Quang Liem leads Aeroflot event

Vietnamese International Grand Master (IGM) Le Quang Liem took the lead at the Russian International Chess Festival Aeroflot Open in Moscow after defeating China's Xiu Deshun in the second round on Thursday.

Taking two points from two rounds, Liem will meet IGM Slovakia's Luka Lenic in the third round.

Competitors have varying levels of skills and are taking part in three open tournaments, each of which is a nine-round Swiss system event.

Liem is among 130 candidates in Tournament A, the highest level, competing for a cash prize of 20,000 euros (US$29,300) for the title winner who also will be entitled to participate in a round-robin Super Tournament in Dortmund in the second half of July.

There will also be prizes for the best performance among seniors, women and juniors in all tournaments and a prize for the best result by an unrated player in Tournament C.

Ngoc Tu to compete for Gia Lai

Soc Trang's judoka Van Ngoc Tu is completing the necessary procedures to play for Gia Lai, after signing a VND10 million (US$500) a month contract.

Tu is nearly unrivalled at Southeast Asian (SEA) region following the 23rd SEA Games.

The four-time SEA champion officially ended her contract with Soc Trang provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism last December.

City to spend $350,000 on youth

HCM City will spend VND7 billion (US$350,000) to train young players this year, mainly in training and competing abroad.

Young talents will also be given top priority, with 16-year-old tennis player Nguyen Hoang Thien, who is competing at the 2011 Tennis Central 18&U ITF Summer Championships in New Zealand, set to receive $30,000.

Thien was ranked 241st in the world according to the latest world ranking table by the International Tennis Federation.

Woman striker hangs up her boots

Do Thi Ngoc Cham, the national women's football team's star striker, has announced her retirement from the sport at just 26 to pursue a coaching career.

Cham, who recently signed on as assistant coach of Ha Noi team, had helped the team win a gold medal at the National Games last December.

Winner of the Golden Ball in 2008, she was the main striker for the national and Ha Noi teams in recent years.

Ha Noi-born Cham began to play competitive football in 1999 when she joined the Soc Son District Sports Centre.

She began to play for Ha Noi in 2001 and a year later was named in the national team for the Asian Games. — VNS

Related Articles

• Quang Liem leads Aeroflot Open chess tournament
• Young stars raise profile of Vietnam chess
• Viet Nam and China sign pack on human trafficking
• Millenium English contest enters finals
• HCMC to relay grand sale program to November

VTV-Binh Dien Volleyball Cup begins in Dong Nai

The annual International Women's Volleyball Championships will start tomorrow in the southern province of Dong Nai with the spotlight firmly focused on the Australian team.

The tournament, which is also known as the VTV-Binh Dien Cup, will see the participation of three domestic and four foreign teams competing in a round robin format before the top four teams progress to the semi-finals.

Viet Nam will be represented by Military Signal Corps, Vietsov Petro and VTV-Binh Dien Long An, while Australia will be joined by teams from Jiangsu Province and Tianjin University in China and Thai club Lopburi.

The Australian team will feature professional players from European clubs and are the hot favourites.

Vietsov Petro will play Tianjin University in the opening match and the final will held on January 16. The winners of the tournament will walk away with VND200 million (US$10,000).

Amateur tennis players to contest SMiC Cup

Amateurs will compete for the Tennis Open-SMiC Cup at the FLC Golfnet Club in Ha Noi this weekend.

The tournament became an annual event on Viet Nam Tennis Federation's calendar last year, and will see players competing in men's and women's doubles. The winning pair will pocket VND10 million (US$500).

Referee Dung chosen to train in English Premier League

Young referee Dinh Van Dung has been selected to take part in a training course organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) in England.

The Dong Nai-based official was of the top five referees on an AFC training course in 2008 and will train with 15 colleagues from the Premier League from January 15-22.

Last year, Dung was the leading official for the opening game of the International Youth Football Tournament – Sanix Cup between Japan and China.

He was praised for completing a successful job with confidence and accurate decisions by Pirom Anprasert, a prestigious AFC lecturer.

