CQ .... CQ .... Alpha Five One Yankee Doodle Calling .... CQ ... CQ

“CQ” is a ham radio or amateur radio Code. When I call out “CQ, CQ” over my radio, I am inviting any ham radio operators listening in on the active frequency to respond to my call. “Alpha Five One Yankee Doodle” is supposed to be my unique amateur radio CallSign which will be recognized by amateurs around the world listening in on my call that I am an operator from Bhutan. In truth, my national CallSign is Alpha Five One Alpha Alpha (A51AA). I am using Alpha Five One Yankee Doodle (A51YD) since this is not a call made over the radio waves. Actually, if I was on air, I would be committing an act of piracy since the CallSign A51YD is already allocated to someone else. Under the amateur radio Code of Ethics and Conduct, it is a serious offence to use someone else's CallSign.

As some of you may have guessed, “Yankee Doodle” stands for my initials: YD. The international community recognizes "A5" as Bhutan’s country prefix and the number “1” after the A5 indicates that I am a national operator: under the BICMA amateur radio CallSign allocation conventions. Visiting Hams will be allocated a temporary national radio CallSign consisting of their 2-alphabet initials of choice, preceded by the alphanumeric "A52".

Now, the reason for this CQ: I am sending out this amateur radio code today in fulfillment of the commitment I made to some of you readers - to allow you a live demonstration of how an amateur radio operator operates. I would like to announce to all those to whom this may be of interest - that an English/British Ham will be operating from Paro as of the 11^th February, 2012. He will remain on air until the night of 16^th February, 2011.

Anyone interested to observe the proceedings is welcome to visit the ham shack in Paro. I will set aside a day - any one day that is convenient to you: between 11-16^th February, 2012. Please let me know if you are interested and which date would suite you. Please note that it would be unfair to distract the ham operator beyond one or two hours. I think 12^th February would be a good day since it falls on a Sunday.

Please mail me at: yesheydorji@gmail.com. Lunch is on me - after the demo and a chit chat with the operator who is visiting Bhutan for the first time – specifically for ham radio operation.