Jay hunts Bear or Bear hunts Jay: A Vietnamese American Hunterâ?Ts Tale.

You're a dead meat . I am gonna tell Jay. Bear is an endangered species. One time I receive a letter from my mom's cousin from VN in 1999 saying that he was using bear's gall bladders to treat his back problems ang told me to find some for her to treat her cancer. I was furious and sent back a letter saying we would do no much thing . Thanks to modern medicine, she recovered. Did you keep the gall bladder just in case?
I like to skin people myself. So pardon my comments.
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Jay hunts Bear or Bear hunts Jay: A Vietnamese American Hunterâ?Ts Tale.

Since I was 12 years old, I had followed my father to many hunting trips around the country. For some reasons, hunting was one of my father most favorite sports. Why my father had selected hunting among other good sports was beyond me. But it seemed he had great love of it. My dad owned a great collection of guns, bows and arrows for hunting. One night during our dinner, dad told us his stories about hunting tigers with my grandfather back on his good old days. Years ago my dad went with his father to many hunting trips. He recounted the quote ?ocọp Khánh Hòa, ma Bình Thuận,? Khánh Hòa tigers, Bình Thuận ghosts, as he made the comparison. Tigers and ghosts were most fearful phenomenon in Việt Nam at that time. However, Bình Thuận ghosts were unreal to him, but Khánh Hòa tigers were. Dad admitted hunting those vicious creatures was a difficult task. With his tiger hunting experience, my dad had the confidence that he would successfully hunt any fiercest animals in America.

?oCha nào con nấy,? like father like son, was an aphorism I heard from some Vietnamese elders. Twenty some year later dad had a son who would also love to hunt. Like my dad, I would travel from Alaska to Zenith, from A to Z, for hunting. America was a great land for avid outdoor sportsmen like us. Living on this great land, we hunted and fished freely all year round at any place, and of course where it?Ts permitted. After hunting for so many years, I thought my dad was tired of eating deer or white tail deer, elk, moose, wild hog, turkey, quail, or pheasant. Maybe that was the reason why he mentioned hunting of Khanh Hoa tigers. But there wasn?Tt any wild tiger in America. The wildest vicious animals in America would be North American black bears, mountain lions and grizzly bears. I could count no more.

Last year we decided to take on these animals. It was my obligation to please my dad. Therefore I accepted his invitation to go hunting some wild and crazy bears. We decided to spend a week at Halifax and Northampton Counties in North Carolina. My dad had this trip planned. He did some careful researches and seemed to acquire good concept of bears hunting. After all, hunting bears was a dangerous game and nothing should be overlooked. My father called a friend, a lawyer in New York City, and got his permission to hunt on his North Carolina?Ts estate. The week after Easter, we packed our equipments, made final checks then we went to Charleston.

The cabin was located inside jungle of hardwoods and pine trees. From the airport, we drove a sport utility vehicle for hours through rugged terrain to get here. It was quite a bumpy ride. This place gave me a terrible feeling when I arrived. No one was here for long time. I could smell the staleness in the air. The cabin provided us minimal support for comforts. We slept in sleeping bags. To stay warm, we kept the fireplace going. We also used the fireplace to cook our foods. To relieve our human waste, there was an outhouse. Actually it was a simple shed with holes dug below and a few wooden seats with bottom opened. Imagine sitting your behind on top of it at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, zero degrees Celsius, and the wind chill factor below would freeze your manhood stiff. The water was in limited supply in here. We tested water from the well and found it inconsumable. I wouldn?Tt take a shower with that water either. No wonder why my dad brought lot of deodorants with him!

After we settled and made ourselves comfortable, the fun began. Next day, we went inside the woods to set up our hunting post. We didn?Tt waste much time since there were many tree platforms had already been set up. The tree platforms were good spots around a swamp area where we would leave our bait. Depending on the wind direction, we could choose the down wind platform at the time we hunt. My dad knew it all. He brought with him slabs of animal fat and stale bagels soaked with honey. We found a cutoff oil barrel and put these items inside. We then guarded it with logs on top and tied it down. We left the bait barrel about 20 yards, roughly 18.2 meters, from us. But to attract bears, we would have to burn some wood and placed honey inside a can. Dad said that any bear could smell the scent of burnt honey over a mile away.

