Mui Ne hosts Street Food Festival

The event aims to create more tourism products and welcome tourists to Mui Ne during this year’s National Day September 2 celebration.

Mui Ne Street Food Festival will take place in Ham Tien – Mui Ne area from September 1 to 2 with nearly 20 culinary booths. 

To create more tourism products and welcome tourists to Mui Ne during this year’s National Day September 2 holiday, Mui Ne Street Food Festival will take place in Nguyen Dinh Chieu street, Ham Tien ward, according to the Binh Thuan Tourism Association.

Attending the festival, tourists may visit the food stalls and enjoy many kinds of Vietnamese food traditions. In addition, visitors will have a chance to enjoy many kinds of Asian and European cuisines. Those will make the shindig more exciting ahead of the moment of National Day September 2 celebration.

Binh Thuan has plans to develop Mui Ne, a popular beach area in the coastal city of Phan Thiet, into a national tourism site by 2030. The information was announced at a conference on March 27.

By 2025, Mui Ne would become the main resort center of Binh Thuan and the south-central coastal region, welcoming 10 million visitors per year. By 2030, the area is poised to meet all requirements for becoming a national-level site, with 16 million visitors and VND58 trillion (US$2.5 billion) in tourism revenue.

Binh Thuan aims to attract tourists from new markets in central and northern Europe and the Middle East, and will focus on beaches, sports, culture and community tourism. “

To achieve the goal, Binh Thuan province should create diverse tourism products, boost promotion and educate people,” Pham Trung Luong, former deputy head of the Institute for Tourism Development Research, was quoted as saying.

Luong emphasized that developing Mui Ne into a national tourism site would boost development in the region, and links with the Central Highlands.

Ethnic cultural activities to be held on occasion of Vietnam's National Day

This is the ethnic cultural series of events to mark the 73rd anniversary of the country`s National Day (September 2).

The Vietnam National Village for Ethnic Culture and Tourism will hold some ethnic cultural activities from August 31 to September 30 to mark the 73rd anniversary of National Day (September 2), the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced on August 27.

The event aims to honor and preserve the cultural identities of 54 Vietnamese ethnic groups, increase exchanges amongst ethnic groups, and attract more tourists during the holiday. 

Accordingly, the event will feature over 220 artists, students, and people from 13 ethnic groups. They are Mong from Ha Giang, Kho Mu from Dien Bien, Thai from Son La, Tay from Thai Nguyen, Muong from Hoa Binh, Dao from Hanoi, Ta Oi and Ko Tu from Thua Thien-Hue, Xo Dang from Kon Tum, Raglai from Ninh Thuan, Ede from Dak Lak, Cham from Ninh Thuan, and Khmer from Soc Trang.

In addition, the highlight of the event will be a market introducing specialties from the northern province of Lang Son such as roasted pork and duck, rice cakes, and horse intestines, as well as music and dance performances.

The organizing board will introduce the lion mask dance of the Nung ethnic group, a piece of national intangible cultural heritage, and the group’s wedding rituals to visitors.

In addition, visitors also will have a chance to discover a Mong ethnic ceremony to relieve bad luck in Lang Son province through the performed.

Attending the event at the Ede ethnic group village from August 31 to September 3, visitors will have a chance to join a Ban Me coffee program that features coffee roasting and grinding. In addition, honey products and souvenirs from Buon Me Thuot and the Central Highlands will also be available.

A space for children will offer folk games and local snacks such as peanut candy, boiled corn, glutinous rice cake, and dry pancake.

Cham people’s traditional Kate festival to be held in October

The Cham Cultural Centre in Bac Binh district in the southern province of Binh Thuan will organize activities on October 10 to celebrate the Cham people’s traditional Kate festival.

A program honoring Cham folk arts and a display of objects featuring Cham culture will be held at the centre, while ethnic Cham artisans from Bac Binh, Tuy Phong and Ham Thuan districts will play Saranai trumpet, make ginger cakes, and prepare offerings to ancestors.

Visitors will have an opportunity to join traditional Cham dances such as Biyen, Chron, and Balaiy and explore two traditional crafts of Cham people: weaving and pottery making.

The Cham people celebrate Kate festival during the first 10 days of the 7th month of the Cham Calendar to thank their Gods and promote their traditional culture and arts. 

The Cham people in Binh Thuan celebrate several unique folk festivals, such as Kate, Ramawan and Rija Nagar.

