On Oct. 7th 2015, Ha Noi Traditional Craft Village Tourism and Culture Festival 2015 kicked off with the Opening ceremony at Quan Ngua Sport Palace, Ha Noi under the theme "Traditional quintessence - Integration and Spread".

The festival aims to honour outstanding craft villages and artisans in Ha Noi and other localities in the North. It is also a good opportunity to promote tourism potential of the traditional craft villages and connect travel businesses with the villages.

The festival features 300 booths from 22 traditional craft villages of Ha Noi and 15 provinces and cities in various fields including ceramics, rattan, embroidery, weaving, folk paintings, paper making, wood carving and bronze casting; cuisine and travel businesses.

At the festival, visitors will get a chance to know more about traditional craft villages in Ha Noi and to enjoy culinary art of Ha Noi and other localities in the North.

The Ha Noi Traditional Trade Village’s Culture and Tourism Fetival 2015 is a part of activities to celebrate 61st anniversary of the Ha Noi Liberation Day (October 10, 1954-2015) and will last until October 11.

Pham Thanh

A photo exhibition featuring 12 photos of Hoan Kiem Lake (Sword Lake) sceneries is opening at Hoan Kiem Lake Cultural Information Centre in downtown Ha Noi.

Titled Sac Mau Ho Guom (The Colours of Sword Lake), the exhibition, which showcases photos taken by Ha Hong, a journalist, is expected to bring visitors the images and exquisite views of the Sword Lake in different seasons.

A native of the central province of Ha Tinh but born and raised in Ha Noi, Mr. Hong is currently head of Nhan Dan (The People) newspaper's Science and Education News Desk as well as head of the newspaper's Photography Club.

With a passion for Ha Noi, especially Hoan Kiem Lake, Mr. Hong launched his own website on the lake (www.hohoankiem.org) in 2006 to tell lovers of the thousand-year-old-city the stories of Hanoians around Sword Lake and introduced his photos.

"Every day after work or at weekends, I often go for a stroll around Hoan Kiem Lake to capture the colourful moments of this place, a bouquet of flowers in the heart of the city", said Hong.

He added that the bouquet of flowers changes its colour with the arrival of each season: the pinkish white of ban (mountain ebony) flowers in spring, the bright red of phuong (flamboyant) flowers, the purple of bang lang (giant crape-myrtle) flowers in summer, the flaming-red of loc vung (Barringtonia acutangula) flowers in early autumn and the giant crape-myrtle leaves turn from green to red warning the approaching cold days of winter.

Mr. Hong engrossed to capture these changes of colours of Sword Lake for all seasons, and in the last nine years, over a thousand news articles and more than five thousand photos taken by the journalist have been published on his website.

This photo exhibition aims to celebrate the 61st anniversary of Ha Noi's liberation (October 10, 1954) at the Hoan Kiem Lake Cultural Information Centre, 2 Le Thai To Street, and will end on October 19.

Source: VNS