WHEN man landed on the moon in July 1969, Daryl Ryan was clutching his rifle and creeping through the jungle alongside other young Australian soldiers of the 9th Infantry Battalion.
“We were out on patrol, on an ambush site, and at about midnight, someone came over and told us. We thought, “What the bloody hell are we doing here then?”
The Werribee resident was conscripted into the army when he was 20, serving five months as an infantryman in the Vietnam War – a war that claimed more than 500 Australian lives.
“Your number was out, or it wasn’t, and mine came out. You did what you were told and away I went.
“As a soldier, we’d be out in the scrub for about 30-35 days, without coming back to Nui Dat … we camped out in the bush, never took our boots off, and wore the same pants, same shirt, for the whole time, before a 10-day rest.”
Mr Ryan was wounded when a Claymore landmine blew up beneath him. Shrapnel hit him in an artery, and he caught some pieces he still carries with him today.
Next Wednesday, Anzac Day will be a time for Mr Ryan to catch up with old mates and, when the bugle sounds the Last Post, pay his respects to those soldiers who never boarded the ship home to Australia.
A passage from The Anzac Requiem by Australia’s World War I war corespondent and historian, CEWBean, encapsulates the meaning of Anzac Day for Mr Ryan.
“On this day, above all days, we recall those who served in war and who did not return to receive the grateful thanks of the nation.”
For 20 years, Mr Ryan and other members of the Werribee RSL have been speaking at schools across the municipality about their wartime experiences.
“We try to get across to the kids, it’s not like a John Wayne movie, where at the end everyone gets up and walks away,” he said.
On Sunday, the Werribee RSL will lead a march at 2.30pm from outside the Wyndham Cultural Centre, finishing at the cenotaph for a wreath-laying ceremony, and later, drinks at the RSL. For Anzac Day, there’ll be a 6.30am service at the cenotaph, followed by a breakfast.
