Live from 38th and Classen

File this under Things I Didn't Know Existed.

Vietnamese Public Radio, based in northern Virginia, beams shortwave programs across America, and Oklahoma City, with its substantial (somewhere between 1.5 and 2 percent) Vietnamese population, provides a lot of listeners for VPR through a rebroadcast facility in Edmond.

What's more, there's a one-hour locally-originated news/talk program hosted by Mai Ly Do, which runs daily from 11 to noon and is rebroadcast at 5:30 pm. While no one is sure how many people are listening, the local station offers low-end shortwave receivers for $35, and they've sold 2200 of them so far.

Color me impressed.

(Updated broadcast time on 2 May; also, VPR's local office is moving about one mile south, to 21st and Classen.)

Posted at 7:59 AM to City Scene , Overmodulation