Danang’s full of flowers for Tet

Despite the gloomy weather, an abundance of colourful flowers, here to welcome the new year, could be seen in the streets of Danang.

The flower markets were opened on January 29. They can be found on many streets, such as Ham Nghi, Nguyen Huu Tho, Nguyen Ven Linh and Square No. 29/3.

Like pretty much all prices this year, the cost of flowers has increased between 30% and 40%.

One flower seller, Nguyen Van Quang, said, “A peach branch costs about VND900,000 (USD45), which is much more expensive than last year.

The demand is still high though. On a normal day I sell 10 peach branches.” Tran Duc Vinh, a member of the Hoa Cuong Association of Gardeners in Danang, said, “My friends and I share our knowledge of gardening. So my flowers usually bloom on schedule.” He added that, “People seem to prefer apricot trees, which are priced anywhere from VND5 million to VND10 million (USD250-USD500) each.”

Among the other favourites are yellow daisies. This type of flower is grown in the villages of Hoa Cuong and Cam Le, around Danang. A pot of yellow daisies would cost between VND200,000 and VND300,000 (USD10-USD15).

Images from flower market:

Finding the best apricot tree

Peach trees arrive from the north

Dazzling peach blossoms

Apricot or peach?

Apricots are the southernTet flower

Elderly apricot In full bloom

Kumquats are never forgotten on Tet

Flowers make the streets brighter

Yellow daisies

Flowers warm a gloomy winter

Sunflowers sandwiched between daisies

Waterlily

Tet is here!

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Tet in Miet Hau Giang

Miet Hau Giang (Hau Giang countryside) lies at the extreme southern tip on the map of Vietnam and is the old name of the land from the left bank of the Mekong River to the southern tip of Ca Mau province.

Tet celebrations in Hau Giang have an indigenous quality about them. Local residents living along the canal in makeshift houses made from coconut leaf begin preparations few months ahead of Tet. They start breeding chickens, growing ornamental plants and flowers and stacking firewood for cooking.

Each year on the twenty third day of the twelfth lunar month, just before Chinese New Year, they prepare a feast for the Kitchen God who they believe returns to Heaven to report all activities of every household. During this time people put on hold all work in their fields to concentrate solely on preparing for the coming Tet.

First they clean, tidy up and decorate their homes. They then pray for more prosperity and focus on decorating their altars.

People catch fish from ponds to dry and then use later for preparing delicacies to have during Tet. Any surplus fish is later sold in the market to cover for their Tet expenses. The only products they buy from the market are those that they cannot produce or make themselves, like clothes, shoes and incense.

Usually after the 25th day of lunar December, people start preparing strings, banana leaves, green beans and glutinous rice for making Tet Cake.

Groups of five to seven elderly women come together and visit each home to help prepare Tet Cake, a traditional long-shaped cake that is the main food for worship of ancestors for the southern people during the Lunar New Year.

Cooking Tet Cake could be a full night event. Around the outdoor cooking fire of each family, an old woman is often found keeping awake well into the night telling old stories to children lying on a nearby mat, while the cake is condensing in the pot.Besides Tet Cake, the women in Hau Giang make a variety of other cakes as well. Young girls get together to help each other make cakes and jams for Tet. They bring ingredients and cooking pots from their homes to make coconut toffee, apple custard and tomato jams and bake sponge cakes, cup cakes and pancakes.

Making Tet cake is a tradition for hundreds of years in Hau Giang. Women here can make a variety of cakes and also teach their daughters this wonderful legacy.

On the 28th day of lunar December, some households slaughter a pig to have pork for Tet. They have pig tripe soup at midnight and the following dawn they share pork with other households.

The pork is used to make stuffing for the Tet Cake and the most popular is the Chinese braised pork.

On the 29th day of lunar December people devote all their time to decorating their altars. Each family places on their alters an offering of different kinds of cakes or fruits picked from their garden like coconuts, custard apple and banana.

Hau Giang people believe that if they offer more cakes and fruits to their ancestors the more prosperous their family will become during the course of the year.

The final day of the lunar year is the most festive and vibrant with activity. Each household welcomes the New Year by preparing a feast, worshiping their ancestors and entertaining relatives and visitors.

Guests are those living in the same hamlet and they usually gather in groups to visit each home in a procession which is accompanied and followed by a lion dancing performance and amateur singers singing southern traditional songs. The little hamlet comes alive until midnight.

When people return home they bathe and wear new clothes, lay out cakes and jams on the table, burn incense on the altar and greet each other and seek the blessings of grandparents.

