Proposal
My platoon was patrolling through jungle in the Central Highlands in early 1968. We encountered a neatly maintained Montagnard village along our return route back to the company location. There was a celebration taking place, food and rice wine in jugs arrayed along the length of a long open sided hutch. The villagers were partaking and enjoying themselves. We set up security and I entered the village with SGT "Frenchy" Fontenot from Louisiana, who spoke excellent French. Hoping to gather information from the village elders, I asked Frenchy to speak to the chief of the village, who also spoke very good French. They exchanged words and the chief pointed to me and began to laugh turning to his friends and speaking in "Yard" and French. They were pointing at me and then at some young village women who were very attractive. "Frenchy! What the hell is going on?" I demanded. "Well, sir" he replied "I was trying to establish good relations with the chief." "What did you say to him?" I asked. "I told him you wanted to marry one of his daughters!"
At the time Frenchy's Cajun humor was lost on me and I told him to politely tell the chief that he had misunderstood me. The chief was a good sport about it and they hosted us for a short while until we moved on back to the company.
Posted by Gerald Koelling Nov 20 2003 05:30:08:000AM
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