An exhibition to celebrate the first Book Day in Vietnam opened at the Youth Culture House in District 3, Ho Chi Minh City on Saturday with the participation of over 1,000 people.

The event will run until April 23 with a variety of activities, including conversations with local writers and journalists about "Reading in the @ Era," cultural exchanges, and book discount programs.

According to a Government Decision dated February 24, April 21 is chosen as the Vietnam Book Day which will be celebrated every year from now to encourage the culture of reading among Vietnamese people who are now strongly influenced by technology and thus ignore reading.

On the opening day of the Vietnam Book Day exhibition, the Standing Committee of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union launched a campaign to introduce “100 Books Teenagers Should Read" to all youths in town.

The campaign, divided into two stages which will conclude by the end of 2014, will recommend good books young Vietnamese should read to better themselves and then take action to promote the culture of reading, according to the Standing Committee.

The first Vietnam Book Day was co-organized by the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Information and Communications, HCMC Youth Union, HCMC Department of Culture, Sports, and Tourism in cooperation with twelve publishers in the city.

As a sideline event, a book exhibit kicked off the same day at the Youth Culture House to mark the 60th anniversary of the Dien Bien Phu Victory (May 7, 1954) and assert Vietnam’s sovereignty and jurisdiction over Truong Sa (Spratly) and Hoang Sa (Paracel) archipelagos in the East Sea.

Numerous young Vietnamese visited an area full of ancient maps that prove Truong Sa and Hoang Sa belong to Vietnam.

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