"Decommunication" on ham radio

Around the sunset, 40m sounded good for the east hemisphere. It could be open to Eu through the long path. I tuned on 7026KHz. Asking if the frequency was occupied, I could not hear any reply. then I started calling CQ for a couple of times.

All of sudden, a big signal told me like "Nut QSY". No identification or explanation why I should move that frequency. I asked who it was and why he required me to move. Silence. I repeated that again. Then, he answered only his call, UA0**. Yet no excuse for his requirement. Someone else told me "PS0T PS0T". I finally understood they were waiting for this station from this isolated isalnd in the Atlantic ocean around the frequency. At first, they have just watched what would go on after my calling CQ. Once they knew that I would go on calling CQ again and again, they wanted me to go away and to clear that spot for possible appearance of this pretty rare one.

I used to be a DX chaser in '80s through '90s. I knew how valuable that island was for them especially on this band. As soon as I understood the situation there, I quit that spot. That UA0 should have told me why he required me to quit. I have called CQ after asking if the frequency was busy or not. No pile ups were going on at that time. They should have courteously explained the reason.

Nowadays, most of those DX chasers could not communicate on this mode. They sound as if pushing the button of their memory keyer or PC keyboard when operating radio. The memories must be their own call and 599TU. Isn't it deterioration of ham radio? Ham radio is originally communication. It seems to have been lost for now.

Some time later, that PS0T has showed up on 7025.5KHz through the path over the south Pacific. Very weak. Recalling that PS0T used to be one of the last few I needed to complete the Top Honor Roll on 40m CW in my DX days, I have given a few calls without success. I also remembered having worked it while I needed PY0S. I haven't felt so excited to be in the pile up that I left that mess in several minutes.    

A new audio rack

I have made a new wooden rack for the audio in the living room.

 

This audio system, not a high end one, has been in my room at the office for a few years. In the big earth quake last year, they fell down on the floor together with TV or cello etc. But, fortunately, they were all intact even though this speaker boxes got some injuries on the surface. Some scooped injuries on the beautifully finished surface. But no damage on the speakers etc. At first, I was inclined to leave this system at the office for the doctor taking over the office.  The injuries on the boxes, however, seemed to tell me I and the boxes had been "fellow soldiers" at the office.  When I asked him to let me bring them back home, he generously answered yes. That's why they are in the living room now.

 

The cheap wooden rack I used to set them on was gradually deformed due to the heavy weight of the amplifier. At a do-it-yourself shop nearby, I found wooden columns grooved for shelf boards. Purchasing them and finding the electric screw driver from the junk box, I have built this in an hour or so. Not painted yet. Not a fancy rack but still my favorite. 

 

So I could listen to music when I cook in the kitchen. It is a part of the living room. Now, piano trios of Schubert and Zemlinsky are always accompanying my task in the kitchen every afternoon.

 

 

A large cohort study on the effect of low dose protracted radiation on the leukemia in Chernobyl cleanup workers

It has not been elucidated clearly yet that chronic low dose radiation could cause leukemia. The following report from NIEHS seems to definately confirm that hypothesis. Those leukemic cases who have started treatment 2 years prior to this study won't agree with it as the authors said. It must be further studied in the future. Even if they are included in the study, it gives the same result.

IAEA etc has confirmed only thyroid cancer of childhood in relation with the radiation in Chernobyl. They should correct their lack of understanding about carcinogenesis, or at least leukemogenesis, of radiation other than this thyroid cancer in such a nuclear power plant accident. The event in Fukushima is not, of course, exceptional for this problem. This teaches us an important lesson for those irradiated in Fukushima due to the nuclear power plant accident. We should follow and back up those people in a long perspective. Especially, those who have had accumulated radiation in protracted course should be closely followed by proper medical facilities.

The summary and the URL of the paper are given as follows;

Abstract
Background: Risks of most types of leukemia from exposure to acute high doses of ionizing
radiation are well known, but risks associated with protracted exposures, and associations
between radiation and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) are not clear.

Objectives: To estimate relative risks of CLL and non-CLL from protracted exposures to lowdose
ionizing radiation.

Method: A nested case-control study was conducted in a cohort of 110,645 Ukrainian cleanup
workers of the 1986 Chornobyl nuclear power plant accident. Cases of incident leukemia
diagnosed in 1986-2006 were confirmed by a panel of expert hematologists/hematopathologists.
Controls were matched to cases on place of residence and year of birth. Individual bone marrow
radiation doses were estimated by the Realistic Analytical Dose Reconstruction with Uncertainty
Estimation (RADRUE) method. A conditional logistic regression model was used to estimate
excess relative risk of leukemia per gray (ERR/Gy) of radiation dose.