The first day of bear hunting was not that bad. We got dressed and camouflaged ourselves from head to toe. We looked exactly like a couple of trees. Dad sprayed me with some kinds of scent shield to eliminate human scent so bears with sensitive nose wouldn?Tt smell us. He even put on his scent shield underarm deodorant. I told him: ?oGees dad, like bears do care about your armpit odor!? We then placed baits. We had no problem selecting our hunting platform. We proudly climbed on top of the platform then waited all day long. While we were waiting for the bears to come, we could do nothing else but talked, joked, drank coffee and minced MREs. For the first time in my life, I ate some MREs. The Meal Ready to Eat, thus MRE, packets my dad bought from the Army Navy store tasted so awful. Except for the oatmeal cookie, my beef teriyaki was so bad. How soldiers could eat these stuffs was beyond me!

Well, bears did not come the first day. They didn?Tt even come the second and third day either. We acted like two idiots who had nothing to do than sitting on top of the trees in the middle of the woods and telling life stories. However, while I was alone with dad, in a sudden I found him very interesting. He was a good comedian. He told me jokes about some bear hunters: There were two guys, Jay and Tom went to a bears hunting trip. When they got there, Tom stayed in the cabin. Jay left to hunt. Jay found a bear then he shot the bear. But he missed so the bear angrily chased him. Jay ran back to the cabin, opened the door then fell down. The bear ran so fast, he tripped over him then fell inside the cabin. Jay quickly stood up and closed the cabin door. He yelled ?oHey Tom, why don?Tt you skin this one. I go get another one.?

I had a good laugh at my dad?Ts joke. Because of laughing, my dad had to climb down the tree to go empty his bladder. ?oDon?Tt go away.? He said. I didn?Tt answer him. Alone by myself, I looked inside the swamp and sunk deeply into my thoughts. The colorful flowers blossomed everywhere. It was so beautiful. Even though I was dreaming, I still had the consciousness to witness some strange things happened. In middle of the flowers bed, there were some black things moving toward me. Then a couple small black cubs appeared. ?oOh my god, it?Ts the bears.? I murmured to myself. My instinct told me to pick up the rifle and aimed at the targets.

Two cubs came within my rifle range. They were small and so cute like my stuffed teddy bear at home. Both of them weight around 80 pounds, or roughly 36 kilograms. I observed their activities through my rifle?Ts scope. One bear went near the fire and sniffed the burnt honey. This little bear pushed the can with its paws. It tried unsuccessfully to shove the hot honey can out of the fire. The honey can was too hot for it to handle. Other bear went after the bait and pulled the barrel down. In a sudden, they stopped their activity and looked over my direction.

Looking down from my tree, I saw a huge black bear wandered below. ?oOh my God, where is my dad?? I was panic. The bear weights at least 400 pounds, 180 kilograms. I pointed my gun down to this giant but realized that my detachable magazine was in my pocket. Dad told me when a bear approaches, I should stand still and never move my body until it reached the rifle range. Then I should pick a vital part of the bear and shoot But there I was, stood frozen, had no bullet in the gun?Ts chamber and scared to death by the size of this bear. Fortunately the big one walked slowly toward the cubs and jointed them digging into the bait barrel. I assumed this bear is the mother of the 2 cubs.

Somehow I managed to get the magazine out of my pocket. I slowly loaded it into my gun. This was a nice feature of my Winchester 7 millimeter magnum rifle. This gun earned me so many marksmanship trophies since I began using it in high school. I could comfortably have it loaded so fast and made so little noise with ease. I aimed the gun at the bear pack but could not bring myself to shoot at the mother. Even though I knew with this powerful gun, I could knock the mother off her feet with a single bullet. Then I heard snapping sounds come directly below me. With little effort, I turned my head around. There was sure enough another huge bear standing behind my platform.

