Hai Duong urgently prepares for Con Son - Kiep Bac Spring Festival

This year's Con Son - Kiep Bac Spring Festival takes place from February 23 to March 3 (ie from January 14 to 23) with many traditional rituals and a variety of attractive festival activities.

The new feature is that the opening ceremony will announce the Prime Minister's decision to recognize the Three Buddha Statues of Con Son Pagoda as a national treasure. The 690th anniversary of the death of the Third Patriarch of the Truc Lam Zen Sect, Venerable Huyen Quang, will be larger because it is an even year. The Culture, Cuisine, Tourism and Trade Promotion Week will be organized on a larger scale with many attractive activities. In particular, associated with this year's festival, for the first time the province will organize the "Heritage Connection Journey" Cross-country Race, the largest in scale and longest distance held in Hai Duong...

Mr. Nguyen Truong Thang, Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Head of the Content and Propaganda Subcommittee, said that the Organizing Committee of the 2024 Con Son - Kiep Bac Spring Festival has soon developed a plan and established subcommittees. The subcommittees clearly assign people, tasks, and progress... Up to this point, all work has followed the plan and is being implemented according to the set schedule...

The art program for the opening ceremony was also rehearsed early. Mr. Bui Quang Toan, Director of Hai Duong Cheo Theater, said that the art program “Linh khi Con Son” was rehearsed for about 30 minutes. Currently, 70 actors, singers, musicians, etc. of the theater are still actively rehearsing.

Mr. Nguyen Van Cuong, Deputy Head of the Management Board of Con Son - Kiep Bac relic site, said that the units directly involved in implementing the events have prepared the conditions to install stages, booths, decorations, etc. This year, the Con Son - Kiep Bac relic site has been renovated with 10,000 m² of trees and flowers.

In particular, this year, many new landscape areas and check-in areas have been designed to be eye-catching and meet the needs and tastes of tourists, such as: "Spring Colors of Con Son" landscape area, "Con Son Flower Stream", "Con Son Fairyland". "Spring Wishing Tree", the area to experience the old Tet, write calligraphy, ask for words, give words... attracting a large number of tourists to experience. The new point this year is that all signs and explanations at the relic have been replaced with bilingual Vietnamese - English; the LED propaganda light boxes on both sides of the road to Nguyen Trai Temple have also been renewed... to meet UNESCO's criteria. Dozens of propaganda banners are hung along the roads leading to the relic; 2,000 red flags, sacred flags, thousands of meters of string flags, flashing lights, lanterns... are hung to create highlights for the relic.

In addition, at the entrance to Nguyen Trai Temple, there is an area for exchanging Cheo and Quan Ho singing, creating a joyful and exciting atmosphere. The Con Son - Kiep Bac Relic Management Board also arranged 2 areas to display tourism products and specialties of Con Son - Kiep Bac and Hai Duong.

The 2024 Banh Chung and Banh Giay wrapping contest in Hai Duong province will open this year's festival. Teams have prepared materials for the competition day. The leader of the provincial Center for Culture and Arts said that the contest will attract 12 teams from districts, towns and cities in the province to participate. Preparations for service personnel, venues and facilities are ready.

Notably, this year's Culture, Cuisine, Tourism and Trade Promotion Week is also larger in scale with 43 booths, including: 19 booths introducing the cuisine of Hai Duong province and regions across the country; 24 booths introducing OCOP products, tourism, and traditional craft villages of Hai Duong province.

Mr. Vu Dinh Tien, Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Head of the Subcommittee for promoting culture, cuisine, tourism and trade promotion, said that units inside and outside the province with booths to introduce and promote products have prepared the conditions to proceed with the installation and decoration. This will be an attractive event for tourists with the highlight of the fashion show and culinary promotion of famous chefs along with the traditional cultural space of the nation. The week also promotes 3 dishes: cha ruoi, banh cuon, banh dau xanh, which have been certified as typical culinary dishes in phase I - 2022 by the Vietnam Culinary Culture Association (VCCA).

As this is the first time organizing a large-scale cross-country race, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has proactively planned and prepared all necessary safety conditions for the tournament to be highly effective. Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Hung, Head of the Department of Sports Management, Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said that the list of 850 athletes registered to participate has been finalized, including many top athletes in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. The organizing committee is dividing the athletes into stages, placing BIBs (chip-attached cards to control athletes and evaluate achievements)...

The clay artillery competition attracted 7 teams with 150 artillerymen from Gia Loc, Ninh Giang, and Tu Ky districts; the ethnic wrestling festival attracted about 40-50 wrestlers and was also ready for the competition day.

The Management Board of Con Son - Kiep Bac relic site has coordinated with local authorities to regularly inspect and supervise price posting; prevent the occurrence of stalking of customers, street vendors, encroachment on sales locations, etc.; arrange permanent forces at relic sites and areas with high tourist concentrations to ensure fire prevention, fire fighting and timely support for visitors. The road to Con Son relic site has been expanded and is more beautiful...