The Cham Ethnic Group Cultural Centre was inaugurated in 2010, covering an area of over 3,000 sq.m with a total investment of over VND 18 billion (around US$900,000) and took 22 months to build.

Items on display at the centre are arranged under six themes, featuring the daily life and traditional culture of the Cham ethnic group, including Cham royal family heritage; images and antiques; traditional agro-fishing equipment, Cham pottery; weaving products; and research on intangible culture.

The centre aims to introduce and preserve the tangible and intangible cultural values of Cham people. It is also a place for the Cham people in the province to gather for communal activities.

SYMBIOSIS, a double bill of talks examining how various forms of film and music have been brought together within the context of cultural heritage, will be held at Manzi Art Space in Hanoi on August 31.

SYMBIOSIS forms a part of the FAMLAB (Film, Archive and Music Lab) strand of Heritage of Future Past, a British Council in Vietnam’s project that engages with Vietnam’s music and film heritage, especially those currently under-threat or under-represented. 

Within the project framework, FAMLAB creates opportunities for revisiting and rediscovering certain heritage elements, in the process enabling connection between values from before and expressions of today.

SYMBIOSIS also marks the launch of the FAMLAB Fund initiative which will provide grant packages to artistic or creative projects that fit the general criteria set out by FAMLAB.

The event features two sessions, namely Folk for Future and Filming Music Heritage.

Folk for Future, starting at 5 p.m., will be hosted by Joel Mills, senior program manager of music at the British Council.

“The presentation will take us through a whistle stop tour of folk music in the UK and introduce some of the artists, festivals and people who help make it a contemporary and thriving scene, as well as explore the opportunities for creative use of archives,” said Joel Mills.

The presentation will be followed by FAMLAB Fund presentation and networking.

Filming Music Heritage, a talk and discussion with Barley Norton, will begin at 7:30 p.m.

Barley Norton is reader in ethnomusicology and director of the Asian Music Unit (AsMU) in the Music Department at Goldsmiths, University of London. At Goldsmiths, he runs the masters degree in ethnomusicology, which includes a course on ethnographic filmmaking.

He has conducted research on Vietnamese music and culture since the 1990s and has spent over three years in Vietnam. His publications include the film Hanoi Eclipse: The Music of Dai Lam Linh, the monograph Songs for the Spirits: Music and Mediums in Modern Vietnam, and the co-edited book Music and Protest in 1968, which won the American Musicology Society’s 2014 Ruth A. Solie Award.

In this talk, Barley Norton will discuss different approaches to filming music heritage and will show some video clips from his projects in Vietnam and from the short films submitted to UNESCO’s Lists of Intangible Cultural Heritage.

The talk and discussion will provide an opportunity for people interested in music and film to learn more about innovative filmmaking techniques and the cultural politics of audiovisual representation.

The talks, conducted in Vietnamese and English, offers free entry and no registration is required. Audiences are free to attend both or either sessions.

Dak Nong to host first-ever festival honouring brocade culture in December

A M’nong ethnic elder weaving brocade in a traditional loom (Photo: dantocmiennui.vn) 

The first-ever festival honouring Vietnam’s brocade culture will take place in Dak Nong province from December 27 to 30 with a wide range of culture and arts activities.

The opening and closing ceremonies of the festival will see the legends and epics of ethnic minority groups in Dak Nong province reproduced on the stage.

Visitors to the three-day event can experience a brocade weaving contest, a fashion show of traditional costumes, a seminar on brocade culture, a trade fair showcasing brocade products, a food fair, and folk games.

The event aims to preserve and promote the unique cultural identities of Vietnamese minority groups’ traditional costumes, which are characterised by the arts of decoration, pattern and the use of colour. The brocade culture also presents people’s long-standing customs as well as their world-view and outlook on life.

The festival is planned to be held biennially, inviting the participation of more artisans from provinces and cities across the country.

Manzi to present show

A contemporary music concert ’Shades of the Sounds’ will take place on September 8 featuring contemporary works by composer Vũ Nhật Tân and the art of tuồng (Vietnamese traditional drama). — Photo sankhau.vn

A contemporary music concert titled ‘Shades of the Sounds’ will take place on September 8 featuring contemporary works by composer Vũ Nhật Tân and the art of tuồng (Vietnamese classical drama).

Organised by the Hà Nội New Music Ensemble and Đông Kinh Cổ Nhạc (the Ancient Music Group of Tonkin), the concert is a journey into the music of the past and present. As a way of expression and cognition, music is a universal language to mankind. Each ethnic group, through its long history of formation and development, has created their own music with distinctive features and characteristics.

