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Books4Guys - T.C. Brown · Books4Guys

• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: No, TC, it's good to have you on, man.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: We've been messaging back and forth for a while now, and you reached out to me about your book, Maiden Taiwan, and I started looking a little deeper into it, and I was like, man, I don't even know.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: I can't even fathom some of the things that you experienced during your uh early transition, uh, a quick transition into adulthood.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: It was some of it wasn't the smartest things I ever did in my life.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, you know, you're young and uh, you know, you're not hurting anybody.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: You don't really think beyond that much, like no consequences.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, it's just me, right?
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, interesting topics.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, TC, how did you start from the beginning on how you even ended up over there?
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: Because I know I I saw where you were a military police officer.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't even know exactly what a military police officer does, but just talk about how you even got into that role and then ended up in Taiwan and just kind of where some of your what some of the experiences were.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I was uh when I graduated from high school, would have been 67.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, the Vietnam War was really starting to cook then, and uh guys my age were uh I I think when I graduated, I'm not remembering if the draft was right then.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: It might have just started or it might have started soon after.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's a long time ago.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, I worked for a while and I was accepted at Ohio State uh to start.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I just I don't know, I wasn't ready to go to school.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I played in a band back in those days, there was a famous national band called the Tijuana Brass Band.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I was in a band here in Columbus, Ohio, called the Buckeye Brass.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: And two of our horn players, one guy was good enough, he got in the first army band in Washington, and another guy went in another army band.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought, I don't want to go to school now, I'll just join and get in a band, right?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so I eventually, you know, I tried the Navy and they had a bunch of tests that I didn't do well at.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then Air Force guy just basically said, Oh yeah, go to go to basic, and at the end of basic, they'll ask you what you want to do, and uh, you tell them you want to be in the band.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, I'm like, that isn't quite how it works.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: I had three choices air traffic control, and my eyesight isn't good.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: So that that was out.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh cook, and after doing KP and basic training, no interest, and then cop.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I became a cop.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: In the Air Force, they call them security police.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: They had actually changed it from air police like the year before I joined because they wanted to show both sides of what they do.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: One is law enforcement, the other is garden airplanes and the bases and stuff like that.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So my first few months in Taiwan, I got shipped to Taiwan after basic in tech school, and I didn't even know where Taiwan was, to be honest.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't thrilled, but I went with some of the guys I was in in tech school, and so we got there in August 68, and I I walked around airplanes for three months, and I must have done something right because they called me in and said we're gonna take you to uh we were gonna move you down to town patrol, which was a great duty because I would live off base, I would work off base, and and there was a big bar strip down there that everybody went to called the Dirty Dozen.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, there's a lot more in the dozen.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so that's that's kind of what I did.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: I, you know, I got on the law enforcement side, and it was it was pretty exciting.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: And instead of just going down there to hang, that was my workplace, really.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, we covered everything.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: You know, some guys lived downtown, they'd have a burglary or always a lot of accidents involving GIs and Chinese.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: And we worked with Chinese police local and um military.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: So there was usually two of us, two Americans, and then two Chinese police.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: So and that's what we did.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: There was a lot of action, to say the least.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: So, true, truly one of those stories where you just you don't really know what you want to do at that age.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know this is an option, so you just jump in, and next thing you know, you're being shipped, shipped out of the country.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yep.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I was, and I was homesick for like six months, you know, but then I, you know, I kind of got used to it.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's a beautiful country, and uh the people are super friendly.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I like the job, I like the people I work with, you know.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: We were kind of all brothers in arms, if you will, you know, and uh, and of course I fell in love and uh that helped everything.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah, after six months, yeah, I was kind of I was I was feeling pretty good about where I was.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then uh of course I stayed.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: What did your just kind of going back, going through the experience of it all, what what did your family think of your decision or or because again I don't we don't hear about the draft really anymore about that really being a serious thing that young men have to go through?
