Over 3 million products are on display at the four-day fair, the 68th annual event, which will run until September 11.

Vietnamese enterprises bring to the event fine arts and handicrafts items made of porcelain, rattan and bamboo, hand knittings and embroideries.

The fair, one of the world’s largest gifts and ornaments fair, is expected to welcome about 200,000 visitors.

Sanz said the photos, selected among those taken during his three-week visit to the nation in March last year, aim to highlight local people who had extended hospitality and warm feelings to him.

He said he hoped to return some day to further explore the hospitable and beautiful country.

Earlier, the works were exhibited during Sanz’s first private show at the El Corte Ingles Trade Centre in Zaragoza City last April.

They will also be displayed at an exhibition hall of the Caja de Ahorros de la Inmaculada Bank in Zaragoza City in June next year.

(Source: VNA)

Born in Hamburg, Jochen Voigt is a photojournalist, documentary film producer and author of books who worked in central and southern Vietnam in 1967 and 1968.

His exhibition in Ho Chi Minh City features 127 black-and-white and colour photos of Vietnamese people, the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta, Central Highlands, northern mountains, Ho Chi Minh Trail, and Hanoi and HCMC taken between 1967 and 1968, and from 2003 to 2008.

The title of the exhibition, the Nhip Cau Thoi Gian – Ky Uc Cho Tuong Lai (Bridge between times – Memory of the future) shows his strong belief that “whoever wants to read the future must leaf through the past”.

“I don’t aim to provide photos of Vietnam’s historical events, but provide Vietnam through the eyes of a German,” Voigt said.

The photos of the past depict the optimism, friendliness and hospitality of people who believed in a bright future despite the hardship of the war.

In 2003, he returned to Vietnam and visited the country every year to rediscover the country. Last year, Voigt, now 62, travelled from HCMC to Hanoi across parts of the former Ho Chi Minh Trail by motorbike to access areas he had never seen during the war.

The 2003-2008 photos were taken in the same style he used during the war as a way of demonstrating similar situations and the bridge between the two eras.

The exhibition, organised by the General Consulate of Germany and the Goethe Institute in HCMC, opens at the Exhibition House at 92 Le Thanh Ton Street, District 1, until November 8.

Voigt has had two photo exhibitions on Vietnam in Germany and released a photography book on Vietnam’s tourism. After this exhibition, he will publish another book on the country.

The Mui Ne Hot Mineral Mud Center in Phan Thiet City, Binh Thuan Province is about 200km east of HCMC. The center is opposite the Tien Dat Resort in Phan Thiet.

Opened last year on an area of 4.5ha, the center offers warm mineral water soaking, warm mineral water bathing under a man-made water fall, hot mineral mud-bathing and many other services.

The center’s owner, Viet Tin Joint-Stock Company, is using a hot mineral water spring, around 800m from the center, and a mud mine in Tuy Phong District of the province.

After changing into clothes provided by the center, tourists can enjoy the service in tubs in green banana gardens. There are about 17 tubs for mud-bathing, each of them big enough for three or four people. Private tubs are available on request.

The mud here is not as thick as the mud in Nha Trang, but the Mui Ne Hot Mineral Mud Center has the advantage of green and well-aired spaces. All the mud tubs are placed apart by bananas. It’s enough privacy for visitors to enjoy bathing.

After trying the mud-bathing service, tourists will come to the warm mineral soaking service area and then to the hydropathy area before going to the man-made warm mineral water fall to enjoy water massage.

One special service is a swimming pool with around 1,000m³ of warm mineral water and smaller massage pools. There is a nice bar at the center of the swimming pool.

There are no accommodations here but the owner said that around 80 four-star and 100 five-star standard rooms as well as a spa and luxury services would open soon.

Hot mineral mud-bathing is VND95,000 per person for a tub of four people, VND200,000 per person for a tub of only one and VND550,000 per person for a special tub for two.

Mui Ne Hot Mineral Mud Center
Add: 133A Nguyen Dinh Chieu St, Phan Thiet City
Tel: (84-62) 3743 482 / 3743 481