It always happens and without fail! Every time I come back from a long holiday, I suffer from withdrawals. It’s devastating effects include loss of appetite, lethargy, boredom and every often bordering on depression.Flashes of memory from the trip keeps haunting my mind. I look at the day and keep thinking, “Monday… I was doing this, this and this at here, here and here today… last week.” Having a photographic memory the potency of an elephant’s does not help to alleviate the pain. As a matter of fact, it makes matters worse.
Sigh… if I could just stop time and take all of it that I need to reel myself back slowly… slowly… like the gentle caressing waves on the soft faces of the sandy beaches along Cat Ba’s many sandy coasts at low tide.
But honestly… I am glad I was able to make the excursions in Hanoi, especially to Hoa Lo prison. The personal encounters I heard from a close and beloved relation became real to me; but made ridiculous and laughable by the outrageous and blatant propaganda about “Hanoi Hilton”. Its desperate and farcical attempts to obliterate the truth cheapened the events about and around it.
George Santayana reminds us that the lessons of history are invaluable in determining the course of the future: "Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it."
I once saw a slogan on a T-shirt:
If you can read this; thank the teacher.
If you can read this in English; thank the veterans.
How true... we owe those who sacrificed for us to live our lives full, to live our lives well.If you can read this in English; thank the veterans.
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