Junior Thien to compete in Australian Open in Melbourne

Nguyen Hoang Thien has earned a berth in the Australian Open junior category which starts on January 24 in Melbourne.

Thien, who will be 16 in March, jumped 111 places in the International Tennis Federation junior rankings released on Monday, from 323 to 212.

Thien is the first Vietnamese player to compete at one of the four grand slams.

He has set a target of breaking into the top 200 this year, and will warm up for the Open by taking part in the Loy Yang Traralgon International on January 15-20 in Traralgon, Australia. — VNS

Related Articles

• HCMC begins to think about giving up meat
• Greenback firmer on signs of rising demand
• Culture Vulture
• Theatre performers nominated for awards
• PM launches news channel

International Sailing Festival to be held in Binh Thuan

Sailing teams from 20 countries and territories will take part in an
International Sailing Festival in Mui Ne, which is the first ever to be
held in the southern province of Binh Thuan , from Dec. 8-11.

The festival entitled “"Yachts-Sea-Sun" will include an exhibition of
200 yachts of international groups, demonstration of professional
yachtsmen and art performances by artists from Vietnam , the US , the
Republic of Korea , Australia and Russia .

During the event, a seminar on building Vietnam marine trademarks will be held.

In
announcing the festival on Oct. 7, Deputy Chairman of the Binh Thuan
People’s Committee Nguyen Van Thu said that the event was aimed at
promoting Vietnam ’s sea tourism, particularly Binh Thuan and Mui Ne
to domestic and foreign visitors, as part of the national sea strategy
till 2020.

He also said that the festival is expected to become
an annual event in Binh Thuan, along with the international paragliding
and windsurfing tournaments.

With 192 km of coastline, Binh Thuan
has many beautiful beaches, historical and cultural relics and a lot of
unique traditional festivals, which are an advantage for the province
in developing sea tourism.

Mui Ne beach in Binh Thuan is rated as one of the best for sailing in Asia by the International Yacht Association./.

Related Articles

• Vietnam demands unconditional release of fishermen held by China
• Projects inaugurated to mark Hanoi’s millennium
• Activities mark Hanoi’s 1,000th birthday
• Offshore oil & gas security in spotlight
• PM foresees bright future for co-operation with Africa

Palestinian diplomat wins highest prize of Hanoi contest

Palestinian Ambassador Saadi Salama has won the exceptional prize at the
2009-2010 international contest on Thang Long-Hanoi called “ Hanoi
-Your Destination.”

Addressing the awards
ceremony, held in Hanoi on October 7, the Deputy Chairwoman of the
municipal People’s Committee and Head of the contest’s Steering
Committee, Ngo Thi Thanh Hang said that the contest has contributed a
great deal to help Hanoi become familiar to international friends.

It has also increased the number of people who love Hanoi , a city
of peace, with national and international cultural heritages and a safe
and friendly destination for international visitors, said Hang.

Ambassador Salama, who used to study and work in Vietnam in the
1980s, said he felt lucky to return to work in Hanoi on the occasion
of the city’s millennium birthday.

The contest gave him a chance to express his love of Hanoi where he considers his second homeland.

“I hope that there will be more contests about the country’s
traditional culture to make international friends understanding your
beautiful capital more,” he said.

Jointly held
by the Hanoi Union of Friendship Organisations and the National Steering
Committee for Thang Long-Hanoi thousand year anniversary, the contest
has attracted thousands of people from many countries around the world
since 2000.

This year’s competition received
1,789 entries in six languages including Chinese, Vietnamese, English,
French, Russian and Spanish.

At the awards
ceremony, the organising board also presented one first, five second and
10 third prizes to individuals and one first and two second prizes for
groups./.

Related Articles

• Hanoi model wins Miss Vietnam 2010
• Ford rewards employee’s technician skills in contest
• Foreigners suggest measures to preserve Hanoi
• Get-together marks German Unity Day
• Poor rural children blaze education trail

French virtuoso to perform recital of Brahms, Liszt

Pianist Michel Bourdoncle will treat Hanoi audiences a recital at the French Cultural Centre, L'Espace, next Friday.

