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Cai luong artist marks 30 years
HCM City (VNA) — Cai luong (reformed theatre) artist Kim Tu Long will mark the 30th anniversary of his career with a live performance in HCM City this week.
Thien Duong Cua Toi (My Paradise) will feature extracts from cai luong plays that helped him achieve fame – including Day Song Bach Dang Giang (Waves in the Bach Dang River), and Nang Tien Mau Don (Peony Fairy).
Long, also the show's director, said it offered him a chance to achieve his dream of "paradise" – or, as he described it, an ideal theatre show where several performances were staged in the best possible conditions and actors work hard.
Long, real name Hoang Kim Long, will be joined by Thoai My, Phuong Hang, Trong Nghia, and Que Tran for the show.
Comedians Hoai Linh and Bao Quoc, and singers Cam Ly and Phi Nhung will be special guests.
Day Song Bach Dang Giang will not be a solo effort. Instead, Long will collaborate with young director Vu Minh, and the play will feature nearly 150 dancers.
Long, born in Sai Gon (now HCM City) in 1966, developed an interest in cai luong at 14. He learned to sing vong co (nostalgic tunes), a traditional southern art form, and perform cai luong from Vuong Quang and the late People's Artist Phung Ha.
In 1985, he was a member of Tran Huu Trang Troupe 3, one of the region's leading cai luong performers. His strong voice and dance skills quickly made an impression on audiences.
In 1992, he won the prestigious Tran Huu Trang Award given to promising cai luong artists.
He also won the Nguoi Lao Dong (The Labourer) newspaper's Mai Vang (Golden Ochna) Award for Favourite Cai Luong Actor in 2002, 2003, and 2009.
Thien Duong Cua Toi will be staged at the Hoa Binh Theatre in HCM City on Feb. 25-26./.
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HCM City bicycle race gets facelift
HCM City (VNA) — Ten years after it was first held, the Sai Gon Cyclo Challenge has been rejigged and will be organised in its new format at the Phu My Hung Urban Area in HCM City on March 12.
Cycle Challenge Version 2.0 aims to raise 30,000 USD to help provide education to poor children.
The race at the Crescent will be open only to platinum and gold sponsors under the new format.
There will be eight of them – VinaCapital Group's VinaLiving, Adidas, HSBC, Hoang Long Hoan Vu, Jardines, Megastar, Halliburton, and VNG, the sole platinum sponsor.
It will be a relay race featuring four riders in each team, with the top three teams qualifying for the finals.
"It is like Formula 1 for cyclos," director of Sai Gon Children Charity (SCC), Paul Finnis, told a press conference on Feb. 17.
"We hope the HCM City community will join us for an exciting morning of racing and, in the process, help provide education for children," Finnis added.
An online campaign was launched on Feb. 17, with SCC partnering Zing Me, Vietnam's largest social network, to launch a new version of Parking Challenge, one of the most popular games on Zing Me.
SCC will use the money raised through the race to support disadvantaged children in HCM City and the southern provinces of Dong Nai, Tay Ninh, Tien Giang, Tra Vinh, and Binh Phuoc.
Since 2001 it has raised 500,000 USD for building schools and providing scholarships and vocational training, enabling more than 3,500 children to equip themselves with the skills necessary to work their way out of poverty./.
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Art of embroidery on show
Hanoi (VNA) — An exhibition presenting the work of French embroidery artist Lionel Descostes has opened at L'Espace, the French cultural centre in Hanoi.
The exhibition, entitled From a Stroke to a Thread, showcases 40 handmade embroidery pieces on taffeta, made using a single-thread technique and the result of eight years' work by Descostes in Vietnam.
"For me, eight years was a long process of fatigue and pressure," said Descostes. "But I love Vietnamese embroidery and always wanted to do something to preserve this traditional craft."
Descostes studied visual art and technique in France and decided to live in Vietnam to pursue his love for the nation's traditional embroidery. He also hired hearing-impaired girls from local vocational training centres and trained them for six-nine months to do embroidery.
"The paintings represent my collective work with these Vietnamese girls, whom I found to be very talented and skillful embroiderers," said Descost at the exhibition opening.
He expressed the view that traditional embroidery could find its place within contemporary art and said that the exhibition would open a new vision for visitors on an popular but little understood artform.
The exhibition runs until March 4 at 24 Trang Tien Street, Hanoi./.
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Logos, ads may appear on invoices
Hanoi (VNA) — Firms are allowed to print their logos or advertising on their invoices along with compulsory information, said Vu Thi Mai, deputy director of the General Department of Taxation.
Earlier this year the Government required firms to print their own invoices instead of having to acquire invoice forms from tax agencies, as was the case before January 1. These so-called red invoices serve as official proof of commercial transactions for taxes and other purposes.
However, many businesses have complained they still face difficulties in printing invoices, especially businesses who generate a large amount of invoices.
Some say authorities should provide businesses with a sample invoice, as there was still confusion over all the information that needs to be included on a legal invoice.
Mai said the department will continue to guide firms on how to ensure they comply with the new decree.
Businesses do not need to send documents and sample invoices to tax agencies before printing the invoices, said Mai.
"Invoices for water, electricity and telecommunications services without user signatures are also valid," she said.
Small firms that have less than 10 employees are allowed to continue to buy invoices from tax agencies until the end of 2011./.