Miet Hau Giang is now a modern developed province with spacious homes and many facilities. However when Tet arrives tradition rules, bringing in nostalgic home-made flavors and the time old festivities of making cakes, worshiping ancestors and greeting neighbors, relatives and friends for a prosperous new year.

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Can Tho’s craftsmen busy for Tet

Craftsmen in Can Tho had been busy making their meticulous handcrafts at a fair to welcome the Tet festival.

The “Orchard Colours” trade fair took place in the Mekong Delta from January 22-26. It was a chance to see with thatched houses and all the normal daily activities of life there.

Two pavilions in particular were of special interest to visitors. Each one resembles household items, a knitted mat and basket.

Visitors could also try out traditional specialties from the southwestern region, including banh xeo (cake made from rice, shrimp, meat and sprouts), banh in (cake made from green beans and sugar), and banh tet (cake made from sticky rice, green beans and meat). Han scripts and abundant fruits add more colours to the festival.

Plaiting artificial flowers

Making toys from coconut leaves

The making of banh in

Waiting for banh trang

Knitted mats for Tet

Knitted baskets

Han scripts make good gifts

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Nha Trang: Beginning to look a lot like Tet

Even though Tet will not be here for another week, every street in Nha Trang is decorated in striking colours.

More and more impromptu markets for flowers and ornamental trees are set up along the side of the road.

The evenings are just as spectacular, with the streets bedecked in a decorative lights.

The atmosphere of Tet has certainly arrived in the beautiful coastal city, which also boasts of its fine beaches.

Nha Trang shows its colours this time of year:

Flowers line many streets

Peach and kumquat trees have arrived

Apricot blossoms find it’s still too cold

Flower shopping

Seasonal trees are everywhere

Planting poinsettias

Other Tet decorations

Nha Trang sparkles at night

The Year of the Cat is coming

Happy New Year

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Fun with banh chung at Sea Horse Resort

Hundreds of holidayers in Phan Thiet cheered on their favorite team at a banh chung wrapping contest at a festival at Sea Horse Resort on Tuesday night.

The contest to make the square glutinous rice cake filled with green bean paste and pork fat was part of a banh chung festival held by the resort. Twenty three teams, many of them tourists from Russia, Germany, Estonia and Rumania, competed.

In 15 minutes, the teams had to wrap all the ingredients of a banh chung in banana leaves and tie it with string under guidance of the resort staff.

All the teams finished the cake on time but the most beautiful banh chung belonged to three teams from Russia.

A Vietnamese overseas lady, Le Thu Nguyet, said, “I am Vietnamese but this is the first time I have made a banh chung. It is a joyful experience after 23 years away from my country.”

All the cakes were boiled to serve guests. “Touring Vietnam, I can

discover many landscapes and learn interesting things interesting about culture, food and history,” said Billy Karksson,a tourist from Sweden.

The festival is held at the resort every year so visitors can know about the traditional Vietnamese Tet festival.

*Binh Thuan Province will hold its Spring Fair at Nguyen Tat Thanh Square in Phan Thiet City from January 22 to 27 with about 150 booths.

Organizers hope the fair will add extra color to the province’s Tet celebrations and bring luck to

enterprises to promote their businesses and find partners.

The fair will feature food, cosmetics, household utensils, souvenirs, fine arts products and home decorations.

Nightly music shows, children’s games, promotions and discount programs promise to make it a fun event.

Source: SGT

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List of Official Vietnam Public holidays in 2010

List of Official Vietnam Public holidays in 2010

The dates for the 06 specified public holidays for 2010 are as follows: (Don‘t miss out our essential advice before you leave for Vietnam)

New Year‘s Day (Tết Dương Lịch)	Friday	1 January 2010
Lunar New Year (Tết Nguyên Đán)	Saturday to Tuesday	13-16 February 2010
Hung Kings Commemoriations (Giỗ Tổ Hùng Vương)	Friday	23 April 2010
Liberation Day	Friday	30 April 2010
Labour Day (Quốc Tế Lao Động)	Saturday	1 May 2010
National Day (Quốc Khánh)	Thursday	2 September 2010

* As LUNAR New Year (falls on Saturday 13 February 2010 and Monday 15 February 2010, the next day, Tuesday 16 February 2010, will be a public holiday.

2. The list of public holidays for 2010 is available on the Wikipedia

REMINDER ON APPLYING FOR A VISA DURING HOLIDAYS

3 . Since Vietnamese Embassies and Immigration Dept are closed on public holidays, it is strongly advised that you apply for a visa in advance to avoid delay of your flights during the holiday time.

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