Alarmeow, a wake-up call application created by a group of young Vietnamese, is available in the iOS App Store. — VNS File PhotoViet Nam News HCM CITY — Alarmeow, a wake-up call application created by a group of young Vietnamese is now available at the iOS App Store. Nguyễn Trần Tùng, 27, of HCM City and his friends worked on the app for six months. The app is ranked 16st in the lifestyle category among the most-downloaded mobile apps by users worldwide, receiving many “five star” ratings. It is offered in Vietnamese and English. Users can download the app for free via the iOS app store. Alarmeow is designed as a super-clever alarm clock to get you out of bed on time, and is suited for people who have trouble staying awake in the morning. By default, the app’s alarm only stops ringing when users have played mini games such as finding a way out of a labyrinth or fast memory or by shaking the phone. “This helps users stay … [Read more...] about Vietnamese wake-up alarm app available in iOS App Store
Citrus alarm clock
BUSINESS IN BRIEF 26/6
HCM City to monitor pork prices The HCM City Department of Industry and Trade has promised to prevent any scarcity of pork or sudden price surges, saying the pork market would be steady. According to the department, the price of pig on the hoof reached VND48,000-51,000 per kilo last month, 40 per cent up year-on-year. Last year pig prices had plummeted, causing losses to most farmers, who reacted by reducing their breeding activities, and the resultant low supply pushed up prices, it said. To ensure adequate supply of essential goods, including meat, in the city, the department regularly inspects the market. According to Nguyen Huynh Trang, the department’s deputy director, businesses taking part in the city’s price stabilisation programme have increased supply and sell at 5-10 per cent below market prices. But following the relentless increase in pork prices since April the city has reviewed and agreed for them to increase pork prices once each in April, May and June. In … [Read more...] about BUSINESS IN BRIEF 26/6
Waking up the neighbors: Indonesia’s Ramadan alarm clocks
Most of Jakarta is fast asleep at 2:00 a.m., but for Fajar Ramadin and his pint-sized comrades it's time to wake up the neighborhood. The motley group of children yell and bang on tambourines and drums as they roam the quiet streets of Indonesia's capital on a mission to stir sleeping residents for a pre-dawn meal. It is Ramadan and millions across the world's biggest Muslim-majority nation are abstaining from eating, drinking, smoking or sex during daylight hours. The morning meal, known as Sahur, can be crucial to making it through until sunset without food or drink. "Sahur! Sahur! Please wake up sir, madam!" hollers the 20-strong group of kids, aged seven to 15. It's music to the ears of dozens of other children who stream out of their houses to join in, adding the thump of empty paint cans and water jugs to the ensemble. "This tradition has been around for a long time - every kid is happy to do it," said 13-year-old Ramadin. "I like it because this not only entertains people, but … [Read more...] about Waking up the neighbors: Indonesia’s Ramadan alarm clocks
Elderly Vietnamese turn to nursing homes for companionship and healthcare
Every morning at 6:30 a.m., Le Thi Thinh, 81, gets up at a knock at her door. “Get up Mom, it’s time for school,” her son says. Thinh's children have been teasing her like this to make her trip to the nursing home more exciting. After breakfast, she gets dressed, grabs her hat and mobile phone, and is helped to walk to a waiting car. After a 10 minute journey she arrives at “school,” which is two kilometers (1.4 miles) away. Thinh and her friends often refer to the nursing home as “school” or “hotel.” Le Thi Thinh, 81, stays at a nursing home in Hanoi's Ha Dong District when her children are at work. Photo by VnExpress/Dien Hong The home was built five years ago in an urban area in Hanoi’s Ha Dong District. Thinh spends the day there with eight others. She has her lunch and takes a bath at the home before her children collect her at 4 p.m. Given her daily routine, it is no surprise that her three-year-old grandchild … [Read more...] about Elderly Vietnamese turn to nursing homes for companionship and healthcare
A special day in the Central African Republic
A typical day at the MINUSCA Every day, the clock alarm goes off at 5:30 when it is still dark outside. Today, Major Dinh Duc Long is “on lodging duty”, which means he is to cook breakfast, prepare lunch boxes for others in the lodge to carry to work. At 7:20, after breakfast, everyone takes their backpacks and lunch boxes and walks to work. Walking from home to the mission’s HQs may be one of their most interesting periods of time of the day. A long the way, all local people they meet greet them. The children not only greet, but also run up to them to shake hands. Welcoming them at the gate of the UN mission are the greetings in the Sango language of the guards. They happily greet, “Good morning the Vietnamese people!” Buying stuff in preparation for the special day There are three Vietnamese officers working in Bangui (the capital city of the Central African Republic). They are Lieutenant Colonel Le Ngoc Son, Major Dinh Duc Long and … [Read more...] about A special day in the Central African Republic
