By Gus Browning, printed in 73 Magazines in 1967-07 reprint by PA0ABM Gus Browning story, Part 25 South Africa In the very next apartment to Jack and Marge, ZS1RM and ZSIOU in Capetown, was the apartment of Jack's mother and father. They came over often and we had many chats about how things used to be in South Africa in the old days. Jack's father is now retired; he used to be a diamond buyer in Kimberly and knew the diamond business coming and going. His wife had some real dandies that I saw on her one night when she was going out to some sort of celebration. She had diamonds in her ears, around her neck, on her wrists, on her fingers, and a brooch or two just pinned on. I mean to tell you that none of them was a little old dinky 3 or 4 carat either. I immediately started calling her Diamond Lib I tried my darndest to let her know that Peggy also loved diamonds, but I never did have any luck. I think she loved those diamonds even more than I did! When I was departing the country a few months later, I told her to be sure to put mv name in her will! Jack's father told me some very interesting stories about the diamond business and about some of the very large ones that had been found years before. Also, some very interesting stories about people trying to slip out of the mines with diamonds. One was about a fellow trying to get out of South Africa and through customs with a big batch of diamonds. The story goes like this: someone tipped the customs officials that a man was leaving from the Jo-burg airport the next day, on flight number so and so, with his leg in a cast. The man claims the leg is broken, but in reality the inside of the cast is embedded with diamonds. The caller did not identify himself. Sure enough, the next day on that flight a man named Smith was pushed in a wheel chair up to customs; he had a one way ticket to Amsterdam, Holland. The customs people arrested him and took him into the little room they have there for such people. They very roughly toreand cut the cast from his supposedly broken leg. They were quite rough handling him and lie was hollering his head off saying the broken teg was verj painful and that he had nothing concealed in (lie cast. Of course, they didn't believe him at all, but when the cast was finally removed and examined there were no diamonds whatsoever. He threatened to sue the South African government for false arrest, painful injuries, delayed flight, and the works. The customs officers tried to excuse themselves for their mishandling of him; they even took him to a hospital and had his leg x-rayed— the bone was broken. They paid to have a new cast put on his leg. He said it was all OK; he knew that they had a job to do and that he would catch the flight tomorrow for Amsterdam. The next day he arrived at the airport, again in a wheelchair, the cast was on his leg and he left for Amsterdam— only this time the cast was loaded up with those diamonds, This was discovered later when the diamond market of Amsterdam was suddenly flooded with South African diamonds which were traced directly to the man with the broken leg. Oh yes, Diamond Lil loved those diamonds and I never did get to first base in chiseling them from herf Later on, when I was in Kimberly, I was approached by someone on the street who had a handful of diamonds; he wanted $1,000 for the lot. As a rough guess there were about five I carat stones, two or three 3 carat stones, and one or two that looked like 3 carat stones. I darned near bought those stones and would have become a diamond smuggler myself, but I just plain chickened out. Also, I did not want to spend $1,000 of WRPSA money, possibly breaking up the entire DXpedition, I told Jack about this later on. I asked Jack if those stones were the real stuff and he said yes, they probably were good ones: he added that if I had bought them the seller probably would have turned me in to customs, getting 10% of the actual value of the diamonds. The stones might even have breti returned to him he may have said I had stolen them from him. Then the $1,000 would have been gone, the diamonds gone, me in jail, the DXpedition blown up and the WRPSA broke because the money was all gone. I am sure glad that I was raised right by mv mother and father to i Kit go around breaking the law, I would have been in very deep trouble I am sure; to this day I could still be rotting away in some South African jail. One night the entire SARL invited me down to their meeting in Capetown, where I met most of the Capetown group, I had a very fine dinner with them and stayed up late with one of those large eye-ball QSO's that I seem to be having all over. Every place I stopped there was a group of hams getting together. The day of the ships departure was gradually drawing nearer and I was taking it easy at Jack and Marge's apartment. I had really moved in running around in my stocking feet, visiting Jack's mother and father a few times each day, and walking around the Strand, Jack and Marge took me all around Capetown— I was getting so I nearly understood how to get from the city to their QTH without getting too lost, I even went downtown on the bus a few times and got back to their QTH on another bus without any trouble. When departure day was about 4 or 5 days away> we paid a visit to the Norwegian Consul to tell him about my proposed trip to Bouvet Island. We explained about the permission I had received through LA5HE to operate from there. Of course he knew nothing about it, but said he would get off a cablegram to Oslo and let us know what he found out. A few days later he telephoned to say that all was OK and the call sign I should use was LH4C— this was great! We then went to the ice breaker that was to carry me there and I was introduced to the crew of the ship. I could see that they were all fine fellows and looked as if they would be an easy lot to get along with— even though most of them were seasoned seamen and a pretty tough looking batch, They had all made many trips to this part of the world and they knew what we were going to be facing when we were in the South Atlantic with those icy cold gales from Antarctica tossing the ship around. After a close inspection of the ship, and being shown where I would bunk. Jack and I left and returned to his home. We had received a phone call while we were away telling us both to be sure to come to the Capetown SARL meeting that night in downtown Capetown, All the hams from that area were there. As near as I can remember there were about 35 or so ZS1's on hand. They discussed the things that hams all over the world discuss when they get together. All the CW fellows said that I used too much SSB; all the SSB fellows said I used too much CW. This is what a DXpeditioner has to face anytime there are meetings anywhere in the world, including the USA. My system of operating from a rare spot