With the criterion “to sing as to behold”, tuồng is a captivating art form, its distinct vocal and performance techniques immerse the audience in different emotional states.

The performance will take place at 8pm at Manzi Art Space, 14 Phan Huy Ích Street. 

Lotte to host concert

Poster for the concert, provided by the organiser.

The Đẹp Contemporary concert will take place at 7pm on September 2 at Lotte Center Hanoi Square aiming to celebrate contemporary Vietnamese beauty.

As a gift from Lotte Department Store to the public, the concert’s lineup includes Hà Anh Tuấn, S Girl, Ngọt and Trung Lương – the lute musician who once made headlines with his renditions of “Fade” by Alan Walker and “Nova” by Ahrix on Việt Nam’s Got Talent.

“Đẹp Contemporary” is a journey for dreamers in the search for beauty. On that journey, Lotte Department Store hopes to share its love for beauty as well as traditional culture to the public. 

Programme highlights lessons on cadres’ morality

An arts programme, entitled “Remember Uncle Ho’s Teachings” took place at the Hanoi Opera House in Hanoi, on the evening of August 29.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and a number of leaders of central agencies and ministries attend the programme.

The programme was attended by Politburo members: Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc; permanent member of the Secretariat of the Party Central Committee (PCC) Tran Quoc Vuong; Secretary of the PCC and Head of the PCC’s Organisation Commission Pham Minh Chinh; and Secretary of the PCC and Head of the PCC’s Commission for Mass Mobilisation Truong Thi Mai; together with a number of leaders of central agencies and ministries.

Speaking at the event, member of the PCC, Editor-in-chief of Nhan Dan newspaper, deputy head of the PCC’s Commission for Communication and Education, and President of the Vietnam Journalists’ Association, Thuan Huu, said that the event, held by the Nhan Dan Newspaper, was part of the activities to mark the 73rd anniversary of the August Revolution and National Day (1945-2018) and 49 years of the implementation of President Ho Chi Minh’s Testament (1969-2018).

The programme also contributed to encouraging the entire Party, people and army to continue to successfully implement Uncle Ho’s Testament and teachings in the new revolutionary situation, especially in national construction and defence cause, whilst reminding the younger generations to study and follow the late President’s ideology, morality and lifestyle, together with the lessons learnt from his great revolutionary cause and testament, he added.

The programme also featured a few scenes from short plays performed by popular artists of the Hanoi Drama Theatre, through which Uncle Ho’s ideologies on the construction of the Party, administration and morality of revolutionary cadres, are reflected in a simple but vivid fashion.

In addition, a number of special works were also performed by artists of the Vietnam Contemporary Art Theatre, praising President Ho Chi Minh, his feelings for the country; and the Vietnamese people’s love for the nation’s “great Father”.

The programme was broadcast live on the Nhan Dan Television channel and several local channels and will be replayed on Vietnam Television (VTV) Channel 1 on the occasion of the National Day (September 2).

Winners of photo contest on natural conservation announced

The Institute of Strategy and Policy on Natural Resources and Environment (ISPONRE) held a ceremony on August 25 to announce the winners of the “Submerged Land: Conservation and Development” photo contest, the Vietnam News Agency reports.

Beating nearly 400 entries by over 100 photographers, submitted from July 16 to August 15, 2018, “Ngay moi tren Dam Chuon” (A new day on Dam Chuon) by Nguyen Truc was awarded the first prize.

“Ngao dan” (Clam farmers) by Nguyen Viet Cuong and “Rang san ho Hon Yen” (Hon Yen coral reef) by Nguyen Ngoc Thien were the runner-ups. The organizers also gave away three third prizes and four consolation prizes. Fifty best photos were exhibited at the ceremony.

The contest is part of efforts to support the “Preserving important submerged areas and related habitats” project carried out in Thua Thien-Hue and Thai Binh provinces.

Addressing the awards ceremony, vice head of ISPONRE Mai Thanh Dung said the contest is expected to help raise policymakers and local communities’ awareness of the significance of submerged land, thus accelerating the protection of bio-diversity and wetland ecosystems.

Vietnam is home to over 10 million hectares of submerged land which accounts for about 30% of the country’s total area. This kind of land plays a significant role in food security and economic activities of various sectors. However, the natural submerged land has shrunk seriously in recent years as a result of the reclamation activities by locals who are trying to turn the land into farms.