Tò he, traditional toy for Vietnamese children, is offered at one of many craft gift booths at the 2024 Hà Nội Tourism Gift Festival. Photos Nguyễn Linh

HÀ NỘI — The 2024 Hà Nội Tourism Gift Festival is an opportunity for visitors to gain gift and culinary experience bearing the cultural identity of the capital's destinations.

Under the theme "Hà Nội comes to love—Hà Nội Gifts", the festival features about 100 units and companies with 80 booths including more than 20 food booths and many check-in spaces for guests.

Many typical culinary products of Hà Nội are introduced such as: young rice, Thanh Trì steamed rice rolls, local baguette, peanut candy, braised sweet soup, draft beer, spring rolls, jam lotus, and Vietnamese sweet meat pies.

Tourists visit a traditional candy and cake booth.

Various activities are held at the three-day festival, including displaying exquisite tourism gift products, introducing tours, offering tour vouchers, and promotional programmes by local travel businesses.

Visitors can enjoy handicraft workshops such as making flute kites, demonstrating silk reels and piecing silk paintings, making bamboo dragonflies, tortoise shells, painting, and painting ceramic vases among other activities. Culinary workshops such as coffee making instructions, bartenders and many other interesting activities are also available.

A visitor at a traditional handmade gift shop.

In addition, there are art programmes of chèo tàu (traditional singing performed on a row boat) singing, ca trù (ceremonial) singing, hát trống quân (folk singing with drums) and music performance. Besides, there are street shows such as drum and gong performances by the Mường ethnic people from Thạch Thất District along with street circus performances, hip hop, and flashmob dance that promise to excite visitors.

Speaking at the opening ceremony on August 23, Deputy Director of the Hà Nội Department of Tourism Trần Trung Hiếu said the Hà Nội Tourism Gift Festival was an activity to stimulate local tourism on the occasion of National Day September 2.

The 2024 Hà Nội Tourism Gilf Festival is held on August 23-25 expecting to introduce local delicacies and tours and is expected to lure thousands of visitors joining the three days of activities.

The festival helped introduce Vietnamese-branded tourism gifts to domestic and international tourists, boost the gift manufacturing industry, and contribute to strengthening tourism and cultural connections.

At the same time, it was expected to help preserve, honour, and bring into play the unique values of local cultural heritage and traditional crafts in tourism development. VNS