~ Le Viêt Nam, aujourd'hui. ~
The Vietnam News

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Vietnam's Hoi An on post-september 11 tourism push

HANOI - Tourist arrivals in the popular Vietnamese destination of Hoi An dropped by half after the September 11 terror attacks in the United States, but the number of visitors rallied to new heights in October, the latest figures show. Hoi An received about 209,500 visitors last year, an increase of 28.3 percent. These figures mean that there were three visitors for every one Hoi An resident.

The shock of September 11 has passed and demand for travel has revived. However, in the newly hostile and violent post-September 11 world, tourists want to travel to safe and friendly places. Hoi An, in the central Quang Nam province, is such a place. Hoi An has been open to domestic and international visitors for more than 15 years. Millions of people have come to the town for relaxation and sightseeing, especially since it was recognized as a world heritage site in 1999. Dozens of festivals, cultural weeks, and national and international conferences have been held in Hoi An without any problems with safety, theft, or the dignity of visitors. This is because Hoi An residents are renowned for their kind-hearted approach to life, their hospitality, and their readiness to help anyone. These characteristics have become the basis for a clean, safe and friendly social environment for everyone, especially visitors from afar who have created jobs and prosperity for the town.

Local tourist managers are trying to reduce troubles for visitors. The litany of hassles for tourists - having to buy goods and services of low quality or at high prices due with the collusion of dealers and intermediaries; being harassed by hucksters, shoe-polishing boys and cyclo drivers; sidewalks or road-beds being utilized for business; and regulations on the use of sound, lighting and business hours being ignored - are all things managers are trying to change. The municipal authorities have organized an urban conduct monitoring team specializing in overseeing social order and the tourist environment in the ancient town, and inspecting cyclo drivers and business intermediaries. Members of this team are always present in the streets and at sightseeing venues to deal with visitors' complaints. "We have also dealt with disputes between visitors and hotels and service establishments submitted to the municipal chairman for settlement. We have even shut down a hotel for a month for treating visitors unfairly," said a local tourism manager.

In Hoi An, visitors are also allowed to participate in handicraft production. Steve Brown, an American visitor coming to Hoi An on the cruise ship Norwegian Wind, said he was moved to discover the rural Vietnamese way of living and working through manual work. He said he believes that the Vietnamese love peace, beauty and humanity. Hoi An was the first city in Vietnam to permit local residents to start up home-stay businesses a few years ago to ease the burden on the small number of hotels in town. Of course, only good families with beautiful houses are allowed to receive foreign guests. Foreign visitors love to stay in 100-year-old wooden houses, listening to the sounds of wooden sabots in a quiet street or the cries of vendors on a tranquil night. For those who come from industrialized countries and are accustomed to crowded streets and air-conditioned rooms, a night stay in an ancient wooden house in Hoi An is an unforgettable memory.

In early December, Hoi An celebrated the second anniversary of its world heritage recognition. The small town is endowed with a unique cultural history that international visitors are free to discover by themselves. The Vietnamese hope that, for foreign tourists, it will not be enough to visit Hoi An without integrating into its interesting lifestyle and simple but hospitable people.

Asia Times - February 20, 2002.