On my discharge, I had the challenge of putting my life back together but Vietnam stuck in the inner recesses of my mind.

Born in the Flint, Michigan, big boat sailing on the Great Lakes and skiing in the winter was how most of my youth was spent.

After high school and a year of College I made a half-hearted attempt at professional skiing in Aspen, Colorado and then found myself back in Flint.

On my discharge, I had the challenge of putting my life back together but Vietnam stuck in the inner recesses of my mind.

My home address is a small apartment in Fair Oaks, California but I'm here in Ho Chi Minh City right now staying in a rented room and this is where I spend a good part of every year.

Some 30 years later I found myself back here again [in Vietnam] on what was to be a short visit that lasted months, and since then I've been living my life with one foot in Ho Chi Minh City and the other in Fair Oaks, California.

Ho Chi Minh City is crowded, noisy, untidy and chaotic. I miss the orderly life of suburban America and the comfort of my apartment and my truck when I'm here, but when I get back in the USA I miss the craziness of Ho Chi Minh City or Bangkok.