What use is an F-call?

Recently I had the opportunity to see some amateurs operating a special event station. Among the operators were a few young faces who had come into the hobby via the Scouts. Chatting away without a worry in the world I thought about an incident that I experienced a few months ago.

At the time I was set-up with my kit, parked, sitting in my car with my squid-pole making a 12 meter tall beacon for all manner of interested people to come past and ask me what I was catching with my fishing rod - which generally resulted in a good natured ribbing and a conversation about Amateur Radio, talking across the world, not unlike CB radio, building stuff and having fun.

Contrast this with a man and his two young charges who wide eyed approached and shuffled about wanting to ask questions. The man was not nearly as interested, in fact his whole demeanour was negative from the start. "What is that?" the young ones asked. "Well it's a big radio antenna that I use to talk to people across the world."

His response was: "I don't need that, I have a mobile phone." "Well, yes, but this will work in places and at times that a mobile won't." "Well, I don't need that." And with that the man stalked off towing his charges with him.

The thing that struck me in this interaction was that his charges were all but crestfallen. I wondered what their life might look like if the people around them had a sense of wonder and curiosity.

It occurrs to me that the Amateurs I've met all appear to have that spark of curiosity and I wondered how many of them had noticed it.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB