Dear Virginia,

Back in Issue No. 52, there was a letter from a TV over here in Vietnam. As one who is in a similar situation may I contribute a few comments on life in a war zone for one who loves and needs femininity?

As you can imagine I live only for the change to dress again, one reason more than average for wanting an “R & R." You know what it is like to not be able to dress. Imagine what it is like not to have any contact at all with femininity. To not see a single woman on the street for days or weeks at a time. To not even see, much less wear the things, the symbols of femininity that I love. Instead I am surrounded by un- painted plywood and gray metal. Olive drab, black, brown and gray are the only colors in my life at a time when I would rather have a little bright yellow or pastel blue. This lack of color is one of the minor things that makes Vietnam even more depressing.

Vietnam does have some of the loveliest women in the world. Petite, graceful, beautiful. In an Ao Dai (Vietnamese dress) they can seem fantastically beautiful, and in a western dress, well there is no comparison. Unfortunately the Vietnamese women that a G.I. meets work in the club or clean the barracks. Many of these are prostitutes, and the rest have been propositioned so many times that they think any American who tries to talk to them has sex on his mind. Local women who do not work on base are unapproachable. There is a gap that can- not be bridged. Take the impression given by drunken kids in uniform, throw in the language barrier, the differences in customs, and so on and you will see what I mean.

There are a few American women, nurses mostly. Nurses are officers, and they won't even talk socially to an enlisted man. Even talking to someone below the rank of captain in the line of duty seems beneath them. But no matter. In the four months I have been here I have yet to see one who looks like her hair has been brushed in the past 30 days. As for cosmetics - none of them seem to believe in their use. A typical off duty costume for one of these ladies is fatigue pants and a man's shirt with the tail hanging out. It's the kind of outfit that makes you wish women would dress like women. There are only three things that turn my stomach, wasted liquor, misused machinery, or women who let themselves go to pot like our nurses.

At least I have a chance to make it back to the world in one piece.

56