European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - September 19, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Magazine in Hue once Center of flare fighting in the Vietnam War Ivory adult Cut lion it to torn extent a Veteran. On the narrow Green coastal Plain lha winds North Tram Danang to the 17thparallel, once the dividing line Between Tvovi Ellams War stories Are told Fiol by soldiers atone some of the fiercest fighting of the american War look place in Hue and every adult is to one degree or another a Veteran among them the 50-year-old Buddhist Monk in his vegetarian Kitchen the poet an aristocratic woman of 78, tending her Orchards the Young Man barely 30, who sailed away in a rickety boat 10 years ago and has come Back to embrace the parents who suffered because of his Choice and the former Soldier from Hanoi still heartbroken by he loss of his first love who married another White he was at War. In Early 1968, at the time of Tel the lunar new year Hue and Danang Wei Lor a Lime at the Center of a fierce offensive a Campaign thai is now regarded As an at Empl by Hanoi to capture the Northern cities in what was Hen South Vietnam the former North vietnamese Soldier now living in Hue and others say troops had been sent into the area in 1967 to prepare for the Campaign Hue seemed ready to fall american and South vietnamese troops dislodged the communist farces in More than a month of heavy lighting and Hue and of Wang remained in Saigon s hands until the War ended in 1975. Residents of Hue Are unexpectedly Neutral when speaking with an american about the events of 1968. Outside and occasionally inside government offices the Battles Are called simply the War not the Standard american War of  a government official in a coastal town South of Hue said people understood that Many americans had come to Vietnam to fight for something they believed in. Sometimes the vietnamese seemed to be blaming americans less for what happened in Vietnam than americans blame themselves. A provincial official in Hue recounting the City s architectural history told a visitor thai residing was added in the 30 years of the puppet regime " Bui townspeople pointed to the amen can Buill roads the Bridge linking two halves of the City across the perfume River the Hue Central Hospital and the Huong Chang hotel once american officers quarters and now a focus of the City s plan la build a Louril Industry. Veterans recall the war9 by Barbara Crossette new Vowk times the tet Campaign continues to exact a deadly toll said Nguyen Dinh Ngo the lieutenant governor of Binh Tri Thien province of which Hue is the capital. Even this very minute while we Are sitting Here talking somewhere in the province someone is getting killed by he War he said Ngo said -4,000 to 5,000 people have died in peacetime White defusing or stumbling on unexploded ordnance. Thousands of bombs and mines have yet to be discovered he added. He said thai 230.000 people have been affected by toxic chemicals. The Young Man returning from a new life in the West under Hanoi s recently relaxed attitude toward refugees who want of visit Home and family said the War had an effect on More than bodies and buildings ii had altered the psychology of the people he remembered he said. In the View of his Emigrant who did not want to be identified the a totems arose from divided family sympathies in wartime and from the Steep postwar economic slide in me South As Hanoi tried to break the machine and impose communist orthodoxy those policies have now been abandoned. This Young Man said that on this trip for the first Tima in his life he quarrelled with his Mother. He had chided Hilr for behaving uncharitable to members of the family he said. She said to me and she was angry you have no idea what life has been like Here and you can i Ell me what to do " he recalled. In the Garden of a spacious Riverside family compound Nguyen Dinh Chi took a different View. Tong Cal the pen name by which she is known said that Little has changed in Hue except Hal the vietnamese people Are finally free. She was the Wile of a mandarin in Hue in the court of the last Kings of Vietnam. She was among those who made the decision after 1968 to join the rebellion against Saigon and the americans after the end of the War. She came Back to her family Home and began to Lurn its Orchards into a sustaining business. This year she spent six months in France visiting relatives. She Hopes to visit Boston where a sister lives but that will have to wait until diplomatic relations Are established Between Hanoi and Washington she said. At the 17th-Century 3