Chapter/Story #9: Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong

I found this story to be weird. For the first 10 or 15 pages, I was lost and I didn't know the significance of the story. It didn't come to me until the end. Vietnam drove Mary Ann crazy and turned her into a whole different person. This may seem bad to readers but Mary Ann is satisfied with her new self and repeatedly states that her situation is not bad. It's hard to believe that Mark Fossie went through so much to get his girlfriend to come to Vietnam. If it is true, I'm surprised that the higher ranking men of the war let him bring her. That's a major distraction. It's easy to understand how the other men got attracted to Mary Ann because they weren't seeing any other girls during war. They probably miss their girlfriends or just looking at girls period. I found the fact that Mary Ann got so involved in Vietnam interesting. She wanted Fossie to show her the land and to get a feel for how people lived. Rat Kiley said that it was "like a cheerleader visiting the opposing team's locker room". Rat Kiley found it hard to believe that Mary Ann learned so quick since she was young and innocent but he also mentions that all of the men in the military unit were the same when they first came but they learned pretty quick. You have to make adjustments if you want to survive. I also found it weird that Mary Ann was focused on the job dealing with casualties where she learned how to clip arteries and pump a plastic splint and shoot morphine. She didn't even want to go home and said that everything she wanted is in Vietnam. I think the point of this story was to emphasize that when O' Brien and others went to Vietnam, they got deeply involved which is necessary. You might spend a significant amount of time in your life there. The irony in it is that Mary Ann was a normal female who knew nothing about war who got so deeply involved in it that it is rumored that she is still somewhere in the Mountains enjoying Vietnam. War affects human nature and challenges you mentally and physically. It affected Mary Ann and changed her into a whole different person.