Why a Tour in Croatia?

Heroes Remember

Why a Tour in Croatia?

Transcript

Croatia was in the news a lot and I like to read the newspaper, I like to keep up on worldly events and you know, things that are happening in the world, so I kinda had, I had an idea of what was going on in Croatia. In the former Yugoslavia as a whole, I knew what was going on there and again I was still in the Camerons at the time, we were in the field in Shiloh doing some training, and again they asked for volunteers to go with the 3rd Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry over to Croatia for the 92'-93' tour. And I didn't even think twice about it, I put my hand up right away. Why?, because I don't know, I think a lot of people will laugh when they see this but I don't think a lot of people should, I don't think people should have to live like that when, you know we have such a great country, a democracy, that people whine about daily voting and you know, "The government's doing this..." Well what if you didn't have what if you had a government that didn't give you that choice. That says we're gonna go to war, we'll do it on our soil, or you know, we're gonna go invade someone else. And you know there's people there that were dying because of the race they were, because of the religion they were. And I couldn't understand why that would happen but I knew, at least Canada wanted to help. They wanted to do something about it, so yeah I had no problem, no problem at all volunteering to go over there and it would be another tour and I would be serving my country.

Description

Mr. Neepin explains his reasons for volunteering for a tour in Croatia.

Darcy Jeremy Neepin

Mr Neepin was born in Portage La Prairie, Manitoba, and moved to Winnipeg with his family while still young. An uncle who served with the 1st Battalion of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI) told him many stories as he grew up. From these stories he gained knowledge of what military life as an infantryman was like and before he turned 12 years old he was sure he wanted to serve. At the age of 18 Mr. Neepin joined the Cameron Highlanders Reserves. Being of Cree descent, he was the only Aboriginal Canadian in his recruiting class of 30. In 1990 Mr. Neepin answered the call for volunteers to join the 1st Battalion PPCLI for a peacekeeping tour in Cyprus. Having his first overseas experience under his belt, he returned home in the summer of 1991. Mr Neepin continued to volunteer for overseas peacekeeping missions, serving with the PPCLI for the 1992/93 tour in Croatia and in 1997 & 2000 in Bosnia.

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