The first words Des Carmody uttered when he saw his birthdate in the morning's paper, he recalls, "would not be something worth repeating".
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The year was 1970 and the list of dates signalled that the then 20-year-old would soon be on his way to Vietnam.
"I was looking to get on with my civilian job, I didn't want to be there, I was very angry to be conscripted," Mr Carmody said.
"The day I shipped out was July 1, 1970, I'll never forget. I was apprehensive, I was angry. My mother was extremely worried, there were a lot of tears."
Over the next year, Mr Carmody would serve as the taskforce maintenance team's 'postie' in one of the most perilous regions of the war.
"Nui Dat was always surrounded by the Viet Cong so riding around, I was surrounded by the enemy all the time," he said.
"We knew where they were, but the daytime was pretty quiet. You'd often be woken at night though."
On Tuesday, Mr Carmody was joined by scores of other veterans and currently serving military personnel in the Victory Memorial Gardens to commemorate the 54th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan.
February this year also marked the 50th year since Operation Hammersley, which cost the lives of 21 Australians. Up to 15 more were wounded when a jumping jack mine deployed near Phuoc Tuy Province.
"That was the single biggest mine incident that cost Australian lives during that war," Mr Carmody said.
Many of those who gathered in Wagga on Tuesday morning - including Mr Carmody - had been in Vietnam during that time.
Together, they shared stories of close encounters with the Viet Cong, and of identifying the horribly disfigured remains of close friends whose lives had been tragically cut short on the battlefield.
Wagga RSL sub-branch president David Gardiner recalls opening the mail to find his conscription order one afternoon in 1968 when he was just 23 years old.
"The birthday lottery is about the only lottery I've ever won," he said.
"It was pretty dramatic. By then, the war had been going for six years or so, I'd seen a bit on TV. I was married just a year-and-a-half when I got the call-up."
Mr Gardiner arrived in Vietnam in the wake of the Tet Offensive.
Though he describes the country as "quiet" of fighting at that time, he said the scares of the recent conflict were ever apparent across the landscape and its people.
"It's something you experience, it's something you see, but you can't think too much about. You just have to get on with the job you've been put there to do," he said.