The pianist will play four pieces including Chaconne for the Left Hand
by Johnnes Brahms, The Valley of Oberman by Franz Liszt, Overture and
Serenade for Left Hand by Sciabine and Rhapsody in Blue.

The 50-year old pianist began his musical studies in Aix-en-Provence .
He continued at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique de
Paris where he won the First Prize for Chamber Music and the First Prize
for Piano in the classes of Genevieve Joy and Dominique Merlet.

He won the Acanthes International Competition in 1984 in the presence
of Iannis Xenakis. After that he received a scholarship from the French
government to study at the Tchaikovski Conservatoire in Moscow .

He was the prize winner of the Liszt Competition in Utrecht in
1986. Since then, Bourdoncle has pursued a triple career as a concert
pianist, a teacher at the Darius Milhaud Conservatoire in
Aix-en-Provence and an artistic director.

He created the International Festival Les Nuits Pianistiques which takes place every year in Aix-en-Provence .

In 2006, he established the International Pianistical Academy of
Aix-en-Provence. He has performed in many countries in the world with
orchestras including Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and l'Orchestre de
Chambre de la Radio de Bucharest.

He often serves as a
judge in the competitions of the Conservatoires Nationaux Superieur and
in various International Competitions. He will be one of the jury
members at the first Vietnam International Piano Contest in September.

He performed with the Hanoi Philharmonic Orchestra 2009 on the occasion of the French National Day.

The concert will open with 17-minute Chaconne for the Left Hand.

A chaconne is a type of musical composition popular in the baroque era
when it was much used as a vehicle for variation on a repeated short
harmonic progression.

Since Bach's time, several
transcriptions of the piece have been made for other instruments,
particularly for the piano by piano/left-hand by Brahms.

Study after a Chaconne by Bach is a piece by the early romantic composer
Johannes Brahms. The composition was first published in 1879 and is
included in Brahm's Piano Studies.

The concert will begin at 8pm. Tickets are available at 24 Trang Tien street , Hanoi./.

Related Articles

• Big buffets for National Day
• Where to hang out on National Day
• Weightlifter grabs Vietnam’s first Olympic gold at Youth Games
• Writers’ temple to display bronze drums
• Hello! Vietnam festival to open in Japan

Vietnam women feature at international art show

Ten Vietnamese women are among 84 artists from 24 countries
participating in an international female art exhibition centred on the
self.

Her Presence in Colours IX, presented by the
International Women Artists Council (INWAC), will remain open in
Portland State University 's Littman Gallery until the end of this
month.

Many international artists have interpreted the
exhibition's topic, "art as a reflection of self", very literally in
their works, organisers said.

Most of the art works
are either abstract or realistic oil paintings, with each displaying a
distinct cultural style that enables viewers to tell which country they
are from, they added.

INWAC was formed in China in
1993 when Yuen Chee Ling organised seven other Chinese female artists
for an exhibition and has since grown to a multinational organisation
with members from Europe, North America, Asia, the Middle East and
elsewhere.

Her Presence in Colours, held every two
years, has thus far been hosted by many Southeast Asian countries as
well as the UK and Australia .

This year's event
includes an artists' forum, a walk through the galleries of Pearl
District, sketching at the Lan Su Chinese Garden and small "sister
group" meetings to foster friendships.

The Vietnamese
artists featured in the latest exhibition are Cao Thi Duoc, Dang Thi
Duong, Nguyen Thuy Huong, Le Thi Kim, Cong Tang Ton Nu Ai Lan, Tran
Thuy Linh, Nguyen Thi Tam, Huynh Phuong Thi Dai Trang, Ly Chanh Van, and
Nguyen Thi Quang Vinh./.

Related Articles

• Party reports come in from provinces
• Widow of late Lao Party leader visits
• Painters show works inspired by nature, nostalgia
• Vietnam Air accepts web check-in for int’l flights
• PM lauds police for keeping public order