Tourism in Vietnam is a significant component of the modern Vietnamese economy. In 2004, Vietnam received 2. 9 million international arrivals, up from 2. 4 million the previous year. The annual increase represented a strong rebound from a slight decline in 2003 attributable to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic in Asia. From 1999 to 2004, tourism rose by 63 percent. Most of the visitors in 2004, 27 percent, came from China, with 8 to 9 percent each coming from the United States, Japan, and South Korea. The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism is following a long-term plan to diversify the tourism industry, which brings needed foreign exchange into the country.
Because of its geography, the climate in Vietnam varies greatly from north to south with three distinct climatic zones. Tropical monsoons occur from October to April in the centre and from May to September in the north and south. It is almost totally dry throughout the rest of the year. It can get exceptionally hot, however, all year round, but the north has a cooler time between October and April. Temperatures around the country can reach up to 40C in the height of the hot and rainy season (May to September), but the northern highlands and Hanoi can often seem chilly and damp in the winter.
Vietnamese (tiếng Việt, or less commonly Việt ngữ[ is the national and official language of Vietnam. It is the mother tongue of 86% of Vietnam's population, and of about three million overseas Vietnamese. It is also spoken as a second language by many ethnic minorities of Vietnam. It is part of the Austro-Asiatic language family, of which it has the most speakers by a significant margin (several times larger than the other Austro-Asiatic languages put together). [citation needed] Much of Vietnamese vocabulary has been borrowed from Chinese, and it was formerly written using the Chinese writing system, albeit in a modified format and was given vernacular pronunciation. As a byproduct of French colonial rule, the language displays some influence from French, and the Vietnamese writing system (quốc ngữ) in use today is an adapted version of the Latin alphabet, with additional diacritics for tones and certain letters.
The đồng (English pronunciation: /ˈdɒŋ/, Vietnamese: [ɗôŋm]) (sign: ₫; code: VND) has been the currency of Vietnam since May 3, 1978. It is issued by the State Bank of Vietnam. It has the symbol ₫. It is subdivided into 10 hào. However, the hào is now worth so little that it is no longer issued.
Vietnam, sometimes spelled Viet Nam, to the east. With a population of over 89 million, Vietnam is the 13th most populous country in the world.
The Vietnamese became independent from China in AD 938 after their victory at the battle of Bạch Đằng River. Successive dynasties flourished along with geographic and political expansion deeper into Southeast Asia, until it was colonized by the French in the mid-19th century. Efforts to resist the French eventually led to their expulsion from the country in the mid-20th century, leaving a nation divided politically into two countries. Fighting between the two sides continued during the Vietnam War, ending with a North Vietnamese victory in 1975.
Emerging from this prolonged military engagement, the war-ravaged nation was politically isolated. In 1986, the government instituted economic and political reforms and began a path towards international reintegration. By 2000, it had established diplomatic relations with most nations. Its economic growth has been among the highest in the world in the past decade. in 2007. These economic reforms also introduced inequality in many spheres of life in Vietnam such as income distribution and women's rights.
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