Where are the JA's has been a topic of interest to me for some time. I have
heard theories from every corner and most have been based on wild guesses. One
theory is that there are few decent HF stations in Japan, that most younger
JA hams prefer small vhf handheld rigs. Another theory is that the crowded
conditions in Japan and the fact that much of the population lives in mass
housing
such as apartments and condos. The theories are endless and seem to be
mostly based on faulty perceptions.
I am always surprised at the number of JA Qsl cards I still receive from
contest contacts. The vast majority of these cards list rather nice stations
with
good equipment and efficient antennas. Whenever there is a DXpedition the
Japanese DX chasers come out of the woodwork in mass. The JA pileups for even
the
non-rare expedition operators are sometimes massive. The JA pileups that
some expeditions create are spread out over a wide portion of the band and
contain hundreds of loud signals, these signals aren't created by substandard
stations running flea power to inefficient antennas.
There are times all year long when I hear large numbers of JA's working
Europe on all the bands, times when they have little or no propagation to North
America.
I believe that there are still large numbers of well equipped JA stations,
but that they are interested in DX chasing and to a much lesser degree
contesting. I am not sure why this is but I believe this to be the reason we
hear so
few during contests. I know that a lot of JA's complain that the contest period
for most world wide contests puts them at a disadvantage. We are still
contesting on Sunday when they have returned to their work routine, its Monday
there. How many of us would get discouraged if we could only operate the first
day
of every major world wide contest.
I'M surprised that there are as many active contesters in Japan as there are,
all of Asia for that matter.
Ron KH6DV (KH6VV)
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