I was looking through a box of old photos from my Air Force days and ran across some pictures of old bicycles in Misawa, Japan and Taipei, Taiwan, taken in the mid ‘60s. While stationed in Japan in ’65 and ’66 I had a 90cc Honda that I used to travel all over Northern Japan with my buddies. We were having the time of our lives, until one day they started to camouflage our squadron of F-100 Super Saber Jets. Now, there was only one place in 1966 that required military equipment to be camouflaged, yep, Vietnam.
I was an aircraft hydraulic specialist and knew that they were not going to take the planes without support troops, so we started selling off everything that we couldn’t take with us, which was everything but our tools and uniforms. After selling our motorcycles, we bought old bicycles for about 1800 yen ($5) and fixed them up with new paint, tires, etc.. Pedal power limited our range somewhat but it sure beat walking. The first two pictures are of my friends working on their bikes. When it came time to leave, I gave my bike to a Japanese man who worked on the base and walked several miles to work. He actually cried when I gave it to him. He spoke enough English to tell me what it meant to him and his family. It wasn’t uncommon to see a whole family (mom, dad and a couple of children) on one bicycle, pedaling around town
During our tour in Vietnam we got to travel to another country for 6 or 7 days of
R&R, so I chose Taipei, Taiwan. It wasn’t a luxury vacation but it sure was better than the “war zone”. There were cars and trucks there but most of the common people got around by some type pedal power. I can’t remember what they called the three wheeled rickshaw type vehicles shown in the pictures but they were used to move about everything. In one of the photos you can see one used as a truck to move a huge load.
Man, this has opened the gate to a flood of memories.
I was an aircraft hydraulic specialist and knew that they were not going to take the planes without support troops, so we started selling off everything that we couldn’t take with us, which was everything but our tools and uniforms. After selling our motorcycles, we bought old bicycles for about 1800 yen ($5) and fixed them up with new paint, tires, etc.. Pedal power limited our range somewhat but it sure beat walking. The first two pictures are of my friends working on their bikes. When it came time to leave, I gave my bike to a Japanese man who worked on the base and walked several miles to work. He actually cried when I gave it to him. He spoke enough English to tell me what it meant to him and his family. It wasn’t uncommon to see a whole family (mom, dad and a couple of children) on one bicycle, pedaling around town
During our tour in Vietnam we got to travel to another country for 6 or 7 days of
R&R, so I chose Taipei, Taiwan. It wasn’t a luxury vacation but it sure was better than the “war zone”. There were cars and trucks there but most of the common people got around by some type pedal power. I can’t remember what they called the three wheeled rickshaw type vehicles shown in the pictures but they were used to move about everything. In one of the photos you can see one used as a truck to move a huge load.
Man, this has opened the gate to a flood of memories.