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: At least not I haven't had to experience that.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's true.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I and I again that's another one of those things I'm like wow, that would be uh I can't really imagine what that would be like to all of a sudden hear my name called and I gotta go, you know, do something I'm not really thinking about.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: But what was just the the whole experience like for you to, I don't know, decide to do that and and what what was your family?
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: What was that like?
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: How did they feel about it all?
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, like I said, I I kind of did it, you know, being hopeful that I could, you know, I was gonna major in music in uh college, and you know, I thought, all right, well, I'll just get in a military band and that that'll keep me going, but you know, I didn't work out that way.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: But I, you know, I just I I just wasn't ready to go to school.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I knew if I didn't go to school, I mean I had a job, but I knew I'd be drafted.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're if you were drafted in those days, you went to one place, the army, and then you went to another place, Vietnam.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that that's a given for most guys.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so uh guys my age, you know, you felt the pressure, you know.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: You you know, a lot of guys uh uh tried to get out of it, you know.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um a lot of guys just said, okay, draft me, you know, and and people had different ideas about what they wanted to do.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: My family was not happy, of course.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the other, you know, I I grew up in Columbus, Ohio, which is home to the Ohio State Buckeyes, which is like a cult here in Columbus.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom's friends that are Buckeye fans.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah, yeah.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: We weren't too happy about it year-round.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we weren't too happy about March Madness recently, but that's the way it goes.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, so my um my mom and dad, you know, they never went to the university, but they went to all the football games for like, you know, my mom until she died, uh almost 60 years, she went.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: So they were excited about seeing me in the marching band, you know.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that had to be a big they never said that to me, but I know it had to be a big disappointment.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: I thought about that much later in life, really, you know.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: I I be honest with you, I guess I was focused on what I felt I had to do and wanted to do.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I had I had some pretty good parents and they, you know, they they got through it okay.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: No, I'm sure a lot of people did.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: And again, it's just kind of one of those experiences of the times and what's going on.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of something you just have to accept.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: And once you make that decision, you you're all in.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: You can't really flip up.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you can't say, Oh, I changed my mind.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Trust me, that first night in Basic, when when they kicked in the door about 5 a.m.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: after we'd had about three hours' sleep, I was ready to say, I want to go home.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: I made a mistake.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're stuck now.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, you are stuck now.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: The fun had just begun.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: Well, talk about some of you're over there now, you know.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: So you you you you enroll, you you're sent overseas.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: Talk about some of the stories and some of the experiences, you know, don't give everything away, but talk about some of the stuff you went through and just some of the things that you just got you got experienced, you know, into and what did all that look like?
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, you know, when you, you know, I I found the side of when you become a cop, you know, now I'm gonna talk about when I was on town patrol because otherwise we're just walking around airplanes all night, all day, you know, and that's an important job, but that thankfully not too much exciting ever happened there.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, you know, down on town patrol, you know, part of our job was patrolling the bars like a couple of times a night, walking through, looking for drunk guys, passed out guys.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you'd find a passed out guy in the bathroom, you know, sometimes there'd be trouble and you'd have to go down there.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and so there was all that.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I just remember when I first started doing it, I was real nervous because, you know, when four cops walk into a bar, like usually it kind of quiets down, and you know, nobody's really thrilled to see you except maybe the management.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so you, you know, you're kind of the center of attention for a while, which I got used to eventually, and I, you know, it didn't bother me.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: But at first it was like very weird, you know.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And but you know, you never know what would happen.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: I uh we would cover everything from bar fights to, you know, guys uh getting in trouble.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like one time a bunch of guys went in a bar and they didn't, you know, they they were mad because of something happened the night before and they just they would sit there and they didn't want to leave, you know, and so you have to go deal with that kind of stuff.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: You guys, you know, you have a lot of guys that want to kick your butt, you know.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I wrote in a book, like it was funny because I guess this is not always, but a lot of times the bigger guys would maybe listen to you, but the little dudes, man, they're they're ready to take you on, you know.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: And approved.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: I wrote about one incident in when we, you know, we had a that's in uh Taiwan is in Typhoon Alley, it's called.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: And when I was there all that time, probably had at least four or five typhoons come through, sometimes tail in.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: But uh we we had to clear the bars out.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: This one guy, you know, he just we walked in and he said, Hey man, you gotta go.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, no, I'm not going.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and so then he just launched off and we're trying to re I mean, girls are screaming, glasses are breaking, we're crashing into tables.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Well, and you're seeing you're what, 18, 19?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: I got there at 18.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was 19 on town patrol.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I turned 19.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Just a kid.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well yeah, well well, and I I'm assuming, you know, a lot of people in these bars are are probably the same age, but there's probably some older guys too.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, and you're you're having to be the enforcer and leader at that point.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: I can imagine that's just a very odd feeling.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and you kind of mentioned it as you kind of started, you're probably like, man, uh how do I enforce the rules here?
