The Vietnam Post Corporation has held a contest to design stamps on Hanoi, highlighting the city’s role as the capital of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam as well as its socio-economic achievements, the Hanoi modern life and its industrialisation and modernisation process.

The Van Nghe Cultural and Art Newspaper run by the Vietnam Writers’ Association has launched a programme to select the best 100 poem lines, focusing on Hanoi. The award ceremony is expected to take place on the Vietnam Poem Day which is also the first full moon day of the coming lunar year - the Year of Tiger.

The Hanoi Music Association has planned to present a number of new works about the capital, including a musical play named Hoa Lu-Thang Long by famous composer Doan Nho.

The association has recently published a comprehensive book on Hanoi music named “The Hanoi Songs in the 20th and early 21st Centuries,” consisting of 300 songs about the capital city and six analyses on various stages of music developments.

The film, entitled “Aspirations of Thang Long”, is about King Ly Cong Uan who decided to move the country’s capital from Hoa Lu to a broad area lying in the flat alluvial delta named Dai La, now

The film, produced by the Ky Nguyen Sang Company, will be shot at a great number of traditional craft villages and many local people will be mobilised to take part in a war scene in the film, Ninh revealed.

However, the director has not disclosed who will play the main roles in the film, which is expected to be taken to international film festivals.

The telling stories focus on traditional and contemporary customs, the lives and culture of people in the three countries where generations have relied on the legendary river for their survival.

The stories are told via a collection of 200 artifacts as well as photos and sounds, providing visitors an insight into the lives of millions of Southeast Asian residents living along Mekong River as well as their struggles against natural disasters and environmental pollution.

Visitors to the show on every Saturday and Sunday will have a chance to enjoy dishes made of rice, fish and coconut copra and milk, and meet with students from Laos and Cambodia.

The three-month event is part of a cultural preservation project sponsored by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency and carried out by 15 museums and agencies of these countries over the past four years.

The exhibition will conclude on February 25, 2010 and then move on to the Mekong Delta province of An Giang , and Cambodia , Laos and Sweden until 2012.

Nguyen Manh Cuong, Deputy Director General of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), made the statement at a conference in Hanoi on March 8 to honour collectives and individuals for their outstanding achievements in the event.

He said ATF 2009 was a good forum for domestic travel companies to increase business capacity and seek opportunities for cooperation with foreign counterparts.

Vietnam hosted the largest regional tourist event for the first time from January 5-12, 2009. Despite the global economic and financial woes, the forum attracted a record high number of 2,064 delegates, comprising ministers, senior officials, businesses and media workers from ASEAN countries.

During the event, Vietnam had many bilateral meetings with foreign delegations to boost cooperation and garner support for its tourism development. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) launched a discount programme “Impressive Vietnam” at ATF 2009 to deal with falling numbers of foreign arrivals. The programme, which ended last December, brought fairly practical results.

Acknowledging the success of the forum, the Prime Minister has awarded the certificate of merit to two collectives and five individuals in the MCST; MCST has presented the certificate of merit to 43 collectives and 71 individuals; and VNAT conferred awards on 23 collectives and 91 individuals.

In the past two months, Vietnam received more than 877,000 foreign visitors, an increase of 27.4% from a year earlier.