Results: A significant linear dose-response was found for all leukemia (137 cases, ERR/Gy=1.26
(95% confidence interval 0.03, 3.58)). There were non-significant positive dose-responses for
both CLL and non-CLL (ERR/Gy=0.76 and 1.87, respectively). In our primary analysis
excluding 20 cases with direct in-person interviews <2 years from start of chemotherapy with an
anomalous finding of ERR/Gy=-0.47 (<-0.47, 1.02), the ERR/Gy for the remaining 117 cases
was 2.38 (0.49, 5.87). For CLL the ERR/Gy was 2.58 (0.02, 8.43) and for non-CLL ERR/Gy
was 2.21 (0.05, 7.61). Altogether, 16% of leukemia cases (15% of non-CLL, 18% of CLL) were
attributed to radiation exposure.
Conclusions: Exposure to low doses and low dose-rates of radiation from post-Chornobyl
cleanup work was associated with a significant increase in risk of leukemia, which was
statistically consistent with estimates for the Japanese atomic bomb survivors. Based on the
primary analysis, we conclude that CLL and non-CLL are both radiosensitive.

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/ehp.1204996.pdf

Repeating the same thing in QSOs

Yesterday, around the sunset, I have met Don N7EF on 40m. He is a kind of DX chaser who used to ask me to go to P5 for DX pedition. Of course, it was a kidding to me. It is, however, a fact that he badly needs P5 for the last entitiy. On the other hand, he is a very nice ragchewer as well. He used to tell me to bring cello to P5 and play something for Kim Jong Wong, the Guru of the country. I answered that I would be brought to the labor camp as soon as I started playing it. Yesterday, he was pleased, as he told me, to know that I had not been sent to the camp yet.

Don told me he could not sleep long as in young days. He got up in 4 hours after falling asleep at night. Then he would go on being awake for 2 or 3 hours until he feels sleepy again and takes 2 or 3 hours sleep again. In the meantime, he often shows up on 40m in our sunset time. I told him how to fall asleep. It is the autonomic training method famous for a treatment for insomnia. Surprisingly, he answered to me he had remebered that since I taught him that 2 years ago. What a shame! I have totally forgot telling that to him before. He told me he had practised that method which worked out fine for him. I didn't dare to ask him if he had not tried that yesterday yet. Anyway, that sleep pattern is quite normal for our age. Wishing him good sweet dream, I gave him 73.

I was stunned to know that I had repeated the same thing to the other in QSOs without being conscious of it at all. Of course, aged people often do that. I could accept it without any problem. But it is a bit embarrassing that it has happened to me. I have realized that I was already in the old age. I should be careful about that. But I could not avoid it at all. I should ask friends for making such a trouble to them. Don was kind enough to emphasize that that method had been helpful to him but not that I used to tell the same thing before.

 

Maybe, I have done the same error in this blog. I should say the readers to forgive me in advance.

A trip to Fukushima

The day before yesterday, I headed to Fukushima to see our son there. Bringing some souvenirs like cooked rice with chesternut, I ran the highway up to north. The trees looked colorful. This ginko tree at a parking area looked like burning with golden yellow.

 

 

 

 

The other trees with reddened yellow foliages.

 

 

 

 

I met our son at the campus of a med school over there.  He has had a problem at school. We have discussed about it taking lunch at a restaurant. Though it was not resolved at once, it seemed he had known how to do with it for now.

 

 

On the way back home, just before getting on the highway, I have taken this photo of the peaceful countryside in Fukushima. Who could know from this scenary that there had been that nuclear power plant accident occurring about 80km east of this area 1.5 years ago? It has contaminated this area. Many people are still groaning being deprived of their mother home town or their works. It should not be forgotten however long it might have passed since that event.

 

It is the area, where I had taken the entrance exam to the same med school when graduating from a college over 40 years ago. Without any preparation for that exam for myself, it turned out not to be a success. Now our son is studying medicine there. I was full with gratitude for this to someone supreme, even though I am not a firm believer in God with personality. Remembering those things, I went back home.



 



 

An bio.

I was born right at this place 63 years ago between a couple who used to work at a sanatorium for tuberculotic patients. It was a small and poor facility that my aunt has started in the faith for Christianity before WWII. My parents had worked together and had known each other there. It was a quiet place surrounded with forests all around. My first memory in my life was a hymn in accapela flown througth the pine trees in the garden. Before WWII, tuberculosis was an untreatble illness which people were scared and hated for. This aunt was a person whose family and folks believed in as their backbone.

It won't take so long before the anti tuberculosis treatment was available for those patients however poor they might be. My aunt has decided to close down the facility since it has finished its role in the society. My parents have also decided to go to Tokyo, where they might have chances for work and education for their children. I still remember our parents working so hard. My father has become a house keeper at a hospital while my mother has got a position at a Salvation Army hospital in a suburb of Tokyo. They have worked hard from early in the morning. My mother used to go for work early in the morning and came back home for a while in a break to care for us preparing for the schools.

