I first met ham radio

This is a story about when and how I began amateur radio.

I was a kid who liked playing baseball and soccer after school.

I was a 12-year-old elementary school student.One fall I went to climb a mountain

in Kanagawa prefecture in Japan.It was a school outing and the mountain was

Mt.Oyama.It was very tough to get to the peak of the mountain

because Mt.Oyama's climbing trail was stairs all the way.

After struggling for some hours I was about to reach the summit.

Then one scene came into my sight.Two young men in their 20's

were doing something on the peak.They seemd to talk to someone.

I asked a friend of mine what they were doing.The friend replyed they were talking

on transceiver.He added that was amateur radio. He was very smart

and he knew a lot about science subject. I was very curious and asked him

what the amateur radio was.He explained to me in detail.I learned

amateur radio is called ham radio.While looking at and listening to two men

speaking to someone with a microphone, I asked many questions to the friend.

One of the men was doing something with an antenna and the other one was

talking to someone pleasantly.I got interested in ham radio right away.

It was on the top of the mountain about 1000 meters high above the sea level

so they enjoyed talking to ham radio operators living far from the mountain.

They were using a TRIO transceiver and dipole.They were on 6 meters.

These things were what I learned afterwards. At that time,

when I was behind the two men I had no idea about frequency and antenna type.

What I was interested in was they were talking to people far away.

It was a sunny day and I was able to view beautiful landscape of Mt.Fuji and

other mountains around from the top of Mt.Oyama.I can feel how I felt

on the mountain top even now.That was such a nice experience to me.

On the way back to school on a bus I talked about ham radio with the friend.

He told me that I needed to take a license to start amateur radio operation.

When I heard I had to study basics of electronics I felt hopeless

because I was bad at science. I was not sure whether I would be able to

get the license or not.The friend pointed out an antenna outside of the bus window

and said " That is Yagi antenna.". I did not know the name of the antenna

but I felt the antenna was bigger than a TV antenna and some of them were

on towers.After I learned how ham radio antenna looked like, I was looking out of

the window and tried to find ham radio antennas.Untill it got dark I continued to

find antennas.I saw a lot of antennas and every time I found one I told the friend

I did it.It was very fun riding on the but and I was not bored at all.

It was my last year in the elementary school and I decided to try to get

the license when I go to junior high school. The bus arrived my school safely

and I came back home.Since that day I was obsessed by amateur radio.

It was the first day I knew ham radio and how interesting ham radio is.

The day is one of the greatest days for me.


My ham radio shack ( Oct.10 2002 )







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