Ha Noi night Pho vendor
For the past 30 years, a Pho vendor in Ha Noi has been serving customers between 3-6 am. Beef noodle soup Pho is a popular dish in Viet Nam and Ha Noi Pho restaurants claim to have the best and most authentic recipes. It is a familiar scene that many Pho restaurants in Ha Noi are always crowded during breakfast time. But a small stall in Hang Chieu Street is no less busy despite its strange opening time. For the past 30 years, the anonymous Pho stall which opens at 3 am when most people sleep and closes at 6 am when the city wakes up. I set the alarm clock at 5.30am on a recent cold winter morning and rushed to the stall but the owner, a middle-aged woman, smiled friendly telling me that she had sold out and inviting me to come another day. Already familiar with the media, she said, "If you want to take some photos, you should come at 4 am when we are busiest." The Pho stall is very simple which the woman carries here in just two hangers and a shoulder pole. A large pot … [Read more...] about Ha Noi night Pho vendor
Hanoi night Pho vendor
It is a familiar scene that many Pho restaurants in Hanoi are always crowded during breakfast time. But a small stall in Hang Chieu Street is no less busy despite its strange opening time.For the past 30 years, the anonymous Pho stall which opens at 3 am when most people sleep and closes at 6 am when the city wakes up.I set the alarm clock at 5.30am on a recent cold winter morning and rushed to the stall but the owner, a middle-aged woman, smiled friendly telling me that she had sold out and inviting me to come another day. Already familiar with the media, she said, "If you want to take some photos, you should come at 4 am when we are busiest." The Pho stall is very simple which the woman carries here in just two hangers and a shoulder pole. A large pot containing Pho broth is put on a coal stove in a hanger while noodles, beef, and some other ingredients are put on the other together with small stools, bowls, spoon and chopsticks.The stall owner said that this kind of Pho vendor … [Read more...] about Hanoi night Pho vendor
Homeless in Hong Kong: soaring costs fuel housing crisis in Asian financial hub
Cheung Muk-gun's home is an illegal, wooden shack under a highway in one of the poorest areas of Hong Kong, where sky-high property prices and a yawning wealth gap have helped fuel a surge in homelessness. The 72-year-old earns about HK$10,000 ($1,279) a month working seven days a week at a frozen meat store in the working-class district of Mong Kok, a short trip across Victoria Harbour from the city's opulent financial centre. With property prices up 200 percent in the past decade, and a bed in a tiny, windowless apartment - often shared with other tenants - going for about HK$2,000 a month, Cheung said he preferred to live in his shack. An apartment of around 250 square feet (23 square meters) in a new building with windows and a bathroom near Mong Kok would rent for about HK$12,000. "Why would I want to spend so much on rent, not to mention other related miscellaneous expenses. After paying all that, my salary could hardly cover my daily expenses," he said. Since Cheung became … [Read more...] about Homeless in Hong Kong: soaring costs fuel housing crisis in Asian financial hub
Farming with phones and without soil
The world of information technology has come into farming in the central region. Nguyễn Quốc Phong has brought those skills with him to farm in a way that soil is not used to grow crops. Rather, crops are fed water with special food for plants in the liquid. Farmers can use their smart phones to tell them when it is time to water their plants that are grown in this way. By Hoài Nam After working with the military-run telecom group Viettel for seven years, Nguyễn Quốc Phong decided he wanted to do something else. The 33-year-old man from Núi Thành District in Quảng Nam Province has since used his IT know-how and experience to study and promote hydroponic farming, launching a startup of his own. Hydroponics is a subset of hydroculture, the method of growing plants without soil, using mineral nutrient solutions in a water solvent. Terrestrial plants may be grown with only their roots exposed to the mineral solution, or the … [Read more...] about Farming with phones and without soil
A bar trail serving haiku on the rocks
NEW YORK: On a cold and rainy night earlier this year, I found myself at Hoyaken, a matchbook-size bar in Matsuyama, a city in the southwest corner of Shikoku, the least visited of Japan’s four main islands.In Shikoku dialect, hoyaken means but anyway, and there at the bar, chopsticks rested on a perfectly still peanut shell, while sake and literary conversation flowed. The bar’s owners, husband and wife Tomoko and Satoshi Kadoya, talked to me about their favourite poets, both Japanese and American. But haiku was never far from their minds.Hoyaken is stocked with magazines and bilingual glossaries of kigo - haiku words used to connote the season like cicada for summer, scarecrow for autumn, and the winter-blooming camellia. It is an ideal setting to write these 17-syllable seasonal poems using the classic 5-7-5 syllable stanzas, or to drop the syllable form altogether and go freestyle as most haiku enthusiasts do these days.Welcome to the haiku bar … [Read more...] about A bar trail serving haiku on the rocks