Warrnambool’s Ken Cumming’s vow to meet up again with a young Vietnamese boy he befriended during his war service in Vietnam is set to be realised later this year.
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Mr Cumming, now 73, his wife, and their three sons and their families, will fly to Vietnam to meet the young boy whom the Australian troops called “Rabbit”.
Rabbit was popular with the troops because he would run fast to warn Australian troops of the presence of enemy Vietcong troops in Hoa Long, his home village.
Knowing little English, Rabbit would only say “VC” (for Vietcong) to put the Australian troops on alert to prepare for enemy contact.
Mr Cumming made friends with Rabbit, who was then aged about six, when working in Hoa Long doing “civil aid” work for locals as a medical and dental assistant with the 7RAR Infantry in 1967-68.
That friendship was nurtured by the fact that Rabbit was poor and hungry and Mr Cumming and other Australian troops regularly distributed food from their own ration packs as well as money to Rabbit and his fellow villagers.
Mr Cumming said curiosity about what happened to Rabbit had stayed with him over the decades and he decided to act upon it earlier this year.
He tried to place some advertisements in newspapers in the area in Vietnam where Rabbit had lived but the ads were not accepted. However his first ever public Facebook post got him an overwhelming response that led to Rabbit being tracked down within 21 days.
Mr Cumming said Rabbit, whose real name is Hoa, could speak no English so he had communicated with him through another man who lives nearby and understands English.
He has found out that Rabbit was seriously injured when the Americans bombed his village during the Vietcong’s Tet Offensive in 1968.
Rabbit was treated in hospital but has been left with disabilities. Now aged 58, Rabbit has family of his own and works as a cattle herder.
Mr Cumming expects the reunion will be an emotional but positive one.
Mr Cumming will also mark his war service by taking part in the Warrnambool service for Vietnam Veterans Day on Saturday.
The ceremony will be held at the Vietnam War Memorial, next to the Warrnambool RSL, at 6pm.