Tran Quoc, one of the oldest pagodas in Vietnam.

This will be a system of multi-media publications, comprising maps, pamphlets, photo books, CDs, VCDs, a website and some TV shows.

The key part of this project is the production of 180 episodes about Vietnamese pagodas.

This series will be in the form of discovery documentaries. Each episode is 20 minutes long, introducing the history, the architecture, famous Buddhist monks and the festival related to one pagoda.

Three dimensional (3D) technology will be employed to restore the image of lost pagodas. Tran Quoc Pagoda, the oldest pagoda in Hanoi, will appear in the first episode.

To celebrate the 1000^th Thang Long – Hanoi anniversary, the first phase of this project will close in October 2010, with around 60 episodes about pagodas in Hanoi and some other in Hanoi’s neighboring Bac Giang and Bac Ninh provinces.

The Vietnam relics map project’s manager Nguyen Quoc Hung said that the first episode about Tran Quoc Pagoda has been completed. The next pagodas that will be featured in films are Ba Da, Ba Danh, Mot Cot, Tay Phuong and Huong pagodas. The Itinerary of Vietnamese Pagodas series will be broadcast as of May 2010.

This project is financed by private sources. Besides documentaries about Vietnamese pagodas, a photo book about Vietnamese relics and a website on Vietnamese relics are scheduled to come out in Vietnamese and English this August. These works will cover 2950 national-level relics. A set of maps of Hanoi pagodas will be issued in October. The project will coordinate with the Vietnam Television (VTV), VTC and Hanoi Television (HTV) to launch a TV show entitled Travel to Vietnamese pagodas and Travel to Hanoi’s pagodas.

VietNamNet/TT&VH