Hello and welcome to VOV’s Letter Box, our weekly feature dedicated to our listeners throughout the world. We are Mai Phuong and Phuong Khanh.

A: We’re in the first days of the New Lunar Year- the Year of the Monkey. We’d like to wish you all the best for the New Year.

B: In Vietnam, the new year brings hope for luck, happiness, and success. Here at VOV, we have received a lot of New Year’s greetings from our listeners throughout the world.

A: We received a red greeting card from Peter Ng of Malaysia. The card is really beautiful and has pictures of cute monkeys on it.

B: Richard Nowak of the US wrote: “Dear Voice of Vietnam, Chúc Mừng Năm Mới! (Happy New Year). Best wishes for a healthy, happy and prosperous New Year! I enjoyed tonight's show on 6175 kHz from 1:00 to 1:27 listening with a 1946 Crosley 56tc hooked up to 2.4 meters of wire going from radio to the window”.

A: Soumya Bhattacharjee of India wrote: “First of all I wish a very 'Happy Vietnamese Lunar New Year' to all of you there at VOV. May the New Year bring good luck, success and prosperity to all of you. I hope the weather is good in Vietnam and the New Year celebrations are at their peak. Please accept my best regards”.

B: Mr. Soumya Bhattacharjee continued: “This is my first email of 2016 to you, and I hope you all are doing well. I was not able to contact you frequently in past months but I was listening to the broadcasts regularly and was enjoying the programmes. I am also a regular visitor to the vovworld.vn website where I regularly read news, commentaries, programme transcripts and follow interesting pictures. But still I listen mostly by short-wave which is very convenient for me”.

A: Thank you very much for your greetings and comments on our program. Your report is very useful to us. We’ll confirm it with QSL cards and we do hope to see you soon in Vietnam.

B: Abdulkarim Ahmed Ali of Libya wrote: “my warm congratulations for the lunar New Year of the Monkey. Wishing you a very happy New Lunar Year full of success. I enjoy listening to your very interesting, informative, and education programs”.

A: Thank you, Abdulkarim Ahmed Ali of Libya. It has been such a long time since we last heard from you. We wish you a very Happy New Year. Sending us a beautiful e-card for the Year of the Monkey, Jörg-Clemens Hoffmann of Germany wrote: “Best wishes from Germany for "The Year of the Monkey". May the New Year be a successful and lucky one for you and your families. Enjoy the spring festival!”

B: Thank you, Jorg-Clemons Hoffmann. We hope to hear more from you. This week we also received congratulations on the occasion of World Radio Day, February 13. SB Sharma of India wrote: “Wishing you a very, very happy world radio day.  It is a day of great importance for us.  Radio is a simple, cheap and convenient instrument of mass communication around the globe. Radio is very meaningful for me. I have listened to radio since 1986. Besides gaining information about the culture, tourism, and language of another nation, I can win a free trip to the foreign nation by winning a radio competition organized by them. That’s a lifetime opportunity for me”.

A: Najimuddin, President of the International DX Radio Listeners’ Club of India wrote: “I wish you a very Happy World Radio Day.I must say that you are doing a nice job of keeping us all informed about the various events taking place in the world through your radio programs and web pages. The fact is that whenever we want to learn about you or about various related things, you are the best source of information. I also want to say that your website is a good source of information, entertainment and news. I think of Radio is as a Window of Knowledge. Through the radio I find lots of information, knowledge, entertainment and more........ HAPPY WORLD RADIO DAY TO ALL OF YOU”.

B: Thank you for tuning in to VOV. Marking World Radio Day on February 13, VOV Vice President Vu Hai said this day not only honors radio broadcasting but also affirms the cultural values it brings to our daily life. He said that despite the robust growth of multimedia, radio will continue to advance. The strength of radio is its ability to reach anyone, be they in remote areas or on the move.

A: VOV will continue to adapt to modern technology and global integration. VOV considers listeners its focus, target, and driving force for development.  

B: Aaron J. Rybski of the US wrote: “I've just started listening to shortwave...recently having an old 1946 Hallicrafters SX42 restored. I ran a wire up in my basement (nothing fancy) and picked up your program, listening from 3:50 until your broadcast ended at 4:00 UTC and hearing an interesting story about waterfalls and music. I was listening on 6175 MHz, I believe. Again, this is an old radio and it's sometimes hard to tell. Your broadcast was coming in quite clear and was reaching my meter at s5 to s7. Keep up the good work. I look forward to listening again!”

A: Thank you, Aaron J. Rybski, for tuning in to our broadcast. We’ll send you a QSL card, program schedule, and frequency list to make it easier for you to tune in to VOV.

B: This week, Cal Craig of the US sent us a reception report on our program on January 7. He wrote: “I had the pleasure to receive the English broadcast from Voice of Vietnam on 6175kz on the evening of Friday, January 7, from 0108 to 0128 UTC. My location is Stow, a suburb of Akron, Ohio, USA. When I first received your broadcast, your signal was fairly strong, but then began to fade in and out and at times you were difficult to hear for very short periods. There was at times moderate static and virtually no other station interference. SINPO 35433”.

A: Thank you, Cal Craig, for your informative report. We will forward your report to our technical department.

B: Cal Craig also sent us a VOV verification card from 1967, almost 50 years ago.

A: Well, that’s really impressive. We greatly appreciate your response to our broadcasts. We wish you all the best for the New Year and hope to hear more from you soon.

B: David Giba of the US listened to our program on February 15 on the frequency of 6175 and said he liked the Sunday show about celebrating the New Year with festivals and costumes and describing Hmong people and what they do as a culture during the New Year. David said his favorite part of the program is when traditional Vietnamese music is played.

A: On today’s program, we’d like to acknowledge emails and letters from Daniel Lampkin of the US who listened to our broadcasts from February 1 to 7 from UTC 1600 to 1630 on the frequency of 9550 kHz, Ratan Kumar Paul of South Asia CRI DXER forum of India, Subir Basu and Soumya Bhattacharjee of India, Eddy Prabowo of Indonesia, Fumito Hokamura of Japan, and Giovanni Ricci of Italy.  We have sent you QSL cards to confirm your reports.

B: We welcome your feedback at: 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 online at www.vovworld.vn, where you can hear both live and recorded programs. Before wrapping up our show, let’s listen to a song called….. We’d like to dedicate this song to Giovanni Ricci of Italy who asked whether we broadcast Vietnamese music. Good bye until next time.