My heart started pounding heavily. I held my breath as long as I could but my hands were trembled. When I concentrated not to move my body, the tree?Ts brand gave up because I leaned on it. Trying to keep me from falling down, I dropped my rifle and dangled on the tree with both hands. Oh god, what?Ts a disaster! The rifle fell near the big bear. That made it jumped. The huge bear looked up the platform and became very angry. It suddenly stood up and started yowling. Its enraged noise warned other bears to get away. I could see its pointy white molar teeth and its long sharp paws that could easily rip me apart. The mother bear and the cubs then quickly ran away. They soon disappeared into the woods. The big bear stayed behind to face me. Then it started climbing the trunk of my tree.

Up to that time, my dad was no where to be seen. I expected he was taking a big dump and could imagine on his face the satisfaction of releasing all the MREs he just ate. Imagine that he would enjoy doing it somewhere in the woods when his son was facing an angry 500 pounds bear. Anyways, the size of this bear didn?Tt seem to matter. The bear was climbing toward me so fast. Within seconds, it reached 3 feet away from me. The platform was set up 15 feet, about 4.5 meters, from the ground. Even though it looked so high, I had no choice but to jump down.

I made a hard landing and tumbled a couple time. I was guessing, with its 500 pounds weight, the bear would hesitate to jump. But my guess was wrong. It jumped. So I started to run into the woods heading toward my dad?Ts direction. Looking behind me, I saw the bear got up and chased me. Despite my fastest track record in high school, the bear seemed to gain the distance. He got closer and closer. Suddenly I tripped over some roots and fell. I turned my head around and hysterically looked at the bear which stood up 10 feet away from me. I was just about to pray the lord then heard a big bang. When I opened my eyes, I saw my dad standing tall with his smoking rifle rested on his shoulder.
?oWhy don?Tt you skin this one, I go look for another one.? He said.

Miss Ngoay Tai,
To tell you the truth, my dad didn't kill that bear. His warning shot scared the bear away. We didn't kill any bear during the expe***ion.
North American Black Bear population have made a come back. We are allowed to hunt them and they are not in the endangered species list. To hunt wild animals in the US, we need hunting license. We can't obtain a license if the animal is on the ES list.
Do you eat meat, Ms Ngoay Tai? Don't tell me you are a Buddhist nun and you ăn chay all your life. J/K. What's the difference between killing a cow for beef and a bear for gall bladder? Most Korean people would buy bear gall bladders from my dad at very good price. The rest of the meat would end up in our freezers for eating. The bear meat however is very tender and delicious. My mom has a recipe to cook an unbelievable bear dish.
If we mix the East and the West medicine, we have a powerful medical combination for treating illnesses. Do you know most famous football players would seek acupuncture as treatment for pain relief? The West pain relief medicines contain unwanted ad***ive agents, like morphine, they tried to avoid. Some athletes would favor Eastern herbs for their body building instead of cancer causing agent steroid. Bear gall bladders would treat cancer more effectively if all else have failed, I believe.
Hey, I do understand. Most Californian think killing bear is the least favorite thing to do. California's state animal is the bear, isn't it?

It's terrible, Mr. Thanhedm, I should say. Anyway, it's a well-written story.
Được sửa chữa bởi - linly vào 01/04/2002 11:22

It's must be Mr. Gaup.

​

It's must be Mr. Gaup.

​

[/QUOTE]
No Milou, It's not for Mr Gaup.

Mr EDM is honoring himself.

Winning isn't every thing, it's the only thing!​

Not quite, depsi . One member I do care. You have to guess again .

You win some, you lose some .(Thắng bại là lẽ thường. ) ]​

Được sửa chữa bởi - thanhedm vào 03/04/2002 03:13

Only idiots would want to win anything on the net. It's just a cliché I pick out of HRH Angélique's postings to be my signature. I remebered this phrase from a coach some time ago. I was amused it was on that list.

Winning isn't every thing, it's the only thing!​

That cliché is cool . I have no problem with it. Don't we all wish to win every thing in life?
I just wanted to tease you with my counter cliché there Mr Depsi.
Cheer,