Year of Weather – open-weather

2025-04-01 11:27:51

Sasha Engelmann

Nicosia, Cyprus

Cyprus

NOAA-18

We drive up the road to the English School Radio Club at dust, the sky a soft purple-blue, and a tower with several Yagi antennas comes into view. At ground level are two bungalows, one with the historical 'home' of the English School Radio Club, and a new renovated bungalow used today, as the older structure is failing. Nestor (President of the Cyprus Amateur Radio Society) and Demetris (President of the Nicosia Chapter of the Cyprus Amateur Radio Society) tell me of the history of the club, the days when one had to call the fire department to be lifted on a raised platform to fix the antenna. They have a cabinet full of hundreds and hundreds of QSL cards, written postcards that confirmed amateur radio contacts between operators around the world. "There are some here from countries that no longer exist!" they tell me, and I immediately find myself spreading out hundreds of QSL cards from the former Yugoslavia on a peeling green table. Next door, we power up the transceivers and I make three QSOs (radio amateur contacts) with hams in Slovenia, Hungary and Barcelona. I speak the longest to the amateur in Barcelona, who tells me my contact is 'excellent' and makes good wishes to me and my family. While we listen and tune the radio, I hear many other stories of amateur radio on Cyprus, of speaking to amateurs in Syria, Egypt, Turkey and Iran, and of the politics of amateur radio and current educational programmes aimed to be inclusive to women and girls. The radio is so clear and engrossing - voice rising clearly on SSB through the 'whoosh' of the spectrum - that we are late for our dinner reservation.

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