Culture Serves As Bridge Between Nations: Argentina-Vietnam Culture Institute Chairwoman
- Friday - 12/01/2024 09:23
- Close page
Poldi Sosa, known as a great friend of the Vietnamese people, has committed 27 years since the founding of the Argentina-Vietnam Culture Institute (ICAV) to enthusiastically introduce and popularize Vietnam's history, culture, and people to the Argentine people.
She said that ICAV has constantly informed Argentinian people, especially the younger generation, about the Vietnamese people's resistance wars against France and the US to save the country, and the war's consequences for the Vietnamese people, especially Agent Orange/dioxin; and at the same time informed about Vietnam's achievements in economic, social, cultural and artistic development.
Poldi Sosa moved to the United Kingdom in 1967, where she first learned of the war in Vietnam. A few years later, she actively participated in demonstrations denouncing the war in Vietnam, along with young people and students in the UK and France. Despite spending many years in Europe, Chile, and Cuba, and eventually returning to her country in Argentina, she is always struck by the indomitable determination of the Vietnamese people's resistance to foreign invaders.
When she visited Vietnam for the first time in 1997, she was invited to its eighth Congress by the Vietnam Women's Union to honor her contributions to the solidarity movement with Vietnam in general and Vietnamese women in particular.
On December 18, 1997, upon her return from Vietnam, she founded the ICAV with 25 members who had a profound fondness for the Southeast Asian country. ICAV's purpose is to introduce Argentine culture to Vietnam and vice versa.
She expressed delight at witnessing personally the rapid and miraculous transformation in Vietnam over the past three decades under the leadership of the Communist Party of Vietnam, having made nearly 30 trips to Vietnam with Argentine friends at the invitation of Vietnamese leaders and mass organizations.
While emphasizing the importance of distributing pictures of Vietnam's people and culture, Poldi Sosa stated that in addition to political, economic, and trade diplomacy, cultural and people-to-people diplomacy plays an important role in developing national solidarity and friendship among nations.
During National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue's official visit to Argentina in April 2023, she was granted the Friendship Order by the Vietnamese State.
According to the Vietnam Union of Friendship Organizations, the ICAV arranged for 21 delegations from Argentina, including parliamentarians, doctors, lawyers, university professors, and social activists, to visit Vietnam between 1997 and 2019 to acquire information about the country's history, culture, and socioeconomic development.
Through practical experiences in Vietnam, Argentinian friends said that they loved Vietnam more and gradually became active members of the ICAV, participating in exchange and promotion activities, and contributing to expanding mutual understanding between the two peoples.