has always been to start with CW and when there was a nice pileup going, switch to SSB and work them until the pileup grew small Then go back to CW until the pileup grew low and then back to SSB. I like this system of operating and if I ever go on any more DXpeditions I think I would still use this system. The percentages of SSB to CW QSO's using this system usually ended up fairly close to 50/50 when the QSO's were counted after a stop had been finished. I always stayed at any place I operated from long enough to give everyone a fair chance to work me. By this I mean at least one QSO on CW and one on SSB, I was sorely tempted a number of times to have a blacklist on account of some of the things I heard over the air and some of the unfair operating some of the fellows used. Then it crossed my mind that this was probably not being done knowingly, I well remember some of the things I had done on the air during pile-ups, in the excitement of the battle, I know I have been called a "lid" a number of times on account of some "dumb" thing I had unknowingly done. Lots of the fellows I have heard doing some of these same things I know personally and I know they are not the kind of fellows that they seemed to be on the air at certain times, I just did not have the heart to not hear them or to work them and forget to put their call signs down on the log page. Maybe I am "chicken hearted", but I had made up my mind a long time ago that I would work every station I heard , ABSOLUTELY no preferred fellows* Not even any preferred countries* I worked what I heard when I heard it. I can sincerely say that I have never let someone "sweat it out" for a few days like I have heard that some DXpeditioners will doIt is easy to say, "I am sorry old Buddy but I did not hear you", but I could never say this to fellows who are high up in the Honor Roll of DX awards. These fellows are the ones you work in the first few minutes or at most the first few hours if there is one of those tremendous piles you have if you set up in a really rare country. All you have to do is look at the first 50 call signs up high in the Honor Roll and you can be sure that these are the ones you worked in very short order. These fellows didn't get where they are with sloppy or unethical operating habits, I suppose "back home" I was too much of a DXer at heart to pull any shady things. I wanted everyone to still be my friend after my DXpedition was over— just as they were before I ever departed, I think that this is exactly how it all worked out too. I tried to be cool and calm at all times and I think I was successful at it but at times it was very difficult to keep my temper under control. But back to the story— at the meeting of the SARL it seemed as though I was back in the USA since things went about like they generally do here, with the exception of the South African brogue that they all spoke. Everyone was very interested in the forthcoming trip, I am sure most of them would have liked to be able to go with me. Of course, practically all of them wanted me to Us ten very closely for their call signs in the forthcoming pile-ups. Naturally, I promised each of them I would do just that! Later on I found that I could not miss hearing any of those ZSTs— their signals were the loudest that were heard at practically any hour of the day or night, I received a lot of invitations to come around and visit each of them and for the next day or two Jack and I did pay a number of visits to most of their QTHs. I can verify that those ZS fellows liked their coffee, usually on the strong side. Capetown is a large, modern city with all the conveniences found in any modern-day city— large department stores and some super markets. Their prices were quite a bit higher than similar stores back in the States. Imported items from the USA were very costly, especially receivers and transmitters. It seems their customs duties on radios and radio components carry a very high percentage, I was told that the stores did not cut prices on these items. Everyone around Capetown seemed prosperous, happy and well fed; fruit was very plentiful and reasonably priced. Meals at cafe's ware not expensive at all and there were plenty of Cokes I am glad to say, but coffee was their favorite drink. A few days before time for the boat to depart, Jack and I went down to the ship with all my radio gear (we had tested it out at his QTH before that day). We set it up in my little cabin and even erected the HyGain 14AVS vertical ground plane with 2 ground radials for each band, from 10 through 40 meters. We went on the air and had a few QSO's signing ZS1OI/R It worked right off the bat. I was all set for the forthcoming ocean trip. My friend Ed Coleman, K8TRW, had even shipped me two pair of red handles. I had tried them on and they fit as far as they went. They felt as though they would keep I he Antarctic cold from getting to me. After leaving the ship we stopped at a fruit store and bought a good supply of fruit, In that big pile of fruit I think I even had a small bunch of bananas which weighed about 100 pounds! Then we stopped at a small super market and I got a big box of canned foods— I didn't want to go hungry while I was operating on some of the islands coming up later on. Oh yes, I got 100 gallons of gasoline (their gallons are about 25% larger than ours you know). This was to be delivered to the ship from the supplier. We both stressed the importance of it being delivered the next day, telling them the ship was departing that night-which was a white lie, but I didn't want to hold up the ship while they delivered it later on. It was a good thing we did this because the gasoline was not delivered the next day; it took another phone call to get it delivered the day before we actually did depart. I think the gasoline was Shell, but maybe I am wrong about this. Anyway, it was good gas and I had no trouble later on with the putt-putt starting, even in weather around 10 °F. I did get 10 weight motor oil so it would not be too thick in the cold weather we knew was on the way. After two more nights with ZSIOU and ZS1RM, Jack set the alarm clock for 5 AM on the morning I was going to depart. After a very good breakfast with them, Jack drove me down to the ship, saw me aboard, and even hung around until the PA system announced, "All ashore that's going ashore." The ice breaker backed away from the docks, the bells rang, the whistle tooted a few times, and we were away for one of the most unusual trips I have ever been on. Tristan da Cunha was to be our first stop to drop off three fellows who had lived there before the volcano eruption, a year or so before, had chased them away along with all the other inhabitants. We ate breakfast on board the ship and this was one morning that I had two breakfasts. More next month fellows, this was one trip I won't forget. Gus