Alex Ditinno: Daily Life in Vietnam
Clip 3

Student: Can you tell us about your daily life in Vietnam?
Alex: I was in the Combined Action Program (CAP) unit. We lived out in the jungle and patrolled 3 villages. We moved from one village to another all the time. You didn't want to stay in one spot for too long. The enemy would try to find out where we were and try to ambush us. So, usually at about 2 a.m. we started to move around from one village to another. We'd come to a village around daybreak and set up with our core-men and help the villagers who were sick or hurt. We had medical supplies and we usually helped them build hooches (thatched huts) or teach them English. We held classes and did protection work for them out in the rice paddies or the jungle.

Student: How big were the villages? Were they about the size of a city in the U.S.?
Alex: Oh no, a village had maybe 20 to 25 hooches in it. So we're talking about maybe 75 people or so.