One of the crazy things one can do in Taiwan is taking an amateur radio exam. I did recently. They do (surprise!) not recognize foreign amateur radio licenses here, at least not long-time, so I had to. But I only did after I was encouraged by a number of local hams, like BV7BU, BV7CW, BV7GA, BV7GC, BV7RC and BM7GFO, plus many hams on the Taiwan Ham Radio Skynet, whom I would like to thank for their pushing and support. Without them, I would have thrown that book I bought to "learn" for the exam into the garbage and slammed my head against a wall.

First thing: You do not learn for the exam, you only memorize. You can pass the exam without having any clue about amateur radio. Next: Lots of questions deal with commercial radio issues instead of amateur radio matters. But somehow that is fine, because it is also how the government deals with amateur radio. And the best: Everything is in Chinese, most of it a pretty archaic Chinese not taught outside Taiwan usually, and even many numerals and units are in Chinese characters.

You have to start with the exam for class 3, and can proceed to the class-2 exam if you pass. If you pass that too, you have to wait one year after setting up a class-2 station, before you can test for class 1. Tests for class 3 are on Monday, for classes 2 and 1 on Friday. So I went there on Monday, passed the exam, and at once they issued me a license and charged me NT$500. When I went there on Friday, they told me that I did not need to get the class-3 license, I could have waited until I passed the class-2 exam. Nice... And even better: After I passed the class-2 exam, they asked me whether I wanted them to issue the class-2 license. Helloooo? Without a class-2 license I can not set up a station, and without having a class-2 station for one year I can not test for class 1!

The second exam itself was rather "entertaining". A few moments after I entered the office, all the civil servants suddenly streamed back into the office from a neighbouring room and rushed to their stations. Hmm, did I disturb a party? The lady who took my application was then unable to start the exam software on the exam computer (which is in the same office, so you have all the office traffic around you), because she did not have the control software installed on her computer. The software was installed on the computer next to her, but... Unfortunately, that lady had not yet received training for this "new" control software. After a while they found someone who had the software and knew how to use it and I took my exam.

Class 2 also requires a telegraphy (vulgo: morse) test. At this point, that test could actually be skipped. You only need to hear, not to send something yourself. What you need to copy are 18 groups of each five letters (no numbers or other characters!) at a speed of 5wpm. At that speed, you could basically copy every dot and every slash and sort it out later. This should be simple, but even this can get messed up. I suppose there have not been many people taking the class-2 exam for a while. There was only one person in the office who could start that exam, but... "Can you hear anything?" "No." In the end, he re-installed the software on another computer.

After you copied the groups, you have to use the mouse(!) to enter all letters into the computer. For this, you have 18 minutes, but the computer I used got bored after about two and closed the exam, so they had to check from my notes. An exam costs NT$200 (so NT$400 for class 2 due to two parts), the license fee is NT$500. On the license there is my photo, it is issued to me, but the license only mentions the class, no call sign at all.

For a call sign, you need a transceiver. Not just any transceiver of course, you need to provide proof of its origin - meaning you need a receipt. If you planned to buy a used one second hand from someone without license to get an illegal device off the air and make it legal - forget it. You can buy new, get the ownership transferred from someone who has a "legal" transceiver, import one after you applied for an import permit or (I heard only one person ever did this in Taiwan) build one.

But whatever you do, you need to get your transceiver "certified". You, as a licensed and (at least theoretically) qualified radio amateur have to use a device that only transmits within the amateur bands, while all the people who use them illegally just go to a shop and buy one that runs as far as its circuitry allows. So I bought a simple VHF handy transceiver and asked the people in the shop to "lock it up for inspection", because otherwise... It tested OK. They have a spectrum analyzer with power display there at their office, and the man behind the counter did indeed hook my HT up and checked its power and whether it would send outside 144-146MHz. One day I really want to take a homebrew transceiver for inspection...

Anyway, I got the call sign: BX7AAH. Interestingly, the card for this does not have my photo on it, because the call sign is issued to the transceiver. Commercial radio, anyone? The small (and of course not worth to mention) contradiction here is that if I "transfer" the transceiver to someone else, then his call sign will be written on the card. So, the call sign is issued to the transceiver, but is not really issued to the transceiver. They have probably not come to a decision yet, so they play these games. "Inspection" is NT$100 for an inspection in their office ("mobile station") and the transceiver ID card or whatever that thing should be called costs another NT$500.

I will probably write these things down in a slightly more systematic order one day, including tips for the exam (You do not need to memorize that much, actually. There are tricks...), but I set up a folder especially for amateur radio articles already and put there a slightly more extensive rant about the exam. After reading it, you will understand why it had to be a rant...

 Amateur Radio exam in Taiwan