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Vietnamese youth attend exchange in Japan
Tokyo (VNA) – Sixty young Vietnamese people, who are outstanding young politicians and journalists, are attending an exchange in Japan as part of the Japan-East Asia Network of Exchange for Students and Youth (JENESYS).
During their visit to Japan from Feb. 16-23, the Vietnamese delegation, headed by Vo Van Thuong, First Secretary of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union Central Committee, worked with high-ranking Japanese leaders, exchanged with Japanese students and visited newspaper offices and television stations along with activities to study Japanese cultural characteristics.
This is the 15 th Japan-Vietnam youth exchange programme that aims to help young Vietnamese people learn more about Japanese people and land while acting as ambassadors to introduce Vietnamese culture and people to their Japanese friends./.
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16 million poor people granted health insurance cards
Hanoi (VNA) – A policy supporting poor people and vulnerable groups in medical check-ups and treatment has seen progresses with some 16 million poor people being provided with health insurance cards so far.
According to the Ministry of Health (MoH), 60 percent of the country’s population had possessed health insurance cards by early 2011.
The MoH said it has suggested health insurance payment policy for all traffic accident patients regardless of their violations of traffic laws or not.
Under its proposal to the Ministry of Finance, the MoH said once approved, the policy will help solve difficulties for traffic accident victims in proving their eligibility to health insurance interests./.
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Domestic social networks to challenge Facebook
Hanoi (VNA) — Long before the Oscar-nominated film The Social Network, Facebook and other internet networks had already become as much an addiction as a habit for many younger Vietnamese, triggering a battle for market share between the global giant and would-be domestic competitors.
ZingMe, currently the leading domestic social network, has already outpaced Facebook in terms of minutes spent online per month, with 1 billion minutes compared to 880 million minutes for Facebook, according to online game producer VinaGame.
But the number doesn't fully reflect the reality of the situation, says Phan Thanh Hai, an online project expert with software firm FPT.
Hai says the growth of ZingMe is due to its online games, not from its networking capabilities, the fundamental value of any social network.
Over the past two years, domestic social networks like Yume.vn, Tamtay.vn or the recently launched GoOnline.vn have mushroomed but have lost users over time, Hai says, adding they failed to upgrade to more modern applications over time, considered a lightning rod to younger users.
"I've tried the new social network GoOnline but it was disappointing, since picture uploading took too long," said 17-year-old user Tran Thanh Huong, who also didn't like the functions for sharing with friends or posting a personal status.
"The problem is that many domestic social networks cannot afford the long-term technical maintenance and periodic upgrades, while Facebook possesses enormous financial backing," said Vietnam Social Media Corporation general director Vu Kiem Van.
But ZingMe still had a chance to compete with Facebook, Van said.
"Facebook is well-known worldwide for its convenient functions, so it will not face a lot of difficulties in the Vietnam market," said Van. "But ZingMe is popular among teenagers, attracting them with Vietnamese music and games. ZingMe should be able to retain these users when their core subjects grow up." Van predicted that 2011 would be a critical year in the competition among social networks to decide who will be number one in the market.
"It would be a breakthrough for Vietnamese companies if they could take advantage of culture understanding," he added. "Otherwise, we'll lose to a foreigner on our home ground."
Facebook, founded in 2004, has become the biggest social network in the world, with over 600 million active users./.
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Late-night game parlours to be banned after 10pm
Hanoi (VNA) — The Ministry of Information and Communication has asked internet service providers to block access to on-line games each day from 10pm to 8am by March 3.
The request, made on Feb. 16, is another move from the authority to mitigate the side effects of online games.
"Provincial departments of information and communication will inspect on-line games activities nationwide and deal with organisations that violate regulations by cancelling their services," said the ministry's Deputy Minister Le Nam Thang.
Internet management should be improved in a way that both meets the demand for information and ensures internet security while not affecting the lifestyle and customs of young people, said Thang.
The request follows numerous stiff measures by the ministry to tackle the issue, including cutting internet access to agents at night beginning last September.
Some on-line game service providers like VTC Intercom and Asiasoft said that the (internet access block) measure reduced entertainment access to adults who have paid a lot for internet access.
They also said it created difficulties for the maintenance of on-line games.
In addition to the temporary measure for on-line gaming and internet agency management, the ministry plans to revise the decree this year in order to make improvements in the near future.
Vietnam currently has around 23 million internet users, accounting for 26 percent of the total population, according to the ministry./.
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Mekong Delta raises tra fish export revenue
Can Tho (VNA) – The Mekong Delta plans to export 600,000-650,000 tonnes of tra fish for 1.55 billion USD in 2011, 150 million USD more than
last year’s figure.
Additional 6,000-6,300 ha of water surface in the Mekong delta, mainly in Dong Thap, An Giang, Ben Tre and Can Tho City, will be marked out for tra fish raising in order to increase its output to 1.3 million tonnes.
The figure will help enlarge the region’s total aquaculture area to 800,000 ha, including 50,000 ha of black tiger shrimp and 195,000 ha of fresh-water shrimp and fish.
The region expects to harvest 2.4 million tonnes of seafood this year, a year-on-year increase of 160,000 tonnes.
To the target, the province will enhance personnel training in seafood raising, tapping and processing and assist businesses in technological renewal as well as expand its market information, promoting and marketing system.
In the meantime, they will continue building the irrigation system for fresh and brackish water, promote quarantine work and increase the management of water environment, the quality and food safety in accordance with international standards./.
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