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Sgt Roman F. Klick 36620923
HS 1393 Engr APO 73
c/p SF Cal
26 May 1945

Dear Aunty Clara,

Saturday

Need I tell you more, yes, it is nighttime once again and I am typing this letter not inside the tent and in the pitch blackness but outside the tent in the light of the brilliant moon I can easily see the type from my normal typing position but I am not going to strain my eyes trying to read every word but just so that I can get the general run of the line to see when the page is near the ending or for that matter when my type approaches the end of a line.

I was very fortunate in receiving your letters of the 8th and the 9th and, surprise, in the letter of the 9th you tell me about Kay's picture being sent out and you not knowing how long it would take to reach me, and I received it right along with the V-mail. Thanks a lot for getting it for me. I haven't shown it to Kerwin for the simple reason because I have not as yet seen him.

Coming back to the camp area from the post office we gave a small Filipino boy a lift and when I opened up the letter and looked at the picture he wanted to see it too so I showed it to him. He asked if the letter was from that girl and to simplify matters and avoid explanations I said yes it was. Then he smiled and said I was married to her. I said no. Then he asked me if she was friend-love and I said no. Then he emphatically said since Kay was not my friend-love, she must be my wife. I told him that girls write to soldiers and one fellow could receive letters from ten girls and he said it couldn't be so that other girls would forget you and only a wife or friend-love would write.

I spent the morning down at the central headquarters typing up all the current censorship regulations and it was a stiff job which carried me through the morning and afternoon until Lynd came back downtown for his afternoon pick up of mail. Fortunately for myself, our dinner meal was in individual cans and the fellows just saved my share of it for me. That way, when I returned at about two or three o'clock I sat down and ate chow.

Also I got to know a little bit more about how to get around the town which is close by for a change. We are not being stuck out in a forsaken spot anymore as we usually are. One bad argument for knowing the town too well is that you are then a guide as I was this evening at six o'clock when I originally intended to write this letter. I had to leave the office and clamber aboard the truck to show a fellow which route to take to get to another outfit.

Incidentally, I was rather sick today and especially so this evening. It all comes from my chronic constipation at times when we are in movement and setting up a camp. Only this time it is worse than ever. The latrines are not enclosed when a fellow first arrives and you just do your business out in the open. I just can't and yet I wanted to and had to go so very bad. What made it so bad was that the native men, women and children just wander about and pass right by you while you are on the toilet. I have enough inhibitions about things like that alone let alone have women walking by. In fact, one woman walked up to a fellow while he was doing his duty and asked him if he wanted to buy some souvenirs or bananas! Of course, to the natives that is nothing. They seem to have such freedom from embarrassment that it is amazing. Anyway, finally I located the new H&S latrine away off beyond the new area where they have erected the pyramidal tents, and it was free of the natives. For a while it was hurting me so bad it wanting to come out and me not being able to find a place to let it do so, that I thought I would bust a gut. Or in other words, have an internal hernia from the pressure. And people die of that as we well know. I am much better now, in fact almost well. Perhaps that accounts for my waking up at night with a sweat yet I am chilled through and through.

Something incident to the natives having no apparent embarrassment seems contradicted in the fact that the natives do definitely not go about with a bare midriff or bare belly as it is bluntly called. An American soldier will take off his shirt at the slightest indication of it being uncomfortable but a Filipino will not do it under any circumstances. Strange isn't it? I suppose we shock them on that score just as they shock me about being so casual about open latrines.

We saw Pedro again this evening and he brought back the laundry all done, pressed and everything. We sat around talking into the night and then Bill, Eb and some others brought some laundry for his sister to do for them and to have that excellent twenty-four hour service which is something that the States hardly approaches.

We were talking about things in general with Pedro and Lt Suiter told us to take him outside the area and he understood that since this was an army cantonment, civilians couldn't very well be allowed in here after dark. He was not at all offended by that and it is anticipated that in time as we get things more organized and set up, he will be able to get a pass allowing him to come in the camp at any time to see us.

Right away Eb began talking psychology to him and Pete had to explain that in the first year of pre-law a fellow is really only taking a freshman Liberal Arts course and that in his sophomore year he would have taken psych. He wants to begin again as soon as possible for he says a lawyer is one of the best professions especially for making the mazuma.

During the course of the day we had some bananas, as usual, plus our regular rations. And let me tell you something, once again we have come to a country which has beauty in nature. The first place wasn't quite as good as Camp White was and the second place seemed very unbeautiful. Here things remind me of Cicero skies. And the sunset was superb. It was astonishing to see the vivid, true and flamboyant coloring of the evening sky. On each side were dark clouds with frequent lighting as if portieres. In the center left was clear sky which assumed a pale green with a tint of blue. Below the clear space was a cloud whose underside was a remarkable reddish satin color and far above them was a string of clouds or a cloud mass which actually looked like a read fluorescent (red) or a red neon sign. And toward the right was a violent display of orangeade red on the order of the northern lights (which were greenish and purplish the time we saw them but the sky had that kind of effect).

Because of the officers vouchers needing to go out, I have more work than I can shake a stick at but by going out on that typing detail I wasted the entire day. There just aren't enough hours in these days. My rifle needs cleaning and I never can get the time to clean that during the day and at night I'm afraid I would botch the job. We are working tomorrow even though it is Sunday but that is to be expected.

Lewis invited Jack to sleep in with us after Jack said he didn't have a good partner in the company or words to that effect and the sharpy has already appropriated the spot I spent a half an hour leveling out yesterday. He did it while I was gone so I can't kick the guy out now.

In answer to your letter of the eighth and the discussion about the furlough. Frankly I am a bit disappointed in your taking it so hard about not being able to have it work out this year. I was confident that I would not build up your hopes to such a high extent because I merely suggested the possibilities. To myself I've taken an extremely pessimistic attitude all along and only figured that maybe a furlough could be possible. Maybe now when I get home, it will be home for good. If not sometime next summer for sure, I'll be home, okay, even if it is only for 45 days.

A few words about native customs: They drive on the wrong side of the road but next week the Army is changing their traffic system to the way we drive in America. The natives have small horses pulling little carts which will haul about six people squeezed together. Everyone has them so it seems no criteria as to the wealth of a person. We see them carrying two baskets, heavily loaded, at each end of a bamboo pole which is supported on their shoulder and which makes them walk with a curious gait.

So-long,   /s/ Roman   Roman