Fruit abound at HCM City festival

(22-05-2006)

Just in time to brighten the summer holidays, visitors to HCM City will be treated to a colourful exhibition of fruit from every corner of the country with the city’s fruit festival, which kicks into gear on May 27 to June 4.

The annual South Fruit Festival 2006 will open in the city’s Suoi Tien Park with a display of over 50 types of fruit, including dragon fruit, mangosteen, grapefruit, durian, longan, and litchi, all Vietnamese specialities.

La Quoc Khanh, vice director of HCM City’s Tourism Department, said that the festival was a chance to introduce the amazing variety of Vietnamese fruit, and promised to be a great tourism event for the city.

To open the festival, organisers will launch a fruit float at Suoi Tien Park, with 100 performers garbed in special themed constumes and four floats festooned with delicious fruit.

This year, the fruit fair will host 30 orchard farmers and fruit processors from nine provinces nationwide. The fair will run until August 31 and is forecast to sell more than 1,000 tonnes of fruit.

A contest at the event will feature plastic fruit and decoration art, with over 80 artists already registered to compete.

The festival will also host lion dances, magicians, circus acts and traditional games for children. Aside from that, the festival will introduce varieties of traditional foods and drinks made from fruit – like coffee, tea, cakes and cocktails.

The festival is organised by the HCM City Tourist Department and Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta provinces to promote Vietnamese fruit and tourism, and attracts participants from neighbouring countries. This year, the festival expects to shatter its record for the number of visitors and the amount of fruit consumption. — VNS