Vietnam Buffs Bring Jungle to Va.

Maybe, he conceded, all this was good for his son: "It's history."

Looking the Part

The midmorning battle ended quickly. After 10 minutes, the popcorn gunfire from the Americans' semiautomatics didn't get an answer from the communist rifles.

"Well, I think it's time to resurrect," someone called out to a downed U.S. fighter.

Markowitz grumbled that he could have done more damage if his gun hadn't jammed. Parker turned out to be tougher than her delicate features suggested. She became an expert at loading her rifle. Sprawled on the ground as "dead," she looked relaxed and managed a laugh at her boyfriend's boasts.

Gouge also allowed himself a smile. He went to an enemy bunker to check on Hubble and his daughter.

"You guys all right?" Gouge asked. "You need water?"

The battles here end nice and neat. No hard feelings.

Besides, reenacting is about more than fighting. It's about the clothes.

From the moment they arrived, they were exchanging tips on their "impressions." Several talked about losing weight so they could fit into real Army fatigues rather than reproductions. They swapped and sold gear like boys trading baseball cards.

At communist headquarters, one guy gave Parker's feet a long stare.

"Are they actually PAVN boots?" asked Rob Williams, the Delaware student, using the abbreviation for the North Vietnamese army.

Williams motioned Hubble over: "They have the actual PAVN boots in her size."

Most reenactors, Williams explained, can't fit into the smaller Vietnamese sizes. They have to settle for the model worn by French soldiers during their war in Vietnam and later adapted by the North Vietnamese. "This is the French Indochina boot," Williams said, showing Parker his footwear.

Parker didn't know what to say. But her worries about feeling out of place were fading. The group's shock that she and her boyfriend had never handled guns quickly turned into gentle ribbing.

Being one of three women wasn't a big deal, either, as Parker had feared. It was authentic: Women fought with the Viet Cong.

The guys cursed and used racial slurs about the enemy, but a couple of them apologized later. Again, it's a "period" thing.

"They're just geeks," Parker said. "They're a lot less macho than I thought. It's kind of sweet."

For her, Vietnam often had been defined by stereotypes rather than reality. She knew the war traumatized her father. He once told her he couldn't bear to attend a welcome-home party thrown by his mother. Parker said she figured it was best not to bring it up.

Gerard Parker, a retired trade show coordinator in San Francisco, said he never consciously avoided discussing Vietnam. He just thought it was something his daughter didn't care about.

When she first told him about reenacting, he worried that the war would be trivialized. But he said he's glad Vietnam is finally being treated like other wars -- and that his daughter has taken an interest.

"In the 1970s, if you said you had been in Vietnam, people would stay away from you," the 65-year-old said. "Things have gotten a bit more realistic and balanced. With the passage of time, that divisiveness is fading into history."

At the reenactment site, there was a range of opinions about the politics of war, in both Vietnam and Iraq. But most conversation steered clear. "That's not what we're here for," Robby Gouge said.

Like real soldiers, they sat around and talked about life "back home," about job promotions and families. One guy showed off photos of his two little girls. Others took turns cradling a grenade launcher. "Great toy," someone said.

The cook fretted over dinner plans. The vintage oven wasn't working, so he had to use a modern gas grill. Reality often spoils a good reenactment.

By Saturday night, 24 hours of Vietnam had become enough. Period music, the Rolling Stones, blared through the woods. But it came from the CD player in a sports car.

Parker and Markowitz left early for the long drive back to New York. Parker said she got what she came for.

"I know these people aren't actually going to kill me, but I had this very strong fear out there," she said. "My father had to deal with it for real, and I just got a vague, vague, removed idea of it."

She intends to visit her father at the end of the summer and talk with him about the war.

Gouge skipped the evening battle because he wanted to go to bed early. He had called his wife earlier; the family was at the beach, and his 4-year-old son, Jackson, saw his first crab. Gouge couldn't wait to join them.

But his sacrifice had been worth it. "You've got to think, if you've got 365 days of this and it gets worse," he said. A taste of grunt life every summer "humbles your thinking."

On Sunday, the reenactors dismantled their tents and packed up Vietnam. Just the shell casings were left, glittering on the ground.