parse(); } Source link

0 notes

96thdayofrage · 5 years

Text

undefined

youtube

Joe Holsinger (Fmr. Aide to Leo J. Ryan): The gist to what I'm getting to is this: I received a lot of documentation, which I'll provide you here today, that indicates the strong possibility that Jonestown and the People's Temple, was in reality, a mass mind control experiment conducted by the CIA as a follow-up to something called MKULTRA which they conducted from the early 50s through 1974. They used to use the VA hospitals and state hospitals. They used the federal and state penitentiaries for their experiment.

Joe Holsinger (former aide to Congressman Leo J. Ryan):

... I had appeared on a public television several months ago, with a group of Black professionals, mostly psychologists and doctors. They invited me to appear today, to provide information that they thought... I might be able to help with the forum today, with their research. I appeared in Washington in February before the International Relations Committee and they made some statements, some charges, and documentation, which resulted in the Foreign Relations -- Foreign Affairs Committee, or International Relations Committee whichever they call it today. They voted to ask the House of that Committee and Intelligence to investigate my charges. They are currently investigating those charges by the House for that Committee on Intelligence.

Interviewer:

Can you tell us what the charges are?

Joe Holsinger:

The charges basically amounted to CIA contact with both the Burnham government there and with the People's Temple. That originally, it was my belief at the time I went to Washington that the purpose of our involvement there was to support the government of Burnham for commercial reasons and they use the People's Temple almost as enforcers to help support an unpopular government there, to keep control of the government Guyana.

There had been an article in the San Mateo Times in December of '79, which indicated that the Deputy Chief of Mission there, Richard Dwyer, was in fact the CIA Station Chief. He was the one that went to Jonestown with Leo’s party and he claimed to be slightly wounded, but there was a tape made at the time of the murders and suicides there with Jones yelling, “Get Dwyer out of here! Get Dwyer out of here!” The indications are that with Dwyer went back into Jonestown after Leo was murdered and was there at the time. There's great questions as to who shot Jim Jones and why? Wether Jones shot to shut him up?

The question also as to how all these people died and just when they died, which is all documented here. As soon as I came back from Washington because of my testimony, I started getting documentation from Berkeley psychologists called 'The Penal Colony' here. Then from the Alliance for Preservation Religious Liberty in Washington, which indicated other things. One of which was that George Phillip Blakey, was a top Jones aid and he was the man who arranged the purchase or the lease of the land in Guyana, provided the money, arranged the lease down in 1974. He is also now tracked as being CIA operative in Angola in 1975 with UNITA. He's also the same guy who was a top aide, who arranged all this purchasing and finances, is also the husband of Deborah Layton Blakey, who fled Jonestown and made those charges.

He's the brother in law of Larry Layton who was acquitted yesterday. And it is interesting to note that the Presidential Times Tribune says, yesterday, in an acquitting the jury appeared to have agreed with the defense contention that Layton was brainwashed and drugged at the time of the shootings and could not be held criminally responsible.

The gist to what I'm getting to is this: I received a lot of documentation, which I'll provide you here today, that indicates the strong possibility that Jonestown and the People's Temple, was in reality, a mass mind control experiment conducted by the CIA as a follow-up to something called MKULTRA which they conducted from the early 50s through 1974. They used to use the VA hospitals and state hospitals. They used the federal and state penitentiaries for their experiment.

Interviewer:

Do you think that Jim Jones was actively involved with the CIA?

Joe Holsinger:

I do now.

Interviewer:

Do you have any conclusions as to how the people died in Jonestown?

Joe Holsinger:

Yes, I have part of our documentation here is a report from - which is attached here. The Chief Medical Examiner in Guyana, Dr. Leslie Moto. He reported - and this is attached here - his opinion was that more than 700 of those bodies found in Jonestown were not suicide victims, but were murdered. They have based this on the injection marker in the upper arm. Page four of my statement here.

Interviewer:

By injection they died?

Joe Holsinger:

Yes, and by gunfire. There were a lot more people killed by gunfire than they've ever admitted so far. We even heard reports that there were about 50 men with guns ringing around there, so people couldn't get out. And very few of them did get out. According to the Chief Medical Officer in Guyana, most the people down there were murdered rather than suicide.

Interviewer:

Who is suppressing all of this? Are you implying the CIA was active in this suppression?

Joe Holsinger:

Yes. I am suggesting to you that a lot of things that don't make sense here -- I'm suggesting that the long delay in anyone getting in, the press getting in there, or anyone at all getting in there for several days, was caused by a deliberate attempt to manufacture the story, which has now been accepted and sold successfully to the American people.

Interviewer:

What is that story do you think the people are falsely accepting?

Joe Holsinger:

That in effect, this was a large group of disillusioned or rather, disoriented Black people who went down to Guyana and who turned their backs on this country, committed suicide, and we mine as well get rid of them. It's an aberration type of thing. I think that's the story that's been peddled. When you see the documentation here, you'll begin to wonder yourselves why the first reports report are 350 people died or 400 people died, and for several days that was report and then they started finding of more bodies when the first reports were that 500 fled in the jungle. The people examined the bodies the first time and counted them. Counted them by name, the types of people, men, women, and children. Turned them over.

Then a few days in they claimed to have found two or three stacks of bodies underneath those. It boggles the mind, the stories that were passed out. But they have apparently gotten away with, I think, with one of the greatest fabrications of recent years.

Interviewer:

What significance do you attach to the fact that the leadership of the Temple was largely white and the membership of the temple was largely black?

Joe Holsinger:

I mentioned that in here. I think that that's in part and parcel for the whole thing. I think it's what got me very suspicious about this whole experiment about the possibilities here, the cadre was all white. And yet, we think of Jonestown as a bunch of Black people who were committing suicide without mentioning the white cadre and that doesn't quite add up. I think there are racist overtones to the whole thing.

Interviewer:

What kind of racist overtones? What are you exactly alleging?

Joe Holsinger:

I'm alleging that the media picture was printed, or was painted rather. Then brought out in print and so on, was that you have to worry about these people because they're crazy, they'll do anything, they're not like us.

It's my impression at this time that they were conducting some sort of mind control experiment. For example, they had a very modern hospital down there, which they bragged about. So modern that that population, they had medical checkups for everyone, every day. There's no need for that unless you're conducting experiments where you having control groups and you're giving people their "vitamins" every day.

It's my guess that they were just using them as guinea pigs to see what they could do under isolated circumstances. They'd take them off to a jungle some place far away from everybody and get them there somehow. Then they were able to see how these various drugs worked on different groups.

Written by OurHiddenHistory on Thursday February 23, 2017

Permalink -

Recent PagesNo recent Page.

Pages overview »

Recent Entries'Operation Carlota' by Gabriel García Márquez (1977)JFK Assassination-era Dallas, JD Tippit, and George HW Bush and the CIA

with Joseph McBride