To fight or not to fight

I am basically a person who loves peace and dislike fighting.

When I was a kid, my dad would enroll me in a 'martial art' class. The only thing that I enjoyed in the class was the 'warm-up exercises'. But after that, we would pair up, and let's say I would be last person to pair up, and I would pretty much be a 'punching bag' in those exercises, because I had no reason to fight.

I was miserable. My dad said, at least, I have a choice when it comes to fighting, because at least now, I know how to fight, and I can choose to fight or not to fight. It's a much better chance than those who do not know how to fight.

Soon, I had my chance. The neighborhood kids would stop me and want to fight me. I mostly declined, but they wouldn't accept it. They stopped me everyday, and if I don't fight them, they take things away from me, ie. my bike. Soon, they used my bike to ram into me and chased me.

At one point, I did get angry, and told them, stop me one more time, and I will fight them, except I will fight them to the death. I was hoping that the 'death' threat would stop them from harassing me, but it didn't. The next day, they did stop me, and true to my word, I did fight. Before I know it, I had the leader down in my arm. I could have strangled him to death. But in the end, I released him and asked to have my bike back.

I was afraid that they would still harass me since I didn't 'finish' the job. But they left me alone afterwards.

I learned from that episode that I have no desire to kill, although I was very angry. (I also learned that my anger can bring me to a point where I was ready to kill). Later, in the Vietnam War, when faced with a gun pointed at me for information from a stranger, I asked the stranger why would he want to kill me. But in the end, I leave the fate of my life in that stranger's hand, because I certainly don't want his death on my conscience even though I would be justified if I kill him since we are in a war. In the end, he walked away too, without killing anybody.

I do hope that one day we wake up and acknowledge that weapons have been a horrible creation and do away with it. It will take a lot of courage.

Since veteran day is coming up, I also have a few words to say. Many people advise me to say - 'Thank You', and that's what the soldiers want to hear. I would like to say - 'I am sorry you have to go through what you went through. War is ugly, and I hope you have healed from that experience.' If we really want to express our appreciation for our soldiers, we have to find ways to keep the peace, and keep them out of harm way, after all, they risked their lives to keep us out of harm way.