New Vietnam library in Udon Thani highlights cultural exchange
Performances, exhibitions and student contests marked five decades of diplomatic ties, while leaders looked to education and youth to sustain them.
- A new Vietnam Library has opened at Udon Thani Rajabhat University in Thailand, serving as the centerpiece of a festival celebrating 50 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
- The library will provide students, teachers, and researchers with access to materials on Vietnamese history, culture, and language.
- It is designed to be a cultural hub that fosters exchange by hosting activities such as film screenings, photo exhibitions, and presentations on Vietnamese music, arts, and cuisine.
- The project aims to support educational cooperation and act as a cultural bridge to strengthen understanding and links between the people of Thailand and Vietnam, particularly the youth.
A new Vietnam Library at Udon Thani Rajabhat University (UDRU) formed the centrepiece of the Vietnam–Thailand Cultural Festival in Udon Thani province.
The event opened on August 28 to mark 50 years since the two countries established diplomatic relations on August 6, 1976, and was jointly organised by the Consulate General of Vietnam in Khon Kaen and UDRU.
Among those present were Dinh Hoang Linh, Vietnam’s consul-general in Khon Kaen; Udon Thani Deputy Governor Nattapong Khamwongpin; UDRU leaders; and representatives of Vietnamese associations in Thailand.
They were joined by many Vietnamese expatriates and students from Thailand and Vietnam.
Housed in the university’s Vietnamese Studies Centre, the library is expected to combine study with cultural activities.
It will provide space for reading and learning Vietnamese, as well as photo exhibitions, film screenings and presentations of the country’s music, arts, cuisine and traditional cultural values.
Linh said it would also support educational cooperation, cultural exchange and links between young people in Thailand and Vietnam.
UDRU President Kanisara Thanyasuntornsakul said the collection would bring material on Vietnamese history, culture and language within reach of students, teachers and researchers.
Its purpose extended beyond safeguarding books and documents, she said, as it would also act as a bridge for knowledge and give young people and others interested in Vietnam more ways to study the country and its people.
Kanisara placed the project in a wider local context, pointing to Udon Thani’s large Vietnamese-Thai community, the President Ho Chi Minh memorial site and other important places associated with people of Vietnamese origin in northeastern Thailand.
She said the friendship between Vietnam and Thailand had become steadily stronger and more enduring over the past half-century.
She also described UDRU as a major academic centre with extensive research on Vietnamese culture and language.
Looking ahead, she hoped the university, the Consulate General of Vietnam in Khon Kaen and Vietnamese associations in Thailand would continue expanding their cooperation for the benefit of both nations.
Udon Thani Deputy Governor Nattapong said the festival’s cultural programme could reinforce the positive course of Vietnam–Thailand relations.
He believed the library would make Vietnamese and Thai cultures more accessible to students from both countries.
Reviewing the wider relationship, Linh described its development over five decades as strong, substantive and comprehensive.
He said political trust had strengthened and the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership had deepened, creating greater scope for cooperation in trade, investment, tourism, education, culture and people-to-people exchanges.
The festival offered more than a display of the two nations’ traditional cultural richness, according to Linh.
It also allowed them to look back on five decades of friendship and cooperation while considering their shared future, in which young people would have a central role.
Linh also credited UDRU’s work in educational cooperation, cultural exchange and people-to-people diplomacy, expressing hope that the event would build further bridges of friendship and improve mutual understanding between the two peoples.
Ho Van Lam, chairman of the Association of Vietnamese in Thailand, said the Vietnamese community would remain involved in joint initiatives, including activities with Thais of Vietnamese origin.
He expected the library to help establish UDRU as an important centre in northeastern Thailand for education, research and the preservation and study of Vietnamese language and culture.
Beyond the library opening, the programme traced bilateral ties in Udon Thani through a video and marked the 50th anniversary with musical performances by artists from both countries.
Paintings of important moments in the relationship formed an exhibition titled “50 years of Thailand–Vietnam relations”, while the student programme comprised speech and quiz contests on Vietnamese language, society and culture.
Source: Vietnam News