Accidentally watching a TV drama which ham radio was the main theme, I got interested in this hobby. I was aged 12 years then. I went to Akihabara, the famous downtown for electrical items, once a month when I was given a small amount of money. There were rows of small shops of electrical items and parts over there. I have purchased parts for radio little by little. At age 13 years, I got the licence and was issued this call sign. My set up those days was a single 6AQ5 transmitter and tubes single conversion superhetrodyne receiver. The antenna was a dipole, half wave for 40m, fed with a ladder line feeder. As an article in a magazine told, I have fried chop sticks with wax, which turned out not to be so effective against rain and sun outdoor. In the beginning, it was difficult for me even to work with JA. However, later on, as I have upgraded the rig to 6146 transmitter and double/triple conversion receiver, all home brew, I could work with all over the world.

In the beginning, I could work the other hams only on CW. That was the reason why I got on CW so much those days. Though that situation has gone on throughout my teen age days, I have become more interested in communication on this mode. As I already wrote, I had got acquaintance with Ed K6NB and his group on 40m CW. Ralph Multon WB6BFR was another elmer for me those days, as I also wrote. What an excitement I have had with them those days! They have lead me into the depth of the enjoyment of CW those days.

I was told to go for a college, that is, Kousen in japanese, a unique school system composed of a high school and a college, where we could learn engineering without going for universities. My parents later told me they could not believe that I would study for the entrance exams for any university since I was a real nut for ham radio then. I have spent a leisurely student days in the college. But I was not very interested in mechanical engineering I specialized. Finishing that college, I decided to be a MD. It took me a couple of years to enter a faculty of medicine at a university in Tokyo. A new world has opened to me then. At that time, ham radio did not take any place in my mind at all.

In the university, I was crazy for music. In the orchestra, I have chosen cello for my instrument and have started learning it. It was a club together with a women's university. It was a hell as well as a heaven for me who had never experienced studying together with girls. I have devoted myself to its activities. Most friends always retired from the club at the 5th grade or so. But I had gone on playing cello at the orchestra or at some chamber ensemble group until graduation. I still regret as for how to have practised instrument. That is, I have not spent much time for the basic training so much. But I always wanted to play in ensemble. At young age, we should concentrate on the basic activities, whatever it might be. Anyway, I have had unforgettable years at the orchestra. There were a girl friend whom I could hardly forget throughout my life as well.

On graduation, most classmates would stay in the mother university belonging to some speciality. I have chosen serving residency at a med school in this area together with my wife, where a professor whom I had known of in person  held a lab. of pediatrics. It was that time when I remembered of ham radio, being away from the orchestral activities. It took me a year or so to prepare a small set up at the dorm over there. It was late in fall in 1980. Most of you might know how I have been doing with the radio.

I could not brag nor even affirm that I have spent good life as reflecting it for now. But being born in that sanatorium and being involved in music in student days are not anything I should regret at present. I am thankful to my fortune for that. I don't know if I could close my life with gratitude and satisfaction yet. But with the pleasure of ham radio and music etc, I would spend days which I won't regret at that time.

Lee HL2DC

I had a chance to talk to my old friend in Korea, Lee HL2DC, recently. I have known him for 47 years through ham radio. When we met for the first time, he was a student studying electrical engineering in Pusan. I was a young student specializing mechanical engineering then. His call was HM9DC at that time, I believe. At that time, we have exchanged photos. After a long interval for about 15 years, we met again on the air in early '80s. He used to work for Sansei Electrical Eng, later LG Electronic Co. In mid '80s, he had been in Tokyo with his family for a couple of years when he was working at the branch there. He and his family used to visit us here twice. He was a tall and handsome guy who spoke pretty good Japanese.

He has already retired from a subsidiary of LG for a few years, where he had worked as the president. He has been settled down in a suburb of Seoul. On my inquiry about the territory issue, he told me it was not a serious and important matter for him as well as his neighbors. It would be settled down as the ongoing Presidential Election was over, as he said. He meant it had been risen in relation with that election. We agreed to have it solved by patient negotiation of diplomacy, not by patriotic ardor. He also told me, when I mentioned about the very hard situation our electrical companies were located at, we, Japanese, tended to take our small flaw or problem as a serious trouble. In his opinion, we should rather esteem ourselves since we have diligence and intellectuality. It might mean just a bit of encourragement to me. However, I still felt thankful for his words.

He approved the FTA with the US. It is not a positive approval. He seems to think they should accept it as the globalism is inevitable not oly to Korea but any countries in the world. He thinks those against the FTA are left winged people. He told me with subtle smile that 60% of the stock owner of Samsung is from the US. It was already globalized, as he told me. But I could notice a bit of cynicism in his smile. He also added that Korea should do well in economy with the US because they need the military back up by the US against the North Korea. I didn't dare to tell him what the globalism causes in the world. Korea is in a really critical situation. When North Korea collapses, it could be a huge burden for Korea to care for the refugees from there. There could be a possibility that the military party in North Korea goes mad and resorts to force if it is negligible. The domestic economy is not very promising as well.

We have talked about families, retirements and even health problems. Whenever we meet on the air, he always invite us to visit Korea. Korea is an important neighbor country. And we have such a good friend as Lee. We should consider visiting him in his home land not so far from now. Promising seeing him in person soon, I gave him 73.