A: Hello and welcome to VOV’s regular Wednesday feature, The Letter Box. To improve the quality of our broadcasts every winter VOV makes some changes to its frequencies and timetables for shortwave broadcasts. This year, it will be as follows: our English broadcasts from Mossbrunn, Dhabayya and Woofferton to the west of Europe will be at from 18.00 to 18.30 UTC on 5955 KHz.
B: From Woofferton and Cypress Creek relay stations, English programs will now be broadcast on 9640 KHz from 01.00 to 01.30 UTC and from 03.30 to 04.00 UTC to eastern USA, and from 02.300 to 03.00 UTC to central USA and the Caribbean.
A: Once again it is from Mossbrunn, Dhabayya and Woofferton relay stations to the west of Europe, our English programs will be at from 18.00 to 18.30 UTC on 5955 KHz and from Woofferton and Cypress Creek stations, our broadcasts now will be on 9640 KHz from 01.00 to 01.30 UTC and from 03.30 to 04.00 UTC to eastern USA, and from 02.300 to 03.00 UTC to central USA and the Caribbean.
B: All the changes began to take effect on October 28th. We hope you can all catch up with the new timetables and frequencies to find it easier to tune programs on VOV. In case, you don’t listen to or don’t’ catch up with what we just mentioned, don’t worry, as we have all the information on our website at www.vovworld.vn
A: For now, as usual let’s check what we got from listeners last week. Many of the questions sent to us expressed a desire to know more about the Vietnamese National Assembly which coincidentally, is convening its year-end session at the moment.
B: Generally speaking, the National Assembly is the highest government organization and the people’s highest-level representative body. The 498-member body, elected for a five-year term, meets four times a year.
A: The NA deputies are elected directly by the people and act on behalf of the people in the assembly. They put forward their opinions to the National Assembly and the NA’s Standing Committee on legislative programs. They supervise and conduct investigations within their remit and exercise other powers as stipulated by law. They also make recommendations on issues relevant to their own personal fields of activity.
B: The National Assembly issues important policies of national interest. In addition to determining the State Budget and helping to develop the economy, society, culture and education, the National Assembly has also issued policies on ethnic issues, national security, defense and foreign affairs.
A: The last session of this year, which lasts for a month, is expected to pass 9 draft laws and 2 resolutions, including the laws on the national reserves, lawyers, publications and tax management. The deputies will issue resolutions on the votes of confidence proposal, and amendments to the 1992 Constitution.
A: You’re listening to VOV’s Letter Box, broadcast every Wednesday. The song you just heard was featuring the proud of Vietnamese young people about the country.This week, I would like to say hello to Harry Forsblom from Helsinki, in Finland. We realize that Harry has sent us letters for a couple of years and said that he has been listening to VOV. We’ve checked the CD you included with the letter and found that it’s neither a program in the Vietnamese language nor a VOV program.
B: What’s a pity, but we hope that in the next letter, you’ll send us details of our English programs and then we can send you QSL cards as a confirmation of you listening and to supplement to your collection of verification cards and letters from other radio stations. We understand that any DX listener shares the hobby of collecting as many QSL cards as possible!
A: Muralidhar from Bangalore in India reported his reception on October 3rd and 6th all on 9730 KHz and from 16.00 to 16.30 UTC. Technically, everything sounded fine to him. In terms of content, he expressed a particular interest in the music and the songs we broadcast on October 6th. In addition, Muralidhar has also sent DX/shortwave news report at least once a month to Letter Box.
B: We’d love to know that our programs are liked by listeners around the world including Muralidhar. Regarding your suggestion, we’ll take it into serious consideration as we try to make as many friends world wide as possible. We do hope that we can be a bridge linking all of you DX listeners together.
A: Welcome Dennis Allen from Milperra, Australia, whose letter moved us so much. Despite the poor reception conditions caused by lots of fading, noise, and distortion, this listener not only enjoyed, what he described as an ‘interesting and informative program’. Moreover, he sent us an extremely detailed report of what he was hearing from the beginning to the end of the program on October 3rd, on the frequency of 9840 KHz from 10.00 to 10.28 UTC.
B: Dennis caught every detail, how the news bulletin was, what the current affairs was about, and the Letter Box on that day with its content and names of the listeners. It’s great! And thank you, Dennis. We promise we’ll tell our technicians about your problems and hope next time, you’ll feel more relaxed when listening to VOV programs.
A: Chris Behl from Corrales, in New Mexico USA, found our program on shortwave frequency 6175 on September 28th at 02.45 UTC very interesting as it discussed tourism and employment in Vietnam. In recent years, Vietnam has become a popular destination for many foreign tourists. On December 26th , 2011, Vietnam welcomed its 6 millionth visitor to the country. It’s the result of a lot of hard work by the Vietnam tourism industry over the last few years.
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| Vu Thi Thu Thuy – Vice Chairwoman of Quang Ninh People’s Committee presents a medal and gifts for the 6 millionth foreign visitor to Vietnam. (Photo: Quang Ninh webportal) |
A: In 2009, 4 million people traveled to Vietnam but by 2010 this had risen to more than 5 million people and the 6 millionth visitor arrived last year, marking another turning point in the hospitality industry. On every Letter Box, we try to mention as many listeners as possible, so welcome to Jurgen Kruger from Potsdam, Germany, Andy Martynyuk from Moscow, Russia, and all you others out there.
B: All these listeners either sent us letters or emails with detailed reports of the English programs that they heard and comments both on the technical aspects and program content. We highly appreciate these. 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 too left out. We’ll try to acknowledge you next time.
A: That’s it for today’s Letter Box. Please keep in touch. We really look forward to receiving your comments and suggestions. Our contact address is: The English Program, Overseas Service, Radio Voice of Vietnam, 45 Ba Trieu Street, Hanoi, Vietnam.
B: Or you can email us at: englishsection@vov.org.vn. And if you miss any of our programs, you can always catch up by logging onto our website at www.vovworld.vn where you can hear both live and recorded programs. Good bye until next time