Greetings once again from a warm and now, very quiet Cretan QTH.
With the last of our visitors departing a few days ago, we are now able to return to what passes for normal around here. We have even had a shower of rain in the past few days and this was the first rain for nearly four months but things are now back to normal with blue skies and temp around the 28°C mark.
Traditions: In our village, traditions are still strong and not easily changed. Recently I had two examples of this.
Our neighbour, Elpida, is 93. She lives on her own and does everything for herself. She is as thin as a rake but still gets about albeit slowly. She was crossing the road the other day and as I was passing, I offered her my arm. Boy was that wrong!
She held up a fist at me and really had a go! Of course I did not understand what she was saying but gathered that the gist of it was that she should not be seen holding another man’s arm unless they are related as this is thought to be ‘shocking’.
However, this attitude is not just for the very old. We took a friend into Aghios to do some shopping recently. The lady in question is about 50 and looks after her older sister. Neither is married. The plan was that I would drop the XYL and the lady, Maria, off at one supermarket while I went up the road to a different one to get something. Maria said to the XYL that she too would like to go to the other supermarket but would not go with me on her own as it would be wrong to be seen out with a man to whom you are not related. We chopped and changed and in the end all went to both places.
It did not worry us but it is thought ‘incorrect’ not to keep to tradition out here.
I guess like a lot of you, we don’t watch a great deal of television. Greek television is ‘odd’ while the stuff from ArabSat is confusing. If we watch a Greek TV programme, apart from the weather forecast, should the programme be in English, it will have Greek subtitles. It will also have adverts. Lots of adverts.
Take a programme such as NCIS. This is shown on Greek TV with subtitles and the actual programme lasts for about 44 minutes. The other 16 minutes are taken up by adverts, usually in two hits. You not only have time to go and make a cup of tea but also go and pick the tea leaves as well.
But, they are not over with you yet – oh no.
When the titles go up at the end of a programme, the screen is split in half and a list of the people, who advertised during the programme, and thus spoiled your enjoyment of it, is listed again!
We are also confused by some channels on ArabSat. First, we can get some 209 channels of which nearly 200 are in Arabic. The ones in English are things like BBC World, Aljazeera, NHK-Tokyo, FOX Movies, Euronews, Dubai One and some MBC Channels.
Two things continue to confuse us.
One is the news on Dubai One. It is in English.
Should we catch the news on this channel, we would not know that there had been some ‘trouble’ in Egypt, Tunisia or Libya as they just do not report it. We happened to catch their news on the day that Tripoli ‘fell’ to the opposition forces. The main news item on Dubai One was that the Education Secretary had opened a new school somewhere and the second item was the opening of a new section of the Metro system in Dubai. Libya was not mentioned once. Neither was Bahrain or Syria.
The other thing than confuses us is that we are led to believe that the ‘Arab World’ is not too fond of things Western or American. Why then do they show so many American series or films, and advertise American or Western products? Yes, some of the American shows are dubbed into Arabic but most are not and one of the most-seen adverts is for Coca-Cola. There are also multiple adverts for Kentucky Fried Chicken, Domino Pizza, Galaxy chocolate and General Motors. Now, as you probably know, drinking alcohol is not allowed in the Middle East – so why do they advertise Barbican alcohol free beer thus making people want to try the real stuff?
As I say, confusing . . .
At this point I was going to mention, in depth, the weather forecasts on ArabSat but suffice it to say that NHK-Tokyo do a more accurate forecast for this end of the Med than BBC World ever does. In fact, the BBC World weather forecast has become a bit of a joke out here. Even their 5-day forecast on the Internet bears little resemblance to what actually happens.
However, we are getting like the locals now. In the morning we open the shutters and look outside. That’s the weather and there ain’t nothing you can do to change it!
September RadComic duly arrived and failed to impress. How fit are you? I mean, can you run a bit, or maybe even jog a little?
The reason for asking is that on the page about the national Hamfest, there is a picture showing the ‘Mobile Flea Market’. I do not understand what a Mobile Flea Market is. Do you have to run alongside the tables and, while pausing for breath, ask the price of something? Most odd . . .
I guess that during the coming month we will hear a lot about the T32C DXpedition.
It will be interesting to see the bands they were worked on and by how many people. The article in Sept RadComic does put a bit of a dampener on trying to work them as it just says how difficult it will be. However, the good thing is that once again those with 4-ele beams, large towers and 2kw linears, i.e. those with a great deal of money to throw at the hobby, may just be able to work them . . . [Sept 25th: I see that their container is now stuck somewhere so it will be a really cut-down DXpedition now as they will have to use FT-450’s instead of the FT-DX5000’s they were hoping to use.]
Question: Why is the 2012 Yearbook published in August? Why not publish it in December?
The blurb for the book says: “More than 200 additional pages of the very latest amateur radio information”. I’d like to bet that this “latest information” will be out of date by the time 2012 finally gets here and by that time, at least half of the QSL Sub-Managers will have changed as well.
One thing that I did like in the Sept edition was yet another letter picking up on the fact that M5FUN keeps getting things wrong in the ‘Start Here’ articles. His confusion between MUF and Critical Frequency does not really help anyone who wishes to start learning about Sporadic-E. Maybe one of two things should happen: 1- M5FUN stops writing his monthly rubbish, or 2 – someone actually bothers to proof read it and correct all his mistakes prior to it being printed.
‘ere, when you shake hands with someone, unless you are a Mason or belong to some other secret group, you tend to shake hands with your right hand. Yes?
Why then does the Lynchie advert, saying about the Yaesu dealership, show two left hands shaking? Another secret society we have never heard of?
I see that the chap who designed that rubbish software called Ham Radio Deluxe, has sold the source code to some guys in the States. The chaps that bought it also sell other software and so it is expected that in due course they will change HRD to something usable and then charge for it. Time to switch to Digipan or Airlink Express then!
The Greek SV NEA magazine turned up just a day ago and again contained more pictures of interest than the RadComic did a couple of months ago of the same event, Friedrichshafen. Close-up pictures of interest included the new Icom ID-31E, the Yaesu VL-2000 linear, the Ten-Tec Orion 11 and a nice close up of the Elecraft EX-3. There was even info on the Emtron linears again but this time the smaller ones that only run 1.2Kw on CW or 1.5 on SSB. Again the RadComic write-up was bland in comparison . . . [Sept 26th: The write-up by Richard, G4DDP, in the Summer newsletter was more informative than the RSGB drivel. The pictures were better too! ]
I read the statement by Norman, M0FZW, about his appointment as Deputy Regional Rep with amazement. Seems he only became a Radio Amateur because they dropped the CW requirement!
So, your new Rep is a CB’er then . . .
As usual, these are just my thoughts etc
[See page 22 of Newsletter 89]
Yammas!
Dick. SVØXBN/9
