Do You Have the Guts?

[JayBros]

What some people will do for freedom and a better life!
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/a...yage-rcna59196

[pegasus1300]

They are very lucky. What did they do for food and water?

[BajaRon]

Serious enough, but pikers compared to these guys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaJv...hannel=NBCNews

[UtahPete]

Desperate people do desperate things. I can't imagine being in that state of mind.

[wyliec]

They are very lucky. What did they do for food and water?

What about sleeping and not falling off?

[wyliec]

Serious enough, but pikers compared to these guys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaJv...hannel=NBCNews

Did you say pikers?

https://www.ocregister.com/2015/04/3...ars-ago-today/

[UtahPete]

It's survival folks; 'guts' don't come into it. Y'all must be really bored to be playing 'top this' with other people's desperate circumstances.

[JayBros]

If you stop to think about it just a bit, one of the things they had going for them was the fact that during the sail the rudder probably moved not more then 10 degrees, maybe 15, port or starboard from dead ahead. Probably had quite smooth sailing too, and given the article's last paragraph they probably knew where it was headed when it left Lagos. Nevertheless...

[BajaRon]

Did you say pikers?

https://www.ocregister.com/2015/04/3...ars-ago-today/

America gets high marks for consistency. Sad state of affairs.

[oldguyinTX]

Did you say pikers?

https://www.ocregister.com/2015/04/3...ars-ago-today/

I was long gone before then, but I do know someone who was five years old at the time, and by a miracle she and her mom and dad were able to get out in that last wave. But so many others did not. Just another in a very long string of the U.S. deserting allies when we no longer have a use for them, the latest being Afghanistan. Wonder who's next?

[ARtraveler]

Please revue forum rule #2

We are getting very close...

[oldguyinTX]

Please revue forum rule #2

We are getting very close...

Whoops. Sorry. Sometimes my keyboard gets ahead of my brain. My mouth sometimes too. You can ask my wife.

[ARtraveler]

Whoops. Sorry. Sometimes my keyboard gets ahead of my brain. My mouth sometimes too. You can ask my wife.

My post was a GENERAL post to ALL the readers/posters. No ONE person is being implicated. The TREND is going the way I stated.

[BajaRon]

It's survival folks; 'guts' don't come into it. Y'all must be really bored to be playing 'top this' with other people's desperate circumstances.

I don't think it is so much a 'One Up'. At least for me. It's a reminder that people have suffered through a lot. Including what our founders went through in the old country which caused them to set out for a new country knowing full well there was a high probability that they would not survive. If memory serves me right. A good majority of them froze or starved to death the 1st year. And that was after a bunch died from just plain sickness. Wives, children... That has to be hard to watch. Knowing you are the reason they are where they are.

I think about these people when I think I've got it bad. That's where I'm coming from.

[JayBros]

Since I'm the bloke who started this, my reason for the original post was just to point out the lengths to which some people will go in pursuit of a better life. Their exploits are intriguing to me for three reasons:

1. In 1965 I saw many Vietnamese who implored us not to leave areas where we protected hard working farmers and fishermen from VC thugs and tax collectors who would return in a flash to confiscate the rewards of people who were simply trying to make the best lives possible for themselves and their families.

2. I have a good friend who escaped from Communist Laos in the mid 1970s with his wife and very young daughter. His wife was shot during their escape, most fortunately just a flesh wound.

3. Our d-i-l is Vietnamese, met our son in high school in VA. In 1975 her father, a civilian who worked for MACV, put her mother and four siblings on a barge in Saigon, bound ultimately for Guam, and told his wife essentially, "Go, I'll find you somewhere." The father sometime later joined a group of South Vietnamese, including some military men, who fought their way down the Mekong River to the South China Sea where they were rescued by a U.S. 7th Fleet ship. The family was ultimately reunited more than six months after the barge sailed from Saigon. The to date end of their exploits: two very accomplished and successful grandchildren.

[UtahPete]

Since I'm the bloke who started this, my reason for the original post was just to point out the lengths to which some people will go in pursuit of a better life. Their exploits are intriguing to me for three reasons:

1. In 1965 I saw many Vietnamese who implored us not to leave areas where we protected hard working farmers and fishermen from VC thugs and tax collectors who would return in a flash to confiscate the rewards of people who were simply trying to make the best lives possible for themselves and their families.

2. I have a good friend who escaped from Communist Laos in the mid 1970s with his wife and very young daughter. His wife was shot during their escape, most fortunately just a flesh wound.

3. Our d-i-l is Vietnamese, met our son in high school in VA. In 1975 her father, a civilian who worked for MACV, put her mother and four siblings on a barge in Saigon, bound ultimately for Guam, and told his wife essentially, "Go, I'll find you somewhere." The father sometime later joined a group of South Vietnamese, including some military men, who fought their way down the Mekong River to the South China Sea where they were rescued by a U.S. 7th Fleet ship. The family was ultimately reunited more than six months after the barge sailed from Saigon. The to date end of their exploits: two very accomplished and successful grandchildren.

I think we share much in the way of war experiences and compassion for the many innocent victims of these terrible conflicts.

[Cramdin]

Wow. Just goes to show you how desperate some people are for a better life, whatever that may mean to them. Crazy.