Wrap your laughing gear around one of these snags!
Last weekend in Saigon, the Vietnam Swans had a Club BBQ to farewell Muzza and Christina and to reflect on what has been achieved so far in 2009. Below is part II of the story looks at the ANZAC Day weekend in Thailand.
ANZAC Day Match, Kanchanaburi, Thailand
In May of last year, the Thailand Tigers invited us to their ANZAC Day match in Kanchanaburi, Thailand.
Patrick Stringer’s father was a Prisoner of War on WWII’s infamous Thai Burma Railway. While he survived the War, his health never fully recovered. Six weeks after Patrick was born, his father died.
Patrick, a Swannie from Hanoi, eventually decided to come on the footy trip. He explains:
Despite living and working in Vietnam for 4 years, and with the railway so close, I had not yet summoned the courage to visit. It’s not that visiting it was not important to me. It was very important to me. I had researched for years the details of my father’s capture in Singapore and his time in the forced labour camps. But I simply did not have the courage to stand in a place where I knew my dad had suffered so much, where he and countless others had been tortured and tormented. I did not have the courage to stand where young boys had died, crying out for their mums and dads. That place, hallowed as it may be, was an awful place, a place of death and dying and I did not have his permission to go there.
But I also knew that to connect with my dad I had to visit the significant places in his life, and this was perhaps the most significant place of all.
In the early morning darkness on 25 April 2009, Patrick spoke to us on the bus as we travelled to Hellfire Pass for the Dawn Service.
At the Dawn Service, the New Zealand Ambassador said:
The far off echoes you hear when you sit here quietly in the dark come from Australian pain. The distant cries you hear come from Australian hearts.
Whether you are religious or not, this cutting represents something which goes beyond our ordinary lives. Men – many of them no more than boys – lived and suffered and fell and died here. Where we stand.
Memories of home – of shimmering heat and cicadas and cold beer – sustained life here, and were lost here. Where we stand.
For the service at the War Cemetery in Kanchanaburi, the ex POW Bill Haskell said:
The prisoners were starved, overworked, exposed to diseases, harassed and brutally assaulted at the work place.
The established rules of warfare in relation to prisoners of war were abandoned completely in the frenzy to push the railway through.
We remember these men with great affection and deepest respect.
Later that morning, during the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery Memorial Service, the Vietnam Swans were invited to lay a wreath which had been provided by the Thailand Tigers.
Imagine that. The Vietnam Swans laying a wreath during the official service at the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery on ANZAC Day 2009. And, thanks to the Thailand Tigers, a Vietnam Swans wreath will now be laid at all future ANZAC Day ceremonies at the Cemetery.
Prior to the match against Thailand, both teams gave a standing ovation when the three ex POWs, Bill, Neil and Snow, arrived. After the match, everyone on both teams shook hands with them. Photographs were taken and beers shared.
A man in the crowd handed us an article about the 4th ex POW, Ernie Redman – “What it means to be Australian”. Ernie, who had made the trip to Thailand for ANZAC Day in each of the previous seven years, suffered a heart attack just two days prior to his scheduled departure to Thailand this ANZAC Day. Five days later, the same man in the crowd wrote to the Swans to advise that Ernie, the 91 year old, had passed away the previous day.
Those of us who travelled to Thailand reflected again on the significance of the 2009 ANZAC Day. The Hellfire Pass Dawn Service, the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery Service, the footy match played in front of 3 ex POWs and with the 4th in hospital… and now, there are just 3 ex POWs.
ANZAC Day 2009 in some respects has just given us a lifetime of daze.
Many people who saw the presentation of the tour were also moved. Feedback came from people such as the Sydney Swans CEO and Director of Football Operations.
The aforementioned speeches can all be found on this website.
Part III from the Saigon BBQ will look at the seriously awesome Kainey Cup held in Hanoi.