Vietnamese, U.S. vets begin trans-Vietnam bike journey
Vietnamese, U.S. vets begin trans-Vietnam bike journey
HANOI (AP): Nearly 80 riders, half of them veterans of the Vietnam War, began a 1,200-mile (1,920-kilometer) bicycle journey yesterday from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City.
The 16-day journey, called the Vietnam Challenge, has been organized by a U.S.-based group to help heal the wounds of the war, which left 58,000 Americans and some 3 million Vietnamese dead before it ended two decades ago.
The riders include about 40 U.S. and Vietnamese veterans, able-bodied and disabled, and others who simply want to take part.
Greg Lemond, three-time Tour de France winner and twice world champion, said his participation in the Vietnam Challenge would be "one of the most memorable events of my life."
"It's a beautiful event, a healing event," said Jerry Stadtmiller, 50, a former U.S. Marine who lost his right eye in a 1968 battle and now counsels veterans suffering from post-war trauma in San Diego, California.
"We are able to spend time with ourselves and spend time with other veterans both American and Vietnamese," he said shortly before the riders set off from the mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, who led the war against the U.S.-backed South Vietnamese.
Vietnamese veterans taking part echoed some of the same sentiments of their onetime enemies.
"It is a great opportunity to reconcile Vietnamese and Americans, to leave the past behind us and look forward to the future," said Tran Van Son, 49, a former North Vietnamese soldier who lost his right leg about the same time as Stadtmiller was wounded.
Son said he once harbored great hatred against American soldiers. A U.S. bombing raid on Hung Yen Province killed seven members of his family and wounded three others.
The event is sponsored by World TEAM - The Exceptional Athlete Matters - Sports, a Charlotte, North Carolina-based non-profit organization that specializes in sporting events for disabled people.
Twenty-seven of the 55 American riders are Vietnam War veterans. More than 20 Vietnamese are participating, about half of them veterans.
In a ceremony Wednesday, World TEAM Sports vice chairman Peter Kiernan presented a check for US$200,000 to Hanoi's Bach Mai Hospital to upgrade and renovate its rehabilitation department and install a new prosthetics clinic.
During a heavy bombing campaign conducted by the United States in the Christmas season in 1972, many buildings at the hospital were destroyed and many staff and patients were killed or wounded.
"I have never seen as many Americans together for purposes of good will and friendship as I have today," Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation head Bobby Muller said at the ceremony.
"Americans linger as ghosts on the landscape of this country, but when you ride along this country, you can dispel that feeling and it will provide a real live present of solidarity, friendship, love and compassion," Muller said.
Stadtmiller said he had been living with guilt since he killed a rifle-carrying Vietnamese boy during the war.
"The guilt is haunting me for the past 30 years. But I am releasing more and more. It is also a giving memory. When I talk to young children I tell them how cruel, ugly and terrorizing war is," Stadtmiller said.
"I talked to some American Vietnam veterans who came back to Vietnam and they said when they come back they have such peace in their hearts. That's why I wanted to come," he said.