I wanted to talk about the scene where he is leaning against the star apple tree smoking a cigarette when the picture is taking. He talks about how the sun "crouches over him like a mama-san with her fleet flat going nowhere." Even up in the highlands he quotes that the sun is still there, and that the sun has blonded his hair even more than before. When i hear this I think that he was expecting to be able to fit in with his new family in Vietnam. He was hopeing that his hair would have turned black like his wifes. So it's upsetting to him that all the time he has spent learning and adapting to the culture that the sun still blondes his hair even more exploiting that no matter how hard he tries he will never be exactly like them. He still holds his American past and nothing can change that. I think it is funny how he kind of makes it into a humerous kind of deal about how it looks like he is waving to the camera crying for help when infact it is the total opposite. It kind of makes him nervous about what they say about him being "missing." Because he is not missing he is found. He has found his new life with these wonderful people who were told to be his enemies. The only enemies he knew was his family that he had left behind. These people were kind, family oriented people. The family that he had been longing to be apart of for ever since he was a young boy.
3 comments:
I never thought of his family as the enemy until after reading this post...and I think it's a good thing. I know that he talks about his "other" life being in America, and his new life being in Vietnman, and it would make sense that if he relates to Vietnam that the Americans would be the enemy. Not only were they the enemy because they were fighting agaisnt each other, but on a personal level, all Americans were the same to Butler....so that makes them the enemy.
I do see how his family can be the enemy, but as Ashley said, Americans in general would also be his enemies. They are the ones that are portraying him as missing in action, or as being held by the communists. This makes his new family the enemy and that is not what he wants, his new family is everything he wanted and he doesnt want to go back to his old life. And the picture taken of him is pulling him back.
I agree that it is the picture that seems to bring him back to reality. He has been living his dream with the Vietnamese: married a beautiful woman, created a wonderful child, and belonged to a united family. Then he sees this picture and it reminds that he's still an American on the outside, and always will be. I think it's very interesting that you comment on the fact that it was the picture that brought about this realization. It's as if he had emotionally and spiritually integrated into the community so fully that he forgot he would never be able to physically integrate.
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