The opening ceremony of the 2019 Hanoi Spring Press Festival. (Photo: baomoi.com)
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Spring Press Festivals are organized across Vietnam annually to introduce Tet publications.
Nguyen Viem Hoang, head of the Hanoi Spring Press Festival’s organizing board, said: “This year’s Spring Press Festival has attracted 25 media agencies. Although modern means of communication are available and easy to access, reading Spring publications remains a special pleasure. For older people, Spring newspapers are indispensable."
A photo report entitled “The color of Vietnamese spring” in the Labor Newspaper highlighted outstanding spring festivals and how people enjoyed them.
Spring festivals in Hanoi like the Dong Da Festival in memory of 18th century King Quang Trung, the Co Loa Citadel Festival, the Perfume Pagoda Festival, and the Soc Son Temple Festival were described in detail in an article published in the New Hanoi newspaper.
The Voice of Vietnam newspaper introduced the Ba Be Lake Spring Festival of the Tay ethnic people in Bac Kan province. The newspaper also had a story praising the beauty of spring in the northeastern region with its typical flowers and fruits, and the sounds of the pan-pipe, the Tinh gourd lute, drums, and gongs played during the Con ball throwing festival and horse races.
Bui Duc Thien, a member of Thang Long-Hanoi Club, said: “Spring publications naturally make people inspired. I like to read newspapers and customarily do so. What interests me most in these newspapers are the historical traditions, national customs, Tet parallel sentences, and festivals, all of which kindle national pride."
As 2019 is the Year of the Pig, spring newspapers naturally featured stories about the animal. In Oriental culture, the pig is the last of the 12 zodiac signs. It has been a close animal to human beings and is considered the embodiment of wealth, good luck, and prosperity.
A specialized column in the Youth Newspaper featured the La Phu village festival in Hanoi’s outlying district of Hoai Duc on the 13th day of the first lunar month. La Phu villagers respect the pig, calling it Mr. Pig and using it as a sacred offering to the village’s tutelary god. Thus the selection and breeding of pigs is a rigorous process.
The News Week paper of the Vietnam News Agency had an article on the need to conserve Vietnam’s indigenous pig breeds while the Liberated Saigon newspaper listed memorable Years of the Pig in national history.
Spring newspapers also covered many stories on how Vietnamese people abroad prepared for the traditional Lunar New Year.
The Liberated Saigon newspaper shed light on the Spring atmosphere and color in San Jose City, in the US state of California, which is the second most populous city of Vietnamese people in the US.
The article entitled “Soldiers welcome in Tet in Central Africa” in the Youth Newspaper touched upon a Tet holiday far away from home for the military officials who are participating in the UN peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic. Spring newspapers 2019 ran many stories about forecasts and expectations of people from all walks of life for the New Year.