Istvan Varsa, known to his colleagues as Steve, had a clear but simple goal when he joined the Voice of America soon after graduating from college.
Istvan Varsa grew up in Budapest in Communist Hungary. He was 12 years old at the time of the ill-fated Hungarian Revolution of 1956.
Five years later, he overcame many obstacles to immigrate to the United States. In Washington, he finished high school and eventually graduated from Catholic University with a degree in economics and foreign trade. But his real love was soccer. He wanted to be a professional soccer player, and was a candidate for the U.S. Olympic soccer team until a knee injury dashed his hopes for a career in sports. But it was soccer that led Steve Varsa to broadcasting.
As a Hungarian service broadcaster, Steve Varsa became an accomplished writer, reporter and program host -- and was able to pursue his interest in sports.
Istvan Varsa believes the broadcasts of Voice of America and the other international broadcasters to Eastern Europe played a major role in the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
"It is, in my opinion, the Voice of America's greatest accomplishment, that for my days, when I came on, and the Polish Solidarity movement was being formed, and then Poland and Hungary and the Czech Republic becoming NATO members, that is VOA's grandest achievement."
The end of the Cold War and the opening of Eastern Europe to the West provided opportunities for broadcasters that had not been available before.
The opening of Eastern Europe also opened contacts between broadcasters and their listeners.
Since the mid-1990s, Steve Varsa has seen major changes in VOA's broadcasts to Hungary, and to most of the countries of Eastern Europe. As domestic media in those countries expanded and information became much more accessible, Voice of America curtailed its broadcasts on shortwave and medium wave, and turned instead to sending programs to local FM stations for rebroadcast, and providing information via the Internet.
Looking back on his 30-year-career in radio, Steve Varsa is reconciled to not being a soccer star.