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, what yeah, I'm sure that was uh a little unique.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, yeah.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: And you, you know, and you're you you never know what somebody's gonna do, you know, too.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, luckily, you know, we all like there was usually two of us, most most times.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now, once in a while you'd be by yourself, but you still have the Chinese cops, although they depending on the cop, they wouldn't necessarily get in.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: Some would, you know, help you out, and some were a little more standoffish.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: But uh yeah, and you know, but if it's you know, we call older guys usually they're lifers, you know, they they were gonna do 20, so you know, and then they like to party too, you know, and they weren't always uh doing the right thing either.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, you but you know, you're the law, right?
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: And you represent that and uh they know that for the most part.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, it was you know, you have a lot of responsibility.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you know, if you went through my book, you will see I uh I kind of walked the dark side a few times, you know, that people that uh did stuff that I did wait a rest.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I was gonna say, I mean, you you obviously have some off time as well, and you're probably looking for stuff to do, and you're a young man.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone's, you know, you don't have a ton to go do except hang out and do what everyone else is doing, and and you talk a lot about that, you know, side of it.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: What um did did you ever have to, I don't know, did you ever get arrested by one of your peers for No, usually my peers were with me doing the same stuff that I was doing, you know.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: Now we, you know, don't get me wrong, we weren't too crazy, but you know, we you know, just uh uh drunk and disorderly, right?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you could say we were drunk and disorderly at times, but it helped be in the law.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: I know that's not really the right thing to do, you know.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: That's not being a good top, but it is wonderful.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm being honest.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: I you know, one thing I liked about this book that everybody that's reviewed it has given it thumbs up for honesty, and which I really tried to do.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what part of the hesitation at writing it, because I knew I wasn't gonna shield stuff that I I wanted people over the I've been a journalist for a long time and retired now, of course, but over the years I would tell people different stories that are in that book, and they say, Why don't you write about that?
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't quite get the right venue.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then uh my wife told me, so why don't you write a memoir?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: I started researching it, and that was perfect, you know.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And it took me a couple of years to write, and uh I actually had an agent in Washington, D.C.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: that liked it well enough that she tried to pitch it, but you know, nobody knows who I am, so my memoir, like why do people you know, they want to make money, the publication houses.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: How many TC, I'm specifically I'm just curious about like the military police, because again, I don't know a lot about it.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you were there?
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, you said two was usually on shift, but how many, how often were you working?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: How many, how many in total were there with you?
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: Was there 20 police officers on rotation?
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: Just just like No, not that many.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: More like a dozen Americans.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, like I said, we there would be Chinese military cops and civilian cops too.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, there was about a dozen.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it was considered primo duty because you got paid more for you know living off base, and we lived in a hostel.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, the economy there is just you can live like a king, you know, really.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so um a lot of guys had a separate apartment, you know.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: And uh but yeah, it was 12 guys.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I I don't I I guess I tried to, you know, I was spit shined.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I did what they wanted, and I suppose maybe that's that's why I got chosen.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was shocked when they picked me.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: I had no idea.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was aware of town patrol, but I I don't remember that I had asked to be on it or anything.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't recall that I did.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: So it was primo.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: Were there times when you felt, I mean, just straight up, did you feel scared for your life, you know, with what was going on?
