Hello and welcome to VOV’s Letter Box, our weekly feature dedicated to shortwave hobbyists around the world. We are Mai Phuong and Ngoc Huyen.

B: Thank you, Fred. We appreciate your listening to VOV and would be happy to welcome you to our station. Usha Hazarika of Assam, India listened to our program on August 10 at 16:20 UTC on the frequency of 9550 Khz with SINPO rated at 43333. She wrote: “I was very happy to listen to the amazing Voice of Vietnam on the air last night here in Assam India. I really thank you for your excellent “weekend music show”. On this program, you played some wonderful music which was really enjoyable. Your station is a storehouse of knowledge, information and entertainment. I enjoyed your program very much”

A: It’s great to hear from you, Usha. We have emailed you and sent you our QSL card to confirm your listening. As you know, our time on this show is limited, so we can’t always play songs on our weekday shows. That’s why we dedicate half of our weekend show to music. We want to introduce listeners to the beauty and trends of Vietnamese music and the best known Vietnamese singers, musicians and songwriters.  We’re very happy that so many listeners say they enjoy the music show very much. Thank you.
B: Neelakandan V of India listened to our program on August 2^nd from 16:00 to 16:28 UTC on the frequency of 7220 Khz, SINPO rated at 45433. Neelakandan commented: “It is interesting to hear about internet use in Vietnam. I would like to know more about the internet penetration in the rural areas of Vietnam, because here in India, we have not covered the rural areas with the latest 3G or 4G technology- only with the slower internet. I would like to know whether the people in rural areas of Vietnam get high speed internet access and what percentage of the total Vietnamese population are connected to the internet”.

A: Over the past decade, Vietnam has consistently recorded a high internet growth rate, the third highest in Southeast Asia. The Ministry of Information and Communications reports that Vietnam has nearly 5 million broadband internet subscribers and 3.3 million 3G service subscribers. By late last year, Vietnam had over 31.3 million internet users, almost 36% of the population.

B: Vietnam’s Ministry of Information and Communications has launched a 5-year program to increase computer use and public internet access among the rural residents in 40 disadvantaged provinces across the country. The project has 50.5 million USD in funding, including 30 million USD from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Microsoft donates 3.64 million USD worth of software. The Vietnamese government will contribute the rest.

A: The program will provide 400 public libraries at the district and province level and 1,500 communal cultural posts and libraries with 12,000 broadband internet-connected computers. The aim is to provide internet access to 760,000 rural residents.

B: The government has launched a 1.23 billion USD project to develop information and communication services in rural areas in the 2011-2020 period. It aims to build public post and telecom offices in all Vietnam’s poor and remote communes. It is hoped that by 2020, internet subscribers in rural areas will reach 30%-40% of the national rate.

A: Now, here are some other letters from VOV listeners. We want to welcome Vikram Kesvala, a member of the British DX Club of the UK to our station and to Vietnam. Vikram wrote: “I listened to your programming on an Eton G3 Globe Traveler portable receiver with a 20 M long wire antenna. I enjoy learning about your history and culture by listening to the Voice of Vietnam on shortwave. I am now thinking of traveling to your country one day”.

B: Yes, we hope to see you in Vietnam one day. Your comments show that VOV is fulfilling its aim of being a bridge bringing international friends to Vietnam. Siddhartha Bhattachajee, a regular VOV listener in India had a question this week about the most popular motorcycle brand in Vietnam.

A: Honda and Yamaha motorcycles have been the most popular brands in Vietnam for many years. Recently, a website called Thetruthaboutcars of the US, in an article about motorcycles in Vietnam and the most typical one is Super Cub. Murilee Martin said Murilee spent two weeks in Vietnam last month and came away with a new appreciation for Honda’s utter dominance of the Asian motorbike market. Scooters and motorcycles are central to the culture of Vietnam; farmers ride them to their fields, parents use them to drop the kids off at school, furniture stores use them to deliver bedroom sets, and so on. Saigon and Hanoi are boiling maelstroms of bikes everywhere.

B: Murilee wrote: “Most of the bikes are sub-200cc machines, most are clutchless, and most are Hondas. The Honda Wave is one of the most popular, with the newer Air Blade, a big seller as well. Those shiny new bikes are kind of interesting, but nothing approaches the majesty of the most-produced motor vehicle in history: the Honda Super Cub. If you see a motorcycle piled high with an outlandish quantity of weird stuff in Vietnam, there’s about a 90% chance that it will one of the 60+ million Super Cubs built since 1958. As James May says in the Top Gear Vietnam Special after selecting a Super Cub as his Saigon-to-Hanoi steed, this is the machine that put Asia on wheels”.

A: That’s a short take on motorcycles in Vietnam through the eyes of a foreigner. This week, we received emails from Jack Wachtershauser of Australia, Mizanur Rahman of Bangladesh, Debakamal Hazarika, and Ratan Kumar Paul of India, Peter Ng of Malaysia, Richard Lemke of Canada, Muahammad Shamim of India, and Toshiya Nishimura of Japan.

A: All these listeners sent reports about the English programs they heard and commented on technical issues and program content. We greatly appreciate this feedback. Dear listeners, your reception reports were all complete enough for us to send you letters of confirmation. If your name wasn’t mentioned this week, don’t feel left out. We’ll try to mention you next time

A: Once again, we’d like to remind you of our address:

English section, Overseas Service, Radio Voice of Vietnam, 45 Ba Trieu Street, Hanoi, Vietnam. Or you can email us at: englishsection@vov.org.vn. You’re invited to visit us at www.vovworld.vn, where you can hear both live and recorded programs. And join us on Facebook at VOV5 English Section. Tata.