* Theme - 00:00
"Birthday Serenade" - Willi Glahe
* Opening Announcement - 00:16
Welcome to "Wavescan", international DX program from Adventist World Radio
Researched and written in Indianapolis, produced in studios of shortwave WRMI
Program outline
1. International DX News
2. Focus on Africa: AWR FM Stations in Burundi & Cameroons
3. Philippine DX Report
4. Bangladesh DX Report
* International DX News - 00:54
PCJ Taiwan: We begin this week's Wavescan with various items of DX news. You may remember that on a previous program we told you about some test transmissions from PCJ Radio in Taiwan via the Trincomalee, Sri Lanka relay station on Sundays from 1300-1400 UTC on the frequency of 11750 kHz with 125 kilowatts beamed to South and Southeast Asia. One of our Wavescan listeners, Gautam Sharma in Abhayapuri, Assam, India tells us that he heard the PCJ Radio transmission on 11750 kHz on May 19 with satisfactory reception. He monitored the broadcast for the first seventeen minutes or so, first at 1259 UTC with interval signal, station ID and Andy Sennitt announcing the time and the Focus Asia Pacific feature. Here's what it sounded like in India:-
Audio 1: PCJ
A few minutes later at 1315 UTC Gautam made the following recording of Keith Perron introducing his Happy Station show:-
Audio 2: PCJ
Thanks to Gautam Sharma in Abhayapuri, Assam, India for those recordings of PCJ Radio via Sri Lanka. Keith Perron tells us that they have since changed from 11750 to 11835 kHz due to co-channel interference from Radio Havana Cuba. The new frequency is 11835 kHz, still on Sundays at 1300-1400 UTC. The tests were scheduled to end on June 9th, but they have been extended now as a result of some sponsorship from the Tecsun shortwave receiver manufacturing company in China. So you still have a chance to pick up PCJ Sundays at 1300-1400 on 11835 kHz.
Sound of Hope Taiwan: Another transmission from Taiwan is the clandestine station Xi Wang Zhi Sheng, or Sound of Hope. Dino Bloise here in south Florida heard a broadcast of Sound of Hope on May 27 on 13530 kHz, at 1445 to 1500 UTC in the Cantonese language. Here's what it sounded like, signing off at 1500 UTC:-
Audio 3: Sound of Hope
A recording of Sound of Hope from Taiwan on 13530 kHz at 1500 UTC made by DXer Dino Bloise here in Miami. Dino is the producer of a popular Spanish-language DX program called Frecuencia al Dia which is broadcast on some of the same shortwave stations that broadcast Wavescan.
Radio Earth Anniversary: Michael Poulos of Evanston, Illinois reminded us that June 1 marked the 30th anniversary of the first broadcast of Radio Earth, June 1, 1983. Mike was a partner in the enterprise, along with myself and a number of others. Listeners may remember the names of well-known shortwave broadcasters such as Rudy Espinal and David Monson who were also heard on Radio Earth. It began as a daily one-hour program on the shortwave transmitter of Radio Clarin in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
Audio 4: Radio Earth Intro
"How well we remember hearing Suzanne Poulos' voice emerging from the heterodyne," writes Mike, "then Rudy in Santo Domingo, and then Jeff and Matt Bell in Curaçao, 'a breath of fresh air' as it was later described." Over the next few years, Radio Earth moved to WRNO in New Orleans, KCBI in Dallas and WHRI in Indiana, and some programs were also broadcast from Radio Milano International in Italy. Shortwave listeners from the 1980's may remember that the predecessor of Wavescan, Radio Monitors International, also produced by AWR's Adrian Peterson, was broadcast on Radio Earth during a good part of its life cycle.
In his commentary on the first broadcast of Radio Earth in June of 1983, Mike Poulos said: Radio Earth is a worldwide radio service transmitting objective news, information, music, and feature reports to our audience, the world community, on the shortwave bands. Financed by the sale of commercial advertising, answering to no one government, organization, or sponsor, we are free of political and parochial bias, free to blend impartial information with innovative programming.
Radio Earth seeks to be a medium of expression for mankind in the broadest sense: programming to humanity's highest common denominator with broadcasts of universal interest; presenting those aspects of the human condition we all share along with the varied facets of individuals and societies so we may better understand each other and see our differences as diversity and not as divisiveness. Despite our national and cultural dissimilarities, as a species - as life - we are more alike than we are different. As they say, people are the same everywhere.
And thus, the charter, the goal of Radio Earth: to give the human species a chance to be heard above the din of nations which occupy these international, these worldwide, frequencies. We give the earth a chance to speak for itself.
Audio 5: Radio Earth Jingle
Radio Mil, Mexico City: In Mexico City, Julian Santiago tells us that the privately-owned station Radio Mil has reactivated its shortwave frequency of 6010 kHz with the call letters XEOI, airing the programming of its mediumwave station Radio Mil, XEOY on 1000 kHz AM. Here's what they sound like:
Audio 6: Radio Mil
Radio Mil from Mexico City on 6010 kHz, back on the air. We had a chance to visit the station's headquarters in Mexico City several years ago. They have their own building with real state-of-the-art facilities in a very nice part of Mexico City. And incidentally, their programming now specializes in tourism and gastronomy, with lots of tourist information about Mexico City and all parts of the Mexican nation. So it should make for some very interesting listening if you can pick them up on shortwave.
Radio Patria Nueva Bolivia: Very nearby Radio Mil's frequency is Radio Patria Nueva from La Paz, Bolivia, which Arnaldo Slaen in Argentina reports in Noticias DX is now reactivated on 6025 kHz, heard in Buenos Aires at 1020-1040 UTC. Radio Patria Nueva is operated by the Bolivian government, and it airs features like this one called Marvelous Bolivia:-
Audio 7: Bolivia Maravillosa
Radio Patria Nueva from La Paz, Bolivia, back on 6025 kHz shortwave.
* Program Announcement - 11:32
Allen Graham
Passing of Don Jensen: Now some sad news to pass along. This comes to us from Ralph Perry via David Zantow in Janesville, Wisconsin, USA. Ralph says "with the heaviest of hearts, I must advise you that our friend and brother DXer Don Jensen passed away on the afternoon of May 23. According to his wife Arlene, Don was working on his computer -- no doubt sending e-mails and working on reception reports -- at the time. Don was a giant of our DXing hobby and can never be replaced. We will all greatly miss him -- his wit, opinions and general brilliance."
The North American Shortwave Association (NASWA) reminds us that "Don Jensen began DXing in 1947 when, at the age of 11, he was introduced to the shortwave listening hobby by his father, a ham operator. He has been associated with NASWA in editorial, administrative and committee activities for some 38 years, longer than any other active member. In 1964, he founded and was the first executive secretary of the Association of North American Radio Clubs (ANARC). From 1969 to 1989 he published and edited the Numero Uno weekly DX newsletter. He was formerly the editor of Communications World magazine and had been a freelance writer since 1963, his DXing columns last appearing in the former Popular Electronics in 1999. He also has had regular features aired on various DX programs around the world.
Don Jensen was a retired newspaperman and lived in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Bob Zanotti, formerly of Swiss Radio Internatonal and now producer of SwitzerlandinSound.com, sent us the following recording of an interview he did with Don Jensen at the 1979 ANARC Convention in Minneapolis, Minnesota:-
Audio 8: Don Jensen Interview (2:30+)
That was Don Jensen speaking with Bob Zanotti of Swiss Radio International in 1979. Don died on May 23. I had the opportunity to meet him a few times at ANARC conventions back in the 1970's, and he was certainly one of the great proponents of the DXing hobby in the United States and around the world. Incidentally, Anker Petersen of the Danish Shortwave Club International reports that Don Jensen's grandparents were Danish and emigrated to the United States. Don had been a member of the DSWCI since May 1962.
* Focus on Africa - 17:37
Over in Africa, Adventist World Radio is operating a total of fourteen FM radio stations in ten different countries, each of which is on the air 24 hours daily. For those of our listeners living in Burundi, you can tune in the FM station in Bujumbura on 101.8 MHz, with all programming in the Rundi language. The AWR station in Yaounde in the Cameroons is at 92.4 FM with programming in four languages: Beti, English, French and Fulfulde.
* Philippine DX Report - 18:18
Henry Umadhay
* Bangladesh DX Report - 22:32
Salahuddin Dolar
* Music of the World - 26:58
Germany: Snow Waltz, German folk style, instrumental orchestra
* Closing Announcement - 27:16
Thanks for listening to "Wavescan", international DX program from Adventist World Radio
Researched and written in Indianapolis
Next week:-
1. Bulgarian Radio Through the Years - Part 6
2. Australian DX Report
Two QSL cards available - AWR & WRMI
Wavescan address:-
Box 29235
Indianapolis
Indiana 46229 USA
Wavescan @ AWR.org
Jeff White, shortwave WRMI