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: Were there moments where things got a little dicey and you were like, I don't this yeah, you you kind of learn, you know.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, yeah, there were like I said, there were plenty of times people are trying to clean your clock, you know, and you're you're doing your best.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not a big guy, you know.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, like I remember when my buddy Ulysses Bryant came from, he was on the Boston Armed Forces Police, and he came to Taiwan and he was my partner, and I write about this.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: There's like one we get called to this gigantic brawl going on outside of the uh front of the bar.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm I start to go in there and he grabs me and he goes, Hey, no, we're not gonna go in there.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna let him, we're gonna let them tire out.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when they throw somebody out, we'll grab that guy.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: Let him let them wear themselves out, which is very wise.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: That was very wise.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, you learn over time, you learn over time.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: You have to to survive.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: But just in general, with what was going on over there at the time with with the war and everything, I mean, were there were there times outside of just your duty of kind of keeping the peace where you were at, where you felt in danger or where you thankfully not because of your role, you weren't having to go be in the you know, the front lines of some of the stuff going on, but like just just your whole experience, what was that like?
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm I'm trying to get you a little more light here.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, I um, you know, I think uh the one I mentioned a little bit ago, the uh fact that so it would there was a lot of racial problems at that time, you know, frankly, like there was in the over here.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, that time I mentioned like going in the bar and all these guys were doing a sit-down, you know, and I was that was the day I was by myself.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I mean I had the Chinese cops, but these guys were, you know, they weren't doing anything.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: They weren't doing anything, they weren't buying anything, they weren't causing trouble.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, that Amazon wanted them out of there or start buying stuff.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: They they were doing it because a buddy of theirs had either been slow walked or not served the night before.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: So they're saying, okay, well, we'll show you.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so I knew, I mean, it was me and a whole bar full of dudes, and uh, I'm thinking, how am I gonna get out of this?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so I I be honest with you, I just I just I wrote about it and I just like I was so sick of the racial stuff, you know.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I just hate that stuff, and uh, you know, I it's unfortunately we still have it, you know.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: But uh so anyway, I I just went out of my mind, I guess.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: I at one point I just took my hat off, threw it down on the jukebox, and said, have at it, boys.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: I know I can't stop you.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you'll you'll have to pay down the road.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: And somehow whatever I said got through to them, and they they you know, they didn't do anything, and then they eventually left.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I was nervous then.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: I was pretty nervous.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: No, and I'm just sitting here, T C trying to to put myself in your lens and see things on on what you what you saw and what you experienced.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: And again, I did I don't think there's anything I can do to truly experience it.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad you wrote your book though, because it does want to give more insight.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, to to all these things that went on.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because you were over there from for what five years, 18 to 23?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: I I went, I got there in August 68, and in February 70, I went to Vietnam.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: And because I took what they called a short reenlistment uh at the end of Vietnam, I got out of Vietnam a couple months earlier, but then I had four more years in the service.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I did, I I don't want to give it away, but I did that for a particular reason uh that's at the beginning of the book, and you know, that I wanted to go I wanted to go back to Taiwan.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: We can say it had to do with a young lady, and uh I was intent on.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't give it away either.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, that's right.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, I you know, but so I was in uh Vietnam for about seven months, eight months, something like that, and which was enough.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that was fun.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: But uh yeah, I was a little nervous there too.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: We you know, we got hit with rockets and mortars a few times.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I was riding on some of these uh missions at night that I didn't really have to do and probably would have got in trouble if my base was because I worked in an off-ground, off-base, underground tactical operations center with army guys, Army of Vietnam, popular militia, that kind of and so you know I the the guys the army guys didn't care, they just left them you want to fly in a chopper, go for it anyway, you know.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: It was exciting.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, well you seem to have a very like positive appreciation for what you got to experience, which but I'm gonna ask the question anyway of are there any regrets that you sometimes have of making that decision, or or did you do you appreciate everything you got to experience?
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: And what are some things that you took away as a man from that experience?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: And what are some of the things you appreciated most?
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, so you know, obviously you do some growing up, you know, I guess no matter where you are, 18 to 23.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was 18 when I left, 23 when I came home.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: So you do a lot of growing up there, and I certainly did, and you know, I learned a lot about people.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: One of the regrets is, you know, I was in Taiwan four years.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: I could have learned Mandarin.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: I I could kick myself for not doing that.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: A couple guys did.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: By the time I left, I could I could understand a conversation between two Chinese people, you know, for the most part.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: Even today, if I hear somebody speaking Mandarin on the street, I know it's Mandarin.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: So that is a regret.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm just trying to think, you know, the land is uh so beautiful.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I I might have told you I'm going back actually in about a month.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, a month from today, I'm going back for the first time in 53 years.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, yeah, I'll be there three weeks and then I'm going to Phuket, Thailand for a week.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: I thought, yeah, you know, I'm not getting any younger, so what the heck.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, yeah.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh surreal experience that will be, though, going back.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I would love to catch up with you when you do return to the stage just to hear some of the the things you get to experience and things you get to see, and maybe some of the memories it brings back.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh a lot of time has passed, you know, since you were there, but I'm sure there's gonna be some feelings that arise that were, you know, maybe what you experienced when you were there, which will be pretty interesting.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I a couple of my smart alec buddies wanted to know if I was gonna go try to track down my old girlfriends.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: I said, no, I don't think so.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that's gonna happen.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: That would be a movie.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, and that would be well, so you know, a number of people who have read this book have suggested that there's a series in this or maybe a movie, which I you know, I mean it's come from more than one person, so yeah, it makes me feel good.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I actually did when I got my book got reviewed in the Taipei Times last summer, and that prompted a couple podcasters to reach out, a YouTube guy to reach out, and also a guy that was over here in the U.S.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I he worked for somebody like Discovery or something, and but he's got his own production company over in Taipei, and we're gonna meet up, I hope.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I'm gonna talk to him about it.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he reached out to me, you know, originally, and he's he's kicking around some ideas.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: Now, whether that happens, I don't know, but that would be kind of cool.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm not gonna argue with it.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: No, I mean, it's a great again, you know, we've seen a lot of shows and movies that that talk about this or one story or another, but it never there's always something new to I mean, your book, I again being a military policeman over there, I don't I don't really know what the responsibilities of that look like, you know, and I haven't seen a lot about that during that time.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: So your your book to me is very unique in that it's it's yours, it's your story.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: There's things in there that haven't been shared before.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so I could certainly see the the potential there to to do more with it, which is a really cool thing.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, the guy at the Taipei Times, when he was talking to me about the review and asked me, and I hadn't researched it, but both he and I did.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: No other person has written a book about uh Americans' times at that time and during the Cold War, uh, from that region.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the only person right now so far that's done that.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: So that's that's kind of cool too.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and that's beyond that's what's prompted me because people kept saying, Wow, these stories are crazy.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: You know, why don't you write about it?
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that's That's fine.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: It took a while.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a little slow sometimes, but I get there.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: Did you grow up journaling or or writing at all?
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like did you write while you were there at all?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Or is this something you did later in life?
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, I really didn't.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was a big reader, you know.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I've always been a big reader, but the first thing I ever got published was I was still in the service.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: I was back in Northern California and, you know, getting, you know, kind of getting radicalized a little, I guess.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I was I was tired of the military.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think you're tired of that, you know, cut your hair, blah, blah, blah.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I I wrote a a little piece that was signed by a bunch of guys, and it they put it in stars and stripes.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that would have probably been, let's see, I got out 74.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: That would have been right 70, yeah, probably late 73, early 74.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: I I have it somewhere, but but no, I never hit me.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: And how I got there was um I I started out at a couple of I stayed in the Bay Area when I got out of the service, and I went to a couple junior colleges.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the second one I went to, I was getting ready to go to San Francisco State as a junior, and I didn't know what I wanted.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I uh had a couple ideas, but I took a test.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't know what the technical name is, but it's like an interest test.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: It compares what your qu answers are to people successful in their careers.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: And journalist was one musician, journalist, and so I thought, hmm, okay.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I got to it, and it worked.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it worked.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome, that's amazing.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, TC, I've got one more question for you because I ask everybody this who comes on the podcast, and you said you've been a big reader your whole life, and I would like to know what's a book or two that has meant a lot to you personally or professionally.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: And if people like myself or say, hey TC, I need uh I need I'm I need to pick up another book.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: What's a good book recommendation that you'd give me?
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that first part of your question is hard, you know, because I've listened to your podcast and I I was thinking, what what book, you know?
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess there's so many, you know.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought It's a hard question.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, I mean, sometimes it depends on the part of my life I'm in, you know.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was going, you know, 20 years ago I was went through a bad period and I I started looking into guys like you know, Wayne Dyer or Michael Singer and and people like that, that you know, it's more of a you know learning about not being unhappy if things don't go the way you want them to go.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying that exactly right, but you know what I mean.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: But I can tell you like some of my favorite authors are Elmore Leonard.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: Elmore Leonard is, you know, he's gone now, but man, every book he wrote is awesome.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, Don Winslow, I've got all of Don Winslow's books.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Carl Hyacon.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Every book of Carl Hyacons is hilarious.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I would recommend those to anybody as authors.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's and I know I I I think about it all the time.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: When I ask that question, I kind of rerun it in my certain points.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: What's yours?
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I it's kind of like you when you're at different points of the year, even or different at times in your life.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a few years ago, I was I would have probably answered it differently.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I have my two go-to books now that I I recommend to a lot of people.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: One of them is is Question Behind the Question and uh QBQ, and it's just one that talks about being a servant leader, and I read it every year to start the year, just kind of to tune my head in to be a good, you know, peer, husband, friend.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then I'm a big sports fan, and so I always find I always find it fascinating on how the best of the best athletes and coaches get to where they're at.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I love more the mindset part of it.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: And uh the Tiger Woods book that came out a few years ago, it was really interesting to me because it just talked about more about how his dad was and how he grew up, and it kind of like talks about why Tiger may think the way he thinks or talks the way he talks, and just how that killer instinct came about on the golf course.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so it it really just gave me more insight to why he is the way he is, you know, why he was so good on the golf course, why he had trouble off the golf course in certain areas of his life, which also kind of stemmed from him seeing how his dad was.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was just really you know, but but I've done the same thing.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: I've read about like Tom Brady and Peyton Manning and John Wood and so I just love the way they think, and just it's interesting to me how that all comes together.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, it opens doors, right?
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: That you maybe you don't think of, you know.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's the that's the beauty of reading for me, anyway.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, not only entertaining, but you know, uh I I read both.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: I read fiction and nonfiction.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, same here, same here because I I take something from it all.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love learning new things, experiencing new things, and so yeah, that's uh and that's the whole point of of Books for Guys.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: And before I let you go, TC, you know, I definitely want to publicly thank you for your support of being a part of Books for Guys and helping helping our mission.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: And we're very proud to have your book spotlighted on the website and highly recommend everyone picking it up and and reading it.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: And hopefully at some point too, maybe we'll see it on on Netflix or on the big screen somewhere.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, who knows?
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Possibilities are endless.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: All my friends tell me they have to get somebody better looking to play me.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't argue with that.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have any candidates, but I'll think on it.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, with all this uh AI stuff, yeah.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure they could touch you up and make you look real good.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no kidding.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of scary.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, TC, this has been uh an honor and a pleasure, my friend.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate it.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: I yeah, I and I I love what you're doing, getting books to people who might not read.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think that's important stuff, really